Skip to main content

Q-Free’s ALPR demonstrates high read, low error rates

Q-Free’s German OEM partner VMT Düssel has recently installed its VideoScan automatic licence plate reader (ALPR) system at the entrances to Phantasialand theme park in Brühl, Germany, in an effort to provide the park with an insight to the type of visitors, their geographic distribution and pattern of returns. Q-Free’s Intrada ALPR software is integrated into the system’s video processing server for video and image handling; video captured by the VMT VideoScan installed on the entry lanes is sent to the
May 13, 2014 Read time: 2 mins
108 Q-Free’s German OEM partner VMT Düssel has recently installed its VideoScan automatic licence plate reader (ALPR) system at the entrances to Phantasialand theme park in Brühl, Germany, in an effort to provide the park with an insight to the type of visitors, their geographic distribution and pattern of returns.

Q-Free’s Intrada ALPR software is integrated into the system’s video processing server for video and image handling; video captured by the VMT VideoScan installed on the entry lanes is sent to the Intrada ALPR engine where the licence plates are recognised.  The data is forwarded to the central server for statistical analysis on visitor patterns.

The ALPR engine features a combination of various optical character recognition (OCR) technologies and the Intrada library contains data for more than 100 countries and states around the world. The software not only reads the bare registration number, but the OCR also uses plate features, such as the characters’ location and fonts, to determine a plate’s origin.

According to Q-Free, the Intrada ALPR software is currently deployed in numerous systems worldwide, where it has demonstrated very low error rates. For the Stockholm congestion charging scheme, Intrada automatically handles 97 per cent of the images with an error rate of less than 0.01 per cent, and for Amsterdam’s low emission zone, it achieves a 98 per cent read rate, with an error rate below 0.1 per cent.

Related Content

  • January 10, 2012
    Robust enforcement strategy needed for free flow toll roads
    Timidity has no place in effective enforcement operations on free-flow toll roads, says the NRA's Cathal Masteron. What's needed is a robust strategy which starts big and reduces in size over time, rather than starts small and gains a reputation for being easy to avoid
  • August 30, 2016
    UK city council adds school safety solution to hosted civil enforcement platform
    Portsmouth City Council is adding school safety to the range of enforcement applications running on its hosted digital video platform. The council has started by deploying the Videalert system outside schools where illegal parking in keep clear areas has been identified as putting children’s lives in danger.
  • February 1, 2012
    Time for a rethink on road user charging
    There is no value in further US VMT charging trials, except to delay the inevitable. These trials should end after completion of the University of Iowa's National Evaluation of a Mileage-based Road User Charge. There is far greater promise in unleashing private operators to commence profitable, non-tolling services, then using these for toll assessment and collection as fuel distributors are currently used to collect fuel taxation. Bern Grush writes
  • May 31, 2013
    Temporary traffic monitoring with Bluetooth and wi-fi
    David Crawford reviews developments in temporary ITS. Widespread take-up of technologies such as Bluetooth and wi-fi are encouraging the emergence of more sophisticated, while still cost effective, ITS responses to the traffic issues posed by temporary road situations such as work zones and special events. Andy Graham of traffic solutions specialists White Willow Consulting says: “A machine-to-machine radio link is far easier and cheaper than reading characters on a plate.” There can be other plusses. Tech