Reducing Traffic Congestion with Smart Video Technology

In addition to negatively impacting vehicle owners and air quality, traffic congestion costs cities millions of dollars annually in lost productivity. To address these issues and keep traffic moving, Juan Sádaba, ITS Business Development Manager at Hikvision Spain, says forward-thinking cities around the world are using innovative smart video solutions.

Traffic congestion and stop-and-go traffic also significantly increase vehicle emissions in cities, negatively impacting air quality targets and broader climate goals. To address these challenges, urban planners around the world are working to encourage the adoption of faster, greener modes of transportation, including electric vehicles and public transport. However, such initiatives take time, and traffic management needs to be improved immediately to achieve rapid gains in congestion and emissions.

When it comes to addressing congestion in cities, smart video is a key asset. This is because it provides real-time traffic awareness and supports faster, more effective responses to vehicle congestion at intersections and on busy routes.

Intelligent video, in particular, can help authorities address traffic congestion issues in a number of key ways.

Identify and Alleviate Traffic Congestion Points

Smart video solutions can show authorities when traffic is congested at specific intersections and generate automatic alerts for traffic management teams. This allows authorities to take a range of actions to keep traffic flowing, such as adjusting traffic light timings, implementing traffic pricing schemes or working with satellite navigation partners to reroute traffic. All of this helps increase average vehicle speeds, reduce stop-and-go traffic and reduce emissions. Smart video solutions can show authorities when traffic is congested at certain intersections and create automatic alerts for traffic management teams.

Control Vehicle Access to Restricted Areas

With smart video, authorities can restrict access to certain areas of the city for certain types of vehicles, such as older ones or those that cause air pollution. This is possible by relying on license plate recognition (ANPR) technology, which cross-references vehicle license plates with traffic authority databases to determine their eligibility to enter restricted areas.

With ANPR technology, cities can create effective congestion charging schemes that reduce overall traffic demand without penalizing drivers of green vehicles, such as electric vehicles. Additionally, vehicles belonging to residents in closed areas can be exempted from the charge.

Faster Response to Traffic Incidents that Impede Traffic Flow

In urban environments, traffic accidents, vehicle breakdowns and other incidents can cause hourly delays in busy lanes. Intelligent video helps overcome this challenge by detecting incidents in real time and sending alerts to traffic teams. This means incidents can be resolved faster, delays can be reduced and traffic congestion can be minimised.

How Can Hikvision Reduce Traffic Congestion?

Hikvision has created a portfolio of innovative ITS solutions to help cities solve their traffic congestion problems. This portfolio includes AI-enabled cameras for ANPR, vehicle counting and incident detection, which give authorities a real-time view of traffic conditions in their areas of responsibility. With automatic alerts for traffic congestion and other incidents, authorities can react faster and take action to ease traffic flow, reduce congestion and reduce emissions related to stop-and-go traffic.

To learn more about Hikvision ITS solutions and how they can help your authorities reduce traffic congestion, speed up journey times and improve drivers’ experiences, contact us.