Connected Vehicle Pedestrian Safety: How Real-Time Alerts Are Making Roads Safer
- JSF Technologies
- 2 days ago
- 7 min read
Communities across North America continue to invest in Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) and Smart City Transportation initiatives, all aimed at one shared goal: making roads safer for everyone who uses them. For decades, that goal has been pursued through physical infrastructure: Rectangular Rapid Flashing Beacons (RRFBs), pedestrian beacons, illuminated crosswalks, and advance warning signs. These tools remain essential, and they aren't going anywhere.
But a new layer of protection is emerging alongside them. Connected vehicle technology is extending safety beyond the roadway itself, delivering real-time alerts directly to the smartphones and connected devices that drivers, cyclists, scooter riders, and pedestrians already carry. Rather than replacing physical infrastructure, this technology is creating a second, complementary line of defence one that travels with the road user instead of waiting at a fixed location.
This shift matters because most roadway collisions involving vulnerable road users (VRUs) come down to one simple problem: a lack of awareness, often for only a second or two, at exactly the wrong moment. Connected vehicle pedestrian safety technology is designed to close that gap.
What Is TravelSafely™?
TravelSafely™ is a free connected vehicle smartphone application developed by Applied Information, Inc., a leading developer of Smart City and Intelligent Transportation System technology. The app connects drivers, cyclists, and pedestrians directly to roadway infrastructure, creating a two-way flow of safety information that didn't exist a decade ago.
Here's the basic idea: a smartphone running TravelSafely™ communicates over cellular networks with traffic signals, school zone beacons, emergency vehicle systems, and other connected infrastructure in the area. The app automatically detects whether the user is a motorist, cyclist, or pedestrian and adjusts the type of alerts it delivers accordingly. A driver might be warned about an approaching emergency vehicle or an active school zone, while a pedestrian or cyclist might receive a warning that a vehicle is approaching their location at an unsafe speed.
This is connected vehicle technology in its most accessible form. Rather than requiring specialized hardware built into a car, TravelSafely™ brings many of the same safety principles to the smartphone already in someone's pocket. That accessibility is what makes it relevant to such a broad mix of road users, and it's a meaningful expansion of what connected vehicle technology has historically meant. Where the term once referred almost exclusively to vehicle-to-vehicle or vehicle-to-infrastructure systems built into cars, it now increasingly includes the everyday devices carried by the people walking, biking, and rolling alongside traffic.
For municipalities investing in Smart City Solutions, this kind of app-based layer extends the reach of existing ITS investments without requiring every road user to purchase new equipment.
How Connected Vehicle Alerts Help Improve Pedestrian Safety
Improving pedestrian safety starts with understanding why pedestrian-related collisions happen in the first place. Research and crash data consistently point to a small set of recurring factors: driver distraction, limited visibility (particularly at dusk, dawn, or in poor weather), unexpected pedestrian movement, and the simple fact that a driver's attention can only be in one place at a time.
These are not new problems, and they're part of why advance warning & notification systems have become such a standard part of ITS planning. An RRFB or illuminated crosswalk gives drivers a clear, location-specific cue to slow down and scan for pedestrians. Connected vehicle alerts work on a similar principle, but they aren't tied to a single physical location. A smartphone alert can reach a driver before they're even within sight of a crossing, giving them additional seconds to register that pedestrians may be present.
Those extra seconds matter. A 2021 University of Florida study examining the TravelSafely™ app found that drivers using the app showed a reduced probability of speeding in active school zones and an increase in visual scanning behaviour, meaning they were more likely to actively look for pedestrians and cyclists rather than just react to them. The study also found a meaningful increase in the likelihood that drivers noticed a cyclist when the cyclist appeared in a location where one wasn't expected.
That finding speaks to a broader truth about vulnerable road user safety: no single tool solves the whole problem. Multiple layers of protection physical infrastructure, signage, lighting, and now connected vehicle alerts work together precisely because each one compensates for situations where another might not be enough.
How the TravelSafely™ App Works
Setting up TravelSafely™ is straightforward: the app is downloaded for free on iOS or Android, and it uses GPS and location awareness to determine when a user has entered an area served by connected infrastructure. From there, it works largely in the background, delivering real-time notifications only when a relevant situation arises.
A few examples of the kinds of real-time traffic alerts a user might receive:
A driver approaching a signalized intersection may receive a "Get Ready for Green" message based on the signal's current phase and timing, or a warning if the system detects they are likely to run a red light.
A driver entering an active school zone may receive an audible and visual alert if they are exceeding the posted speed threshold while the zone is active.
A pedestrian or cyclist may be alerted if a connected vehicle is approaching at an unsafe speed.
A driver may receive a proximity alert when a cyclist or pedestrian using the app is nearby, particularly in locations where vulnerable road users aren't typically expected.
What makes this useful from an ITS perspective is the integration layer underneath it. TravelSafely™ connects to Applied Information's Glance Smart City Supervisory System™, which allows the app to communicate with school zone beacons, traffic signals, and emergency vehicle preemption systems that municipalities already operate. The alerts aren't generic; they're tied to the real, active status of nearby infrastructure.
Supporting Cyclist Safety Through Smart City Transportation
Cyclists face a distinct set of safety challenges compared to pedestrians, largely because they share more of the roadway with motor vehicles and travel at higher speeds, often putting them in a driver's blind spot or peripheral vision rather than a clearly expected location like a crosswalk.
Visibility at intersections is one of the most persistent concerns in cyclist safety technology. A driver scanning for pedestrians at a crosswalk may not be looking for a cyclist approaching from a bike lane or shared roadway at the same intersection. As communities continue investing in active transportation infrastructure, from protected bike lanes to multi-use paths, the need to bridge this visibility gap has grown alongside it.
Connected mobility solutions offer a meaningful piece of that bridge. When a cyclist's smartphone and a nearby driver's smartphone are both running an app like TravelSafely™, the system can alert the driver to the cyclist's presence and alert the cyclist to a vehicle that may not have seen them. This kind of bidirectional awareness is difficult to achieve with infrastructure alone, since fixed signage or beacons can't always anticipate a cyclist's exact position relative to a specific vehicle at a given moment.
Traffic Signal Alerts and the Future of Intelligent Transportation Systems
Traffic signals have always been a foundational tool in road management, but connected vehicle technology is changing how drivers interact with them. Traffic signal alerts, including warnings about potential red-light running and notifications when a signal is about to change, give drivers more advance information than a traffic light alone can provide.
Stop sign notifications work on a similar principle, particularly useful in rural or low-visibility intersections where sightlines may be obstructed. Signalized intersection safety has traditionally relied on signal timing, signage, and driver attentiveness; connected vehicle alerts add a layer of redundancy that doesn't depend on a driver glancing at the right moment.
This is part of a larger trend often described under the umbrella of V2X communications vehicle-to-everything connectivity that links vehicles not just to other vehicles, but to infrastructure, pedestrians, cyclists, and the broader transportation network. Intelligent Transportation Systems are steadily evolving from collections of individual devices (a signal here, a beacon there) into real-time communication networks in which infrastructure, vehicles, and road users continuously exchange relevant safety information.
For transportation engineers and traffic engineers planning future deployments, this evolution suggests that ITS investments are increasingly about connectivity and data exchange, not just individual hardware installations.
How Smart City Solutions Create Safer Roads for Everyone
Roadside infrastructure and smartphone-based alerts aren't competing approaches to roadway safety. They're complementary layers that, together, create a more complete safety net than either could provide alone.
Consider how this plays out at a typical mid-block crossing. Rectangular Rapid Flashing Beacons give drivers a clear, high-visibility signal that a pedestrian is present and crossing. Crosswalk illumination systems improve a driver's ability to see a pedestrian, particularly at night or in poor weather, by increasing the vertical luminance at the crossing. Connected beacons can extend that warning further by communicating directly with approaching connected vehicles, while advanced warning systems further upstream give drivers time to slow down before they even reach the crossing.
A connected vehicle smartphone alert adds a fifth layer on top of all of this: it can reach a driver's phone even before they're within range of the physical infrastructure, and it can reach pedestrians and cyclists directly, something fixed infrastructure generally cannot do.
This layered approach also supports the data-driven traffic management increasingly central to Smart City Transportation planning. Smart intersections equipped with connected infrastructure can give traffic engineers visibility into where speeding or red-light running is most common, feeding directly into smarter, more targeted planning decisions rather than relying solely on after-the-fact crash statistics.
JSF Technologies has approached this same layered philosophy from the infrastructure side, partnering with Applied Information to connect solar-powered school zone safety beacons and mid-block crossing beacons to the same Smart City Supervisory platform that powers TravelSafely™. The result is infrastructure that doesn't just warn drivers locally but also communicates with connected vehicles in the vicinity, extending the reach of physical safety devices into the connected-vehicle ecosystem.
The Future of Connected Vehicle Pedestrian Safety
Connected transportation technology is still in its early stages of widespread adoption, but the trajectory is clear. As more vehicles come equipped with built-in cellular connectivity and more smartphones run apps capable of communicating with roadway infrastructure, the practical reach of connected-vehicle pedestrian safety will continue to expand.
Municipalities exploring Smart City Solutions have an increasing range of investment options: connected infrastructure such as beacons and smart signals, software platforms that tie that infrastructure together, and smartphone-based applications that extend safety benefits directly to the public without requiring residents to purchase new hardware. Many of the most effective deployments are likely to combine all three.
For planners and public works departments, the opportunity is to think about pedestrian, cyclist, and motorist safety not as a series of separate infrastructure projects but as an integrated transportation network in which every layer reinforces the others. That's the direction Intelligent Transportation Systems are heading, and it has real potential to reduce preventable collisions involving vulnerable road users.
Planning future transportation safety improvements? Contact JSF Technologies to explore how connected safety systems, pedestrian crossing solutions, and smart city technologies can help create safer roads for all users.
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