Not Big Brother, an invisible coach

Friday, July 18, 2008

A new traffic safety pilot program — DriveCam — has officials from Calvert, Charles and St. Mary’s counties joining forces in an effort to reduce traffic-related incidents with young drivers.

The pilot program, sponsored by the Maryland State Highway Administration, will allow 300 young drivers, 100 from each county, to place a camera above the rearview mirror, capturing images of both the driver and the driver’s view of the road.

‘‘I think it’s wonderful,” Sally McDonald of Lusby said after attending a meeting last week where parents and young drivers were able to ask questions about the program.

McDonald’s daughter Ashley, 16, has signed up.

Ashley McDonald said she didn’t think there would be any problems with privacy and didn’t mind having a camera placed in her car. Alexis Snow, 15, from Owings said she thought the program was worth a try and also didn’t see it as a privacy issue. The camera only records when the driver’s actions cause the car to swerve, brake hard, etc. The camera then records 10 seconds prior to the event.

‘‘We don’t pick on kids for minor hard braking, we’re just going to be there for the scary high-risk events,” said Rusty Weiss of the consumer team for DriveCam.

Once the company accesses the video and analyzes it, the password-protected event is then sent to parents via e-mail, along with a grade given by DriveCam employees. The grade is based on the events leading up to the incident, how the incident was handled and so forth. For example, if the video captures a hard brake due to tailgating, the report may read ‘‘unsafe following distance.” Parents are also notified when a recorded event was handled properly.

On Thursday, July 10, parents and their children were given an opportunity to see some examples of the program from video clips released to the program by participants in other states.

At the event, attendees witnessed a young lady cut off a pickup truck, nearly colliding with it. Watching the moments before the incident, it was evident that the driver of the vehicle did not look before changing lanes.

In this example, Weiss said this mistake is common amongst experienced drivers, not just teens. However, being able to sit down and view the mistake online with parents, the teen can correct his mistake with some coaching and the parents can be more aware of the consequences of such an error.

A more dangerous error occurred in a video clip where a young girl was applying makeup while driving. Taking her eyes off the wheel for mere seconds, she swerved towards the shoulder where a disabled vehicle was parked. Swerving to miss the disabled vehicle, the young woman lost control of her car. As the car spun, the camera captured a tractor-trailer in the next lane. Luckily for the girl, Weiss said, traffic stopped in her lane, her car came to a stop backwards in her lane and barely missed a collision with the oncoming truck.

While these types of events can happen to anyone at any time, whether or not a camera is involved, Weiss said being able to see what just took place and having constructive criticism along with the video can quickly correct distracted driving as in this case.

Southern Maryland will be the first pilot program in Maryland of this kind beginning Aug.1. There are 50 slots still available for teen drivers to sign up for.