Recently, Iteris announced the development of a new AI-powered sensor system that can detect, monitor, and manage traffic. What challenges do growing cities face, what does the system provided by Iteris offer, and what problems can integrated smart systems face?

 By Robin Mitchell

What challenges do growing cities face?

As the world population grows, so does the demand for transportation services, whether it be increased use in buses, taxis, or privately owned vehicles. While the current climate crisis is changing how vehicles are made and what sources of energy they use, it has little impact on the increasing number of vehicles. Using public transport may be better for the environment, but poor availability and inconvenience leads many to privately own vehicles.

Most roads around the world were laid during a time of significantly fewer vehicles, and these roads may have been designed with a few decades of vehicle growth in mind. If the demand on a road increases to the point where traffic starts to build up, it is often impossible to widen the road and add lanes as roads often have buildings on either side.

This leads us to a new challenge where modern road networks are quickly becoming congested. Congested traffic is not only bad for waiting times, but it also results in increased emissions from vehicles and can increase the chances of collisions and accidents.

For traffic management to improve, smart cities will need to be introduced, which involve the placement of sensors and smart technologies that allow computers to take over control in real-time. Simply put, a smart city would recognise key areas of congestion and then redirect traffic to improve safety while reducing waiting times. Furthermore, a smart city would be able to more efficiently control signals at traffic lights to prevent severe congestion forming while making better decisions on when to let pedestrian’s crossroads.