How hidden car GPS data can help avoid crashes before they happen

If drivers swerve or brake hard in a car or truck built since 2014, it is recorded and mapped to track near-misses on Sydney roads in a bid to prevent crashes.

Crashes are down by more than half and near-misses are down two-thirds around Pennant Hills Rd since the NorthConnex tunnel opened in October.

While the crash data is obvious enough, the new information about near-misses is thanks to GPS chips hidden away in most cars and trucks built since 2014.

If drivers swerve or brake hard in one of these vehicles, it is recorded and mapped.

Toll road operator Transurban has hailed the technology as the future of road safety.

“This is shaping up as the ‘missing gap’ in road analytics, using accurate and real-time data to proactively identify trends and patterns before a crash happens,” Transurban head of operations Adam Lloyd said.

“Transurban will use this new data to complement our existing safety data analysis to manage our network, and continue to work with government on road safety initiatives that address existing issues such as hot spots and well as new and emerging trends.”

Before: Near-misses on Pennant Hills Rd.

After: Near-misses on Pennant Hills Rd.

The data has revealed near-misses on Pennant Hills Rd and nearby side roads have reduced by almost two-thirds during peak periods since the NorthConnex tunnel opened and more than 6000 heavy vehicles a day were sent underground.

Preliminary road safety data compiled by the Centre for Road Safety has also revealed crashes on Pennant Hills Rd have more than halved north of the M2 and south of the M1 above the NorthConnex tunnel since it was opened, but the data is still subject to change.

In the first four months the NorthConnex tunnel was open, between November 2020 and February 2021, there were 10 crashes on Pennant Hills Rd that resulted in six people being injured.

In the same four-month period a year before the tunnel was built, between November 2019 and February 2020, there were 22 crashes on Pennant Hills Rd that resulted in 14 people being injured.

Entrepreneur Emily Bobis, 26, is a co-founder of the company Compass IoT, which is making sense of more than a billion “packets” of information collected every day from vehicles on Sydney roads.

Entrepreneur Emily Bobis is the co-founder of Compass IoT, a start-up tech company that analyses data from the SIM cards in cars built after 2014 and maps the near misses. Picture: Toby Zerna

When a new Bunnings distribution centre opened in Eastern Creek, car data revealed M7 motorists were forced to swerve or slam on the brakes to avoid increased traffic banked back on the motorway. The traffic light sequence was changed as a result.

“When a vehicle swerves or brakes suddenly we get the data from the car manufacturer, which includes location, speed, g-force, roll, pitch and yaw of the car,” Ms Bobis said.

“Road safety data has tended to rely on police reports from accidents where someone has been seriously injured or killed and trends take two or three years to develop.

“Our data is proactive and provides information about near-misses, not just crashes.

“In Australia, on average, we have 1000 deaths and 35,000 injuries every year, which is a lot of family, friends and loved ones we can potentially prevent from being seriously injured or dying.”

The data is supplied by vehicle manufacturers, who do not track cars constantly but instead record instances of violent changes in speed or direction.