Analysis of Bus Drivers’ Gaze Behavior on Public Roads Using Eye Camera

Abstract

In Japan, since bus service is one of the most important transportation infrastructure especially in regional cities, traffic accidents by bus make large impact to our daily life. However, the number of bus accidents is still at a generally high level. In this study, we let 23 bus drivers (16 newly-employed bus drivers in training, 7 bus instructors) drive on public roads and measure their gaze behavior in traffic scenes frequently occurred in a daily service (e.g. departing from/stopping at bus stop, turning at busy intersections). By comparing measured data of drivers in training and those of instructors, we investigate in what kind of traffic conditions bus drivers behave riskily. As a result of our analysis, we found that drivers in training performed significantly less checking behavior than instructors while departing from bus stop or driving narrow residential streets where driver should simultaneously pay attention to multiple mirrors and traffics around to prevent in-vehicle/inter-vehicle accidents.