Mercedes-Benz Trucks and Daimler Buses deploy Safety Truck, Coach for child road safety initiative
Mercedes-Benz Trucks and Daimler Buses are backing Blicki e.V.'s 'Deutschland blickt's' initiative, which has reached more than 90,000 children, using the Safety Truck and Safety Coach for practical workshops.
- More than 90,000
- Around 11,000
- 2
What Happened
Mercedes-Benz Trucks and Daimler Buses are supporting Blicki e.V.'s nationwide 'Deutschland blickt's' road safety initiative this year, deploying the Mercedes-Benz Safety Truck and Safety Coach for practical workshops and training sessions. The initiative has already reached more than 90,000 children nationwide, and around 11,000 preschool and elementary school children as well as senior citizens are expected to take part this year. Till Oberwörder, CEO Daimler Buses, said practical workshops help raise children's awareness of road traffic challenges and that the company is pleased to support the initiative with its buses. The association's stated goal is to significantly reduce accidents involving children.
The initiative was presented at the Federal Ministry of Transport in Berlin by VDA President and Blicki Ambassador Hildegard Müller, Achim Puchert, Till Oberwörder, and Dirk Hendler.
Kickoff event in Leipzig attended by Minister-President of Saxony Michael Kretschmer and Mayor of Leipzig Burkhard Jung.
A planned action day in Berlin was cancelled due to weather.
Another event took place in Augsburg.
“With our participation in 'Deutschland blickt's', we want to help strengthen road safety for children together with our partners. Education, awareness, and mutual consideration are key to achieving this. At the same time, we continuously work to make our trucks even safer.”
The Safety Truck is an electric vehicle, chosen to draw attention to how increasing electrification changes road safety: other road users must adapt to a new soundscape and quicker acceleration, and rescue services need to prepare for high-voltage technology. The changes apply largely in the same way to electric buses, whose acceleration is electronically controlled, dynamic, yet always comfortable and safe even for standing passengers. On the passive safety side, the Safety Coach features the Front Collision Guard (FCG), a system designed to help prevent passenger cars from underriding the coach and to absorb impact energy through integrated crash elements, along with a robust driver workplace structure that helps maximize survival space in an accident. The vehicles are also prominently wrapped to visually emphasize the topic of safety.
- Emergency braking assist
- Turning assist
- Front collision warning
- Traffic sign recognition
- Attention assist
- MirrorCam
At the IAA Transportation trade fair in Hanover in September, Mercedes-Benz Trucks will present two new safety systems for use at intersections. The systems are designed to intervene in critical situations to help avoid collisions with other road users or mitigate their consequences, and their development is based on findings from the company's own accident research team's analysis of real-world accidents. Both functions are intended to be made available as early as possible and, in some cases, anticipate future regulatory requirements, continuing the goal of bringing new safety technologies into series production quickly and reducing accident rates.
“Traffic is about more than mobility. It also reflects how we interact as a society. This is exactly where 'Deutschland blickt's' comes in. Road safety is not created by technology alone, but by the responsibility and attitude of every individual. Those who demonstrate consideration, caution, and foresight make road traffic, and therefore our society, a little safer.”
Why this matters
The initiative focuses on children, who are especially vulnerable around large commercial vehicles, and also reaches senior citizens. Daimler Truck is connecting the effort to the rise of electric trucks and buses, which are quieter and accelerate more quickly, requiring other road users and rescue services to adapt. New intersection safety systems are also being developed from real-world accident data, with the goal of reducing accident rates.
Terms in This Story
- Active safety
- Vehicle systems designed to help prevent accidents, such as warnings and driver-assistance functions.
- Passive safety
- Design features that reduce injury or damage when a crash occurs, such as crash structures and airbags.
- Underriding
- A type of collision in which a smaller car slides beneath a larger vehicle, such as a truck or coach; safety systems aim to prevent it.
Summarised from the linked release; details can be imperfect — always verify against the original source.