Future of Enforcement

Several countries, including the United States, the United Kingdom and Singapore, have already adopted measures to tackle vehicle accidents and fatalities.  India is currently joining the league by not only installing red light cameras, but by also including radio frequency identification (RFID) tags on vehicles´ number plates, as well as by installing electronic toll collection systems and black boxes in some automobiles. TrafficInfraTech speaks to few industry players to understand the latest trends and the future of enforcement technology and safety.

Today, enforcement relies almost entirely on standalone systems that use real-time visual detection and analysis to monitor traffic movement and speed. With the expansion of connected mobility where the vehicle is connected to the infrastructure, we will see the emergence of identification combined with detection in the enforcement arena.

Jenoptik Robot GmbH is a leading supplier of a complete range of enforcement technologies that can be used to identify and process traffic offences, including spot speed, average speed (P2P or section control), red light, speed on green and many more. Key to these capabilities is the wide range of sensor technologies available including radar, laser, in-road loops and video triggering. This range allows configuring standard & proven modules to create customer specific solutions.

Carsten Biermann, Director Product Management, Project Management and Marketing, Jenoptik Robot GmbH, explains, “Accident prevention is still gaining in significance as well as optimization of traffic flow. There is a trend towards average speed systems. Classic enforcement is going to develop and monitor more complex and complicated traffic situations, eg. turning violations at intersections (left/right turning), and wrong lane use. A number of tests and pilots in different countries worldwide manifest the focus of traffic monitoring of accident hot spots/black spots (e. g. tunnels, road work, bridges). Furthermore, current trend to ensure and improve traffic flow is specific speed control, e. g. for lane or vehicles class specific speed limits or close following / tail-gating.”  Stalker Traffic Technologies

The US based Stalker Traffic Technologies has leveraged its decades long radar and laser speed enforcement expertise in developing the next level of Photo Enforcement products.

Stalker CiTE – Camera Issued Ticket Enforcement, with its latest generation of radar and laser photo-evidence capture devices, is a comprehensive traffic-photo enforcement solution that automates the citation process from violation capture to collection to completion. The system features effortless ‘one-click’ citation processing and iron-clad evidence management with flexible processes and fully customisable documents and reports.

CiTE is paired with either the radarbased stationary Stalker Phodar SE-2, featuring both video and high-resolution still capture, or the laser-based Stalker LidarCam, a highly mobile, hand-held device.

Bill Fagan, Vice President of Sales, Marketing, and Business Development, Stalker Traffic Technologies, says, “We see two emerging trends in enforcement technology. The first is the combining of manned enforcement tactics with automated photo enforcement technologies. The Stalker LidarCam is a perfect example of this trend. The presence of an officer provides a powerful eye-witness component while the photo technology provides an indisputable evidence record. We are also seeing the increased use of video in many enforcement scenarios. If a picture is worth a thousand words, as the saying goes, a video is worth many times more.”

The future of enforcement

“We see the future of enforcement as continued integration of technologies. Radar or Laser speed measurement combined with imaging technologies and ANPR capability. A good example here is the Stalker Phodar SE-1. This multi-faceted functionality will make enforcement more efficient and less dependent dwindling manpower resources.”

Enforcement technology involves different methods of enforcing Traffic Violations. The current trend is to stop the vehicle or the person in test/ question, take appropriate method of collecting the evidence for the violation challan on the spot or prosecute them for the violation as it deemed appropriate.

Iqbal Singh Jagdeva, Managing Director, Turbo Consultancy Services Pvt Ltd, says, “The future trend of enforcement will be to prosecute / penalize / challan the violator without stopping the vehicle or person. Through 3G / 4G, send the information to the Central Server and after fetching the ownership details of the violator, the challan or violation ticket shall be sent to their residential /official address. This can be even sent on the same day of violation occurred. Thanks to the new technology!”

There are different types of violation enforcement.

• Red Light and Speed Enforcement Violation System
• Air Pollution Enforcement System
• Noise / Sound Level Enforcement System
• Vehicle Weight Enforcement System
• Breath Analyzer Enforcement System
• Other Violations as per Motor Vehicle act.

Different technologies are used for enforcements. For speed violation, the trend is to use speed doppler radars / 3D tracking radar / loop sensors and virtual lines / laser or other type of sensor technology. Turbo Consultancy are the exclusive distributors of Laser Technology Inc., USA for the supply of laser speed guns in India. The newest amongst these is 3D Tracking Radar and Laser Technology.

The Interceptor vehicle is also used to intercept the violating person on the spot at present. However, for the future trend, as said above the violation is captured with the speed and sent to the Central Control Room through 3G / 4G. The data is collected from the server for violating person and the challans are generated automatically and sent accordingly to the violator. If the sound / noise at any particular area are beyond the prescribed dB limit, the appropriate action is taken by the enforcement team. This is done by the Sound / Noise Level Meter and the prosecution is done on the spot.

Breath Analyzer is used to check the Alcohol contents in the breath of the subject person. Currently, for evidence, the print is taken out for the Alcohol Contents in mg/100ml of blood along with the time & date stamp. In future trend, this will also have the location and the picture of the violator.

Dr Rajesh Krishnan, CEO, ITS Planners and Engineers states: “Currently, enforcement technology in India is limited to red-light violation & speed-limit violation detection using spot-speed detection sensors and weighin-motion. However, this is just the tip of the iceberg and ITS technology can be used for a wide range of enforcement functions making our roads safer.

With a focus on road safety, I see a number of new enforcement technologies getting adopted in the future. Some of these include

Average speed enforcement: Spotspeed enforcement will ensure that people do not over-speed at a given location on the road. On the other hand, average speed monitoring technologies will ensure that people drive within the speed-limit on a stretch of road. Average speed enforcement can be implemented using a number of different technologies, including ANPR and RFID. ANPR based average speed enforcement schemes are common in the UK.

The police in many cities are turning to technology to detect a number of traffic violations. Examples include driving without seat-belts, driving two wheelers without a helmet, triple-riding and wrong-way driving. The technology has to mature before such violations can be detected reliably. However, the market need will ensure that we will start seeing mature technology solutions to the above in the near future.

Legal compliance checking: Motor vehicle departments currently stop vehicles to check for statutory paperwork such as PUC, insurance and regulatory compliance (permits, commercial taxes etc.) for commercial vehicles. Digitisation of above records combined with vehicle identification using ANPR or RFID means that such checks can be automated using technology. This will result in a far higher proportion of vehicles automatically getting checked without the need for having to stop them on the road resulting in safer roads and less polluting traffic.

Going ahead in the years to come what will be the enforcement scenario when automated cars and driverless vehicles crow the car? Simon Pickup, Managing Director, Pickup Infinity Limited writes in “Thinking Highways’: Enforcement systems and programmes will have to change to cope with a mixed environment. Who receives the ticket when a driverless car is photographed, for example, driving in a dedicated bus lane? Ultimately the vehicle manufacturers may take liability, yet if the “auto-pilot” is off at the time an offence is detected, the driver should be held responsible, but the enforcement system needs to know who’s in control at the time – man or machine.

Secondly, as increasingly automated vehicle control becomes available, the vehicles will have to have demonstrably accurate speed measurement on board. This means the courts won’t be able to dismiss so lightly the defence that “my GPS shows I wasn’t speeding, your honour”. Of course, we all need to be protected from those who might wish to modify the “brain” of their autonomous vehicle, as is sometimes done now for improved performance, but the future will open up many more possibilities, whether malicious or merely selfish.

Preeti Swaminathan