Vision Zero is a bold goal: to eliminate all traffic fatalities and serious injuries. It’s a mission that has been adopted by governments, cities, and mobility stakeholders around the world. But achieving this goal requires more than better signage or stricter laws, it demands actionable insights, real-time data, and proactive measures.
That’s exactly what NIRA Dynamics offers through its intelligent vehicle data solutions. One of the most powerful of these is Harsh Braking—a predictive analytics tool that transforms real-world driving behavior into insights that help prevent accidents before they occur.
Traditionally, traffic safety strategies have relied on post-incident data such as crash reports, hospital records, or police investigations. While valuable, this information is reactive by nature. It only tells us where people have already been harmed, and often comes too late to prevent future incidents in the same location.
In contrast, predictive data highlights risk patterns before accidents happen. This shift from reactive to proactive is essential if we are to meet the goals of Vision Zero. NIRA Dynamics is leading this transition by harnessing data from connected vehicles to build a smarter, safer traffic ecosystem.
Harsh braking refers to rapid deceleration events—typically above 4 m/s²—that occur when drivers are forced to react suddenly. These events often signal that something in the environment is wrong: poor visibility, inadequate signage, confusing intersections, unexpected obstacles, or slippery road surfaces.
Using data gathered from millions of vehicles across the Volkswagen Group (including Audi, VW, Škoda, and SEAT), Harsh Braking captures these moments in real time. The system records the location, timestamp, initial speed, and maximum deceleration of each event. All data is anonymized and uploaded to the cloud, where it is aggregated and analyzed.
What makes Harsh Braking so powerful is not just the data itself, but what it reveals. When many vehicles repeatedly brake hard at the same spot, it’s a clear indicator of a risk hotspot, even if no actual crash has occurred yet.
This allows road authorities, urban planners, and mobility experts to:
Detect and map dangerous road segments before injuries happen
Adjust traffic flow, signage, or road design in real time
Prioritize maintenance and infrastructure investments based on real-world usage
Validate the effectiveness of safety interventions using behavioral data
Support ADAS (Advanced Driver Assistance Systems) and navigation tools with up-to-date, location-specific risk information
In short, Harsh Braking enables cities and governments to act proactively—protecting citizens and improving infrastructure based on actual driver behavior.
Whether it’s a municipality aiming to reduce serious injuries at urban intersections or a national transport agency planning strategic road investments, Harsh Braking data helps bridge the gap between policy and implementation.
For example:
Traffic engineers can detect hidden dangers, such as misaligned signage or worn road markings—without waiting for accidents to occur.
City planners can optimize the placement of pedestrian crossings, traffic lights, and roundabouts using actual risk data.
Public health agencies can measure safety improvements not just by crash statistics, but by reductions in risky behavior.
Insurance companies and fleet operators can analyze driving patterns to better manage risk and improve safety culture.
NIRA Dynamics takes data privacy seriously. All data collected through Harsh Braking is fully anonymized and GDPR-compliant, ensuring that individual drivers cannot be identified. The system does not rely on GPS tracking of specific users, instead, it aggregates braking events across the fleet to build a high-resolution, crowd-sourced risk map.
The data is updated monthly, offers spatial resolution down to five meters, and can be delivered in multiple formats (CSV, shapefile, API) to fit seamlessly into existing traffic analysis systems or decision-making workflows.
Custom deceleration thresholds can also be set, allowing users to tailor the definition of “harsh” braking to local speed limits, road types, or seasonal conditions.
Several cities and road authorities are already using Harsh Braking data to inform their Vision Zero strategies. For example, areas previously overlooked in accident statistics are being re-evaluated based on near-miss behavior. This leads to faster, smarter safety interventions, reducing both injuries and costs.
In addition, Harsh Braking complements other NIRA products such as Road Health and Winter Road Insights, creating a complete ecosystem of data services for safer mobility.
If we are serious about reaching Vision Zero, we need better tools to understand and predict traffic risk. Harsh Braking by NIRA Dynamics is one of those tools. It turns everyday vehicle behavior into life-saving insight, and gives road authorities the means to act proactively, efficiently, and with confidence.
By enabling smarter infrastructure planning, supporting advanced driving systems, and identifying invisible risks, Harsh Braking brings us one step closer to roads without fatalities. Because when it comes to saving lives, waiting for accidents is no longer an option.