German based Traton subsidiary, MAN Truck and Bus s has revealed the introduction of a new SafeStop Assist program on its buses in Europe, which the company says detects driver inactivity and will add to better road safety outcomes.
MAN claims it is the only manufacturer to offer the driver assistance system, which will be fitted to all new its coach models. Basically the MAN SafeStop program is the bus equivalent to Autonomous Emergency Braking, a function that has been available on trucks for several years.
The company says that if the driver does not intervene despite visual, haptic and acoustic warnings, the system is designed to bring the bus safely to a standstill.
“It happens again and again that the driver is suddenly unable to act due to unforeseen events, such as medical emergencies. The consequences can be devastating,” said MAN’s Truck and Bus head of Bus, Barbaros Oktay.
“Experience shows that it is not uncommon for buses and coaches to leave the road or collide with other road users in such cases,” Oktay said.
MAN says that for this reason, it has been working intensively on the new assistance system, which is now available as an option for the MAN Lion’s Intercity, the MAN Lion’s Coach, the Neoplan Tourliner and the Neoplan Skyliner.
“No other bus manufacturer offers such a system for all current coach models,” said MAN’s head of product marketing for buses, Heinz Kiess.
“However, this is not the reason why it is one of the most important innovations of the 2024 model year, but rather because it can prevent serious accidents,” Kiess added .
MAN said that the system has been designed to recognise when the driver is no longer able to act and uses the driving activity recognition of an active lane guard system as well as the functionality of the adaptive cruise control.
“All the data collected is bundled and evaluated. In this way, SafeStop Assist can deduce the status of driver activity, and thus also possible inactivity,” explained Kiess,
“Thanks to the intelligent interaction of various highly developed systems such as the attention guard, lane guard and emergency brake assistants, we have been able to increase safety for drivers, passengers and other road users enormously,” added Kiess.
