Skip to main content

Bluetooth technology to shorten travel times

A new traffic app recently launched in Adelaide, South Australia, is helping drivers avoid roadworks and traffic jams with real-time updates. AddInsight taps into more than 400 of Adelaide’s state-of-the-art Bluetooth receivers, which monitor the city’s road network in real-time and broadcasts verbal messages to drivers in about approaching delays through a vehicle’s hands free systems and mobile phones. The free app has been released at a time when the South Australian capital’s road network has been
April 20, 2016 Read time: 2 mins
A new traffic app recently launched in Adelaide, South Australia, is helping drivers avoid roadworks and traffic jams with real-time updates.

AddInsight taps into more than 400 of Adelaide’s state-of-the-art Bluetooth receivers, which monitor the city’s road network in real-time and broadcasts verbal messages to drivers in about approaching delays through a vehicle’s hands free systems and mobile phones.

The free app has been released at a time when the South Australian capital’s road network has been plagued with disruptions caused by major infrastructure improvements such as new freeways and building projects.

Travel times determined using the information from the Bluetooth beacons are also broadcast on more than 47 electronic signs around metropolitan Adelaide to help motorists choose their fastest route.

The Bluetooth data allows traffic control centres to change traffic signals immediately in response to incidents such as crashes.

South Australian Transport and Infrastructure Minister Stephen Mullighan said the unique traffic app would help shorten travel time. “The AddInsight app is like having a personal navigator in your car, giving you information in advance about hazards or delays ahead, so you can avoid them by finding an alternative route,” he said.

Related Content

  • Future traffic management needs new thinking, new technology
    January 23, 2012
    One of the biggest problems facing US ITS professionals, says Georgia DOT's Hugh Colton, is the constrained thinking which is sometimes forced upon those making procurement decisions. It is time, he says, to look again at how we do things. In the November/December 2010 edition of this journal, Pete Goldin interviewed Joseph Sussman, chairman of the US's ITS Program Advisory Committee. Amongst other observations that Sussman made was that, technologically, ITS in the US is 10 years behind that in the world-l
  • Virginia presses ahead with tunnels upgrade despite tolls challenge
    July 30, 2013
    David Crawford reviews current developments and legal/financial issues facing tunnel management in Virginia. This autumn the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) in the US will defend its plan to introduce tolling on the Elizabeth River tunnels linking the cities of Norfolk and Portsmouth in the State’s Hampton Roads area. The tolling, which is due to start from February 2014, will be examined by the State’s Supreme Court later this year. The anticipated toll income, along with loans and bonds, is
  • Helsinki’s residents trial MaaS as alternative to private cars
    August 21, 2018
    Would you give up your own car? Helsinki implemented MaaS late last year and Colin Sowman discovers that the initial reaction has been positive What would it take for you to give up your own car? That is the question posed by Sampo Hietanen, the so-called ‘father’ of Mobility as a Service (MaaS) and CEO of MaaS Global. And he is about to discover if MaaS really will convince the people of Helsinki to do the unthinkable. MaaS Global introduced a fledgling version of its Whim app in the city in late 2016
  • Your Tesla Autopilot has arrived
    October 20, 2015
    In a blog on its website, Tesla Motors, which since October 2014 has been equipping its Model S car with hardware such as a forward radar, forward camera, electric assist braking system, to allow for the incremental introduction of self-driving technology, has announced the release of Tesla version 7 software. Called Tesla Autopilot, it allows those tools to deliver a range of new active safety and convenience features, designed to work in conjunction with the automated driving capabilities already offered