Skip to main content

Mazda develops system to avoid car-streetcar collisions

The University of Tokyo and Mazda Motor Corporation have jointly developed a system involving wireless communications technology to prevent collisions between cars and streetcars (or trams). The system’s car-mounted sensors can detect signals from a streetcar up to 100 metres away, in contrast with the current range of just a few dozen metres for conventional sensors on cars. The new system is designed to prevent collisions between vehicles and oncoming streetcars by allowing their position and direction
September 5, 2013 Read time: 1 min
The 5315 University of Tokyo and 1844 Mazda Motor Corporation have jointly developed a system involving wireless communications technology to prevent collisions between cars and streetcars (or trams).

The system’s car-mounted sensors can detect signals from a streetcar up to 100 metres away, in contrast with the current range of just a few dozen metres for conventional sensors on cars. The new system is designed to prevent collisions between vehicles and oncoming streetcars by allowing their position and direction to be automatically monitored, according to the university.

The experimental ASV-5 version of Mazda’s Atenza sedan will be deployed for trials in Hiroshima. Streetcars, which are used by around 150,000 people per day in Hiroshima, form an essential part of the city’s public transportation system.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Do satellites provide a heavenly view of tolling’s future?
    December 16, 2014
    Satellite-based tolling opens up new options for authorities and can be integrated with DSRC systems as David Crawford discovers. As the proud custodian of the European Union (EU)’s longest road network covered by a single (truck) charging scheme – and the only one to include all major roads - Slovakia has become the continent’s poster-nation for the virtues of GNSS/CN (Global Navigation Satellite System/Cellular Network)-based tolling. It is also proved to be a very fast implementer. Speaking at the 2014 I
  • Axis aids incident detection on French viaduct
    October 31, 2016
    France’s first AID system has halved attendance time on the Calix Viaduct. TheCentre for Traffic Engineering and Management (CIGT) at Caen in northern France manages 367km of the national network in the Manche/Calvados district including the 1.2km long, 15-span Calix Viaduct across the Canal de Caen à la Mer.
  • Flexibility, interoperability is key to future traffic management
    February 3, 2012
    Jon Taylor of Faber Maunsell and Tabatha Bailey of Transport for London describe how an unusual mix of traffic practitioners, researchers and industry are working together to build new tools for the future. As we face higher expectations for managing congestion from both citizens and politicians, and as more and more data is becoming available from new sources, our traffic management challenge is changing.
  • Include ITS in policy decisions from the start, not as an afterthought
    February 1, 2012
    DG TREN's Fotis Karamitsos, on why the European Commission's new ITS Action Plan is looking to the past for future direction. The European Commission's (EC's) new Action Plan for the Deployment of Intelligent Transport Systems in Europe, which was announced as 2008 drew to a close, intends that transport and travel become 'cleaner; more efficient, including energy efficient; and safer and more secure'. At first sight, that wording might be interpreted as marking a significant policy shift within Europe, wit