A delicately knitted network of processes, smart technologies for traffic assist transport employees commuters, drivers and drivers control traffic flow and efficiency. Intelligent traffic systems can adjust the controls of traffic lights and freeway onramp meters as well as bus rapid transit lanes. They also make use of advanced IoT hardware and routers with cellular technology, as well as cellular networks. They also can forecast changes in traffic demand, and provide real-time data to road users.
Pittsburgh’s adaptive traffic signal system is a perfect example. When Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) professor Stephen Smith installed his first couple of traffic signals, which were merely experimental, in a highly congested part of the city’s East Liberty, he saw immediate results: Drivers traveled 25 percent faster and spent 40 percent less time in traffic jams than before.
The system is able to collect information from sensors that monitor the flow of traffic and adjust their timings on the fly. It also detects pedestrians near intersections, and gives them enough time technologytraffic.com/2021/07/08/generated-post to safely cross the street. The sensors send their raw data to a central hub, where it is processed by artificial intelligence and then sent back to the intersections via 5G-enabled mobile networks.
These intelligent systems allow for better and more accurate simulation of scenarios that reduce risk, which human traffic managers cannot accomplish. And all this in real-time. This is a major step towards Vision Zero, the goal of a road with no accidents where cars and human beings can travel together without colliding.
