Driving test car license (B) gets overhauled: more focus on driver assistance systems

Knowledge of driver assistance systems important

The questions about a car’s driver assistance systems are asked during the practical exam during the preparation and inspection acts. “You can compare the questions to questions like they already do with questions about tires and oil levels. You have to know something about the vehicle you are driving. So we also include these new developments,” says Anton Hols of CBR Vocational Training. “The driving trainers have now been informed about this by the CBR. This gives them time to fit the change into the driving lessons they teach in a well-informed way.”

Moment of realization

Hols continues: “It is not necessary for someone to also already be driving off in the very latest car with everything on it. But there are already more driving assistance systems on older cars than people sometimes realize. Almost all cars have cruise control, parking sensors and navigation. These, too, are driver assistance systems that were once new, but now come standard with a car.”

Insufficient knowledge about driver assistance systems

“The European Union has stipulated that since 2022, all new cars entering the market must have certain driver assistance systems on them. Experience shows that far from everyone knows which systems are on their cars,” Hols said. By including driver assistance systems in the practical exam B, the CBR expects candidates to prepare on this topic.

Resources

Candidates have already been allowed to use driver assistance systems during driving since 2016. During their exam, for example, they can decide whether to turn lane-assist (which keeps the car in the center of the lane) on or off. It has also been common for years that a candidate will turn on the navigation as part of the exam to drive back to the exam site, for example.

Special operations such as parking will still need to be mastered by the candidate. Therefore, only automatic parking is excluded from the practical exam. Meanwhile, CBR is exploring ways in which driving assistance systems can be applied to the exam in the coming years. Indeed, this requires a different way of assessing both knowledge of the driver assistance systems and their use during the exam.

Source: CBR