Coventry uses Bluetooth to assess how connected vehicles interact

A journey time measurement system for traffic monitoring using Bluetooth technology is being installed in Coventry to assess how connected vehicles interact on key corridors leading into the city centre from the national road network. 

The Intelligent Variable Message Systems (iVMS) scheme is seeking to develop a real world connected car to infrastructure demonstrator in the West Midlands. The project started in January 2016 and is planned to end in 2018.

Coventry City Council is leading the iVMS project, which is drawing on expertise from Coventry University’s Centre for Mobility and Transport as well project partners HORIBA MIRA and Serious Games International. 

The Siemens Sapphire units are being supplied and installed along three main corridors into Coventry. They will measure journey times and help optimise traffic flow as part of the project.

Many of the signalised junctions on Binley Road, Walsgrave Road and A444 are also being upgraded by Siemens to be controlled via SCOOT and MOVA along the major corridors into Coventry to help minimise delays and further improve traffic flow. 

The Siemens hosted traffic management system – Stratos – will be used to manage the flow of data and send enhanced traffic data to the mobile application. Network operators will have more control of the routing information provided to commuters as the system will manage the expected traffic loads on the network.

The project will change the way in which commuters can travel into Coventry. Using a mobile phone application, commuters will be able to plan their daily commute and be incentivised to travel at the most sustainable times. The app will seek to provide advice on when commuters should start their journey in order to avoid congestion or increase journey time reliability, as well as providing live in-journey information to give advice on the most appropriate route. 

This will provide benefits for both the road user and network operator as peak traffic congestion can be reduced, reducing delay, congestion and pollution in the city. The project will also provide benefits for commuters, who will receive reliable data from the transport network in order to plan their journeys accordingly. 

Serious Games International (SGIL) will ‘gamify’ the app to encourage the development of an online community who will seek to travel at the most suitable times. Users will be able to score virtual points for different sustainable driving traits such as driving styles, route choices and journey times. Leader boards could be created for people who saved the most fuel, adjusted their travel time the most to help the city or travelled the most suitable route and commuters could be offered a discounted coffee on route if they travel at less congested times.

Cllr David Welsh, lead for transport at Coventry City Council, said: “We are on the edge of making some great new technology available to drivers in the city and Coventry is once again leading some fantastic, cutting edge technological advances that will change how we use and think about transport. 

“I’m really pleased that we are working with Siemens and other partners on this project which will help to cut journey times and reduce congestion and pollution. But this isn’t just about roads and how we travel – this will also have economic benefits for the city too.” 

Other intelligent traffic systems projects deploying Siemens technology include the UK’s first connected road test environment, also in Coventry, and the provision of energy-efficient intersection services in Newcastle. 

The UK Connected Intelligent Transport Environment project aims to enable automotive, infrastructure and service companies to trial connected vehicle technologies in real-life conditions on 40 miles of roads within Coventry and Warwickshire, using combinations of dedicated short-range communications and long-term evolution talking car technologies to compare their performance.

Meanwhile, Siemens is working with Newcastle City Council and Newcastle University to provide traffic signal priority to non-emergency ambulances and test vehicles, the aim of the project was to reduce unnecessary braking or accelerating by providing green light advisory timings to the driver and green priority at 20 junctions, thus reducing energy consumption levels of test vehicles.