Automotive Blind-Zones: A Review of Legislation and the Use of Close-Range Camera Systems

The development of vehicular electronic vision systems for the automotive market is a growing field, driven in particular by customer demand to increase the safety of vehicles both for drivers, and for other road users, including Vulnerable Road Users (VRUs), such as pedestrians. Close-range automotive camera systems are designed to display the areas in the close vicinity of the vehicle to the driver, typically covering the blind-zones of the vehicle. Customer demand is matched by legislative developments in a number of key automotive markets; for example Europe, Japan and the United States are in the process of introducing legislation to aid in the prevention of fatalities to vulnerable road users, with emphasis on the use of vision systems. In this paper we discuss some of the factors that have promoted the introduction of this legislation. We show also that, by the use of wide-angle camera systems, these legislative requirements can be met.