AVT cameras, part of a new generation of ETC

Allied Vision Technologies (AVT) has supplied Norwegian company Q-Free with its high performance machine vision cameras for use in electronic toll collection (ETC) systems. Q-Free has developed an ETC installation based on a single gantry which relies on the latest machine imaging systems, radio systems and automatic license plate recognition (ALPR) software technologies to collect toll data. This versatile system is designed to do pure video tolling or a combination of video and radio tolling depending
August 20, 2015 Read time: 3 mins
518 Allied Vision Technologies (AVT) has supplied Norwegian company 108 Q-Free with its high performance machine vision cameras for use in electronic toll collection (ETC) systems.

Q-Free has developed an ETC installation based on a single gantry which relies on the latest machine imaging systems, radio systems and automatic license plate recognition (ALPR) software technologies to collect toll data. This versatile system is designed to do pure video tolling or a combination of video and radio tolling depending on the needs of the responsible authorities where it is installed.

The gantry currently features two AVT Prosilica GX1920 digital cameras per lane and on both sides of the gantry to capture high quality images of a vehicle’s front and rear license plates. In addition, the single gantry also features two AVT Manta G-125B monochrome cameras per lane. These cameras are used to track each individual vehicle as they enter and leave the detection zone around the gantry, and when a lane change occurs. Accurate vehicle tracking ensures that front and rear pictures of vehicles license plates are reliably captured in all lighting and weather conditions, as well as in situations ranging from urban environments to multi-lane free-flow highway infrastructures. The combination of accurate vehicle tracking and the machine vision cameras’ superior image quality output guarantees a high ALPR accuracy rate.

The gantry also features DSRC units to electronically collect fees from vehicles equipped with transponders, a Sick LMS500 3D laser to classify vehicles and Q-Free’s Intrada ALPR software for automatically reading the registration numbers from the pictures. The ALPR data is then processed by an operational back office for fee charging and subsequent billing by the local authorities based on each vehicle’s road usage and the tariff in charge. The video tracking ability is used to reliably integrate the input for all these sensors into single transactions.  

According to AVT, machine vision cameras offer many benefits for tolling and outdoor imaging applications due to a wide array of advanced features such as low-latency trigger for timely image capture, flexible exposure, gain and binning modes to adapt to any outdoor lighting conditions, high sensitivity to minimise motion blur and image distortion, as well as configurable I/O to synchronise the image-capture process with traffic system peripherals such as IR lights, ground loops, radar or laser triggers.
Detection, Monitoring & Machine Vision Charging, Tolling & RUC

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • RedSpeed enhance school bus safety
    January 7, 2014
    With an estimated 15 million stop arm violations in America every year, RedSpeed is offering school bus operators an automated photo enforcement system free of charge.
    Read More
  • Study finds big differences in toll collection cases
    December 16, 2013
    Examination of Norway’s tolling companies finds much to praise, and some criticisms too, as Torill Eidsheim told delegates at the ASECAP conference. The cost of collecting tolls has a substantial effect on the profitability, or otherwise, of tolling companies and is within the company’s control to a far greater degree than, for instance, traffic volumes. And while it is easy to assume that all tolling companies incur similar collection costs, that is not always the case according to Torill Eidsheim, pres
    Read More
  • Cameras speed pothole detection
    October 25, 2013
    High-speed video cameras for ITS applications developed by Sony Image Sensing Solutions have been adopted by system integrator Horus to create a pothole identification system capable of detecting potholes at speeds of up to 130 kph (80 mph). The vision-based pothole detection system integrates six high-speed Sony ITS camera modules, each taking 15 high-resolution frames per second to form a 360-degree imaging system which accurately records data from up to three lanes simultaneously, even when travelling
    Read More
  • Faster more flexible ANPR from Imagsa
    November 22, 2012
    Imagsa’s latest Atalaya automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) camera is more flexible and has more processing power, thanks to the company’s proprietary FPGA processor coupled to a CMOS sensor which allows the camera to operate at 270 frames per second. Although Imagsa say this isn’t necessarily needed for ANPR, the camera works under any conditions and at this frame rate can accurately detect a vehicle ten times in three metres at speeds of up to 250 km/h, even in heavy rain or in direct sunlight.
    Read More

Highlighted Content