News

Great ideas often start with new perspectives, unexpected connections and a shared ambition to make road transport safer. SAFER's steering group has now approved three new partner projects through its Idea Exploration Program, bringing together partners to explore emerging research questions, combine expertise and create opportunities for future collaboration.

SAFER’s Idea Exploration Program is designed to give promising research ideas the opportunity to grow. Through small, collaborative pre-studies, partners can explore new challenges, identify knowledge gaps, test ideas and build the foundations for larger research initiatives.

The program is also an important part of SAFER's role as a collaborative research platform. By connecting different disciplines, organisations and perspectives, we create opportunities to address road safety challenges in new ways. The value is not only in the individual projects, but also in the knowledge, relationships and future research collaborations they generate.

Meet the three new projects

1. Professional Drivers as a Safety Resource in Resilient Transport Systems

How can professional drivers help maintain safe transport operations during extreme weather, infrastructure disruptions or societal crises? Led by Chalmers University of Technology in collaboration with the City of Gothenburg, this project explores the human contribution to safer and more resilient transport systems.

2. Beyond Hotspots: Exploring Earth Observation and GeoAI for Proactive Wildlife-Collision Prevention

Can satellite data and artificial intelligence help us anticipate wildlife collision risks before accidents occur? Led by VTI together with Lund University (LTH), the project explores how environmental information and geospatial AI could support more proactive road safety measures.

3. DCAS Users

How well do regulations for advanced driver assistance systems reflect the experiences and needs of actual drivers? Cognitian and the Swedish Transport Agency (Transportstyrelsen) will explore the relationship between user perspectives and UNECE regulations, contributing knowledge that could support safer and more intuitive driver assistance systems.

Small explorations – bigger opportunities
Although the three projects address very different challenges, they share an important ambition: to bring knowledge and perspectives together, explore new possibilities and prepare the ground for future research. This is what SAFER is all about; connecting people, perspectives and expertise to accelerate knowledge development and contribute to safer roads.

Time plan for next call

• April 25 Submission Deadline
• May 6 Scientific Review
• May 20 Decision by the Steering Group

We look forward to following all three projects, sharing their insights and exploring where these new collaborations may lead!