With insurance rates in British Columbia under escalating pressure, in part from the rapidly increasing number of crashes occurring on our roads, the provincial government, ICBC, and police are launching two pilot programs to explore how technology can help combat distracted driving in our province.
The first pilot — a partnership between the Province and ICBC — will include up to 200 customers using phone apps paired with telematics. Telematic technology involves fitting a vehicle with a small device that communicates with an app installed on the driver’s cellphone.
The app works to block the use of a hand-held device when the in-vehicle technology senses that the vehicle is being driven. The combination of telematics with phone apps typically has allowed insurers to collect driving behaviour data, such as kilometres travelled and average speed. However, for this pilot, ICBC is interested in the user’s experience with telematics in their vehicle.
Findings from the pilots will be used to inform future decisions around distracted driving prevention and enforcement, as well as changes to improve the fairness of how insurance rates are set for drivers.
In the coming weeks, ICBC will confirm two to three vendors whose technology will be used during the pilot, which is set to launch in January, with results prepared in the spring of 2018.
The technology to be used in the pilot was determined to be the most promising based on a review of submissions from a Request for Information ICBC issued in the spring.
For the pilot, ICBC will recruit volunteers from its customer advisory panel. Customers are encouraged to join ICBC’s customer advisory panel through icbc.com for an opportunity to participate in this pilot and future e-surveys to share opinions about ICBC products, services, and policies.
ICBC is looking for participants aged 19 years and up, from all across B.C.
The provincial government and ICBC will also be working in partnership with police to conduct an additional pilot program to test a new distracted driving enforcement technology beginning in the spring of 2018.
A Bluetooth-enabled scope will be the latest tool police will have on-hand to capture distracted driving. Units will be tested by police in varying weather and traffic conditions for usability and effectiveness.
The scope will capture an image that can be instantly shared with other officers in the immediate area. Officers will then have the ability to show the image to the distracted driver.
These pilots are some of the many actions that government, ICBC, and B.C. police are taking to reduce crashes caused by distracted driving.
editorial@accjournal.ca
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