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I, for one, welcome our traffic overlords. All your base traffic are belong to us.
They note the hum of your passing tires. They adjust to meet your needs. They sense your mounting frustration. It won’t be long before they also know how many people are in your car and just where you’re headed.
Traffic systems — and the stoplights that are their highway sentinels — are complex networks that must be synchronized with Balanchine precision or rush hour will descend from the normal headache into commuter hell.
Very few Montgomery County drivers even knew that traffic signals talked behind their backs until a communications glitch in November threw the whole system out of whack and caused almost two days of complete chaos on 3,500 miles of roadway.
Right now you may have a Global Positioning System device that communicates with satellites in real time as you drive. Soon your car’s own computer will be able to gather GPS information and data of all sorts and share that with all the cars around you and with traffic control signals.
You’ll get feedback. It will warn you of dangers — cars too close or too fast — and suggest alternate routes when congestion lies ahead, as many GPS systems already do.
And it will give traffic flow experts a wealth of information they’ve never had before.
It’s about time.
Smart traffic lights would likely reduce oil consumption and pollution from idle cars by at least 10%, IMHO.
Obama needs to get this sort of stimulus idea going before the Republicans re-assume power and take us back to the 20’s again.
Apparently driving is very important to some.
Dallas: The 20s, huh? Back to the Model T…
I live in a city that has had computerized, centrally controlled traffic signals for a long time, maybe 10-20 years. They work pretty well, but so far as I know only use traffic counts to control the signals. There are several speed/red light running cameras at major intersections, though.
GPS systems linked into traffic lights are already reality in Finland. Many buses and streetcars in major cities can request a wave of green lights as they move through the city. The locations are also transmitted back to individual stops to calculate the estimated arrival time.
They’d better bring in auto-pilot systems, too. Driving like an automaton to avoid Big-Brother fines (or insurance company nannying) for speeding and other traffic activity will cause half the drivers to fall asleep at the wheel.
Take it one step further, require every vehicle to install a transponder that would identify vehicle and driver. Build a communications infrastructure that parallels the roads everywhere. Not only would you have an extremely efficient traffic system, law enforcement would become more effective than ever.
What is described in the article is pretty sophisticated…for 40 years ago. A plane?! Seriously? Most major cities are far more automated than this now. AFAIK, in SoCal, none of the crosswalk buttons do anything. They are all set to detect if someone is there or just to show “Walk” when appropriate.
#1
With the money your boy is spending, you should soak in the efficiency we have now because there won’t be any money to do upgrades for another decade or two.
Too bad we also don’t have the same opportunity to go completely all out when looking after the necessities of our families as we fork over more & more of our hard-earned money in taxes to pay for such “necessary” extravagances.
RBG
One thing that keeps annoying me about people’s understanding of “communication” in GPS is that there really isn’t communication. That’s like saying the radio is communication. While it is ONE-WAY communication, the assumption in this article is that communication is two way. Most GPS today aren’t two way and they definitely don’t send information directly to satellites.
My GPS has two antennas, one for receiving my XM radio transmissions and one for receiving my traffic data. But, one important thing, it DOES NOT send traffic information back to any system to integrate with the traffic controls.
Well said dmstrat. This issue has annoyed me too.
#9: GPS may be one-way, but with video cameras on every corner in most big cities combined with cameras in other places, facial recognition software, license plate readers (the airport here in Vegas has them), etc they don’t need GPS to keep track of you. And don’t forget cell phones which can listen even when turned off and other tech I can’t think of right now that is being increasingly deployed everywhere.
Any positional data better be anonymized. If they can identify you they can subjugate you. Better yet would be a way to spoof your identity.
#2 – A worthwhile life cannot be lived if individuals are not driving. Close packed urban living and mass transit is unnacceptable for a free person. Fine for sheep though.
Thomas: “in SoCal, none of the crosswalk buttons do anything. They are all set to detect if someone is there or just to show “Walk” when appropriate.”
Is that because of the Orthodox Jews problem? I recall there was a lot of arguments in the LA Jewish community about the question: Is pushing a cross walk button considered “work”, which is forbidden on Sabbath?
There is a rather large Jewish area of LA, and on Saturdays I see the families walking to and fro (and they say no one walks in LA!). I always wonder how the hard cores manage to cross the street.
#12 –
I thought sheep have wealth siphoned by leases and insurance premiums. The free walk and get things delivered by those paying off monthlies.
hhmmm and we can all be re-assured that Leo Laporte will be touting the all new Microsoft Traffic Sync,,,
wait till the blue light of death pops up… 😛
#13
I seriously doubt it. I suspect it had much more to do with efficiency in traffic control than some silly notion of “work” by pushing a button. If they have sensors that can detect a pedestrian, then why rely on them to push the button?
#1 Our little berg started to get this sort of thing for the main drag back under Bush Sr. but don’t let that stop you from blathering partisan nonsense.
Some people on both the left and the right see some of this as being an invasion of privacy. The problem being that in some cases they know exactly whose car is where doing what rather than that some car is there doing this.
You can rig it so you get a phone call if your kid is speeding in a car you own and GPS will tell you exactly where the car is and has gone and how long it was at any given location.
The police can do the same thing.