Skip to main content

Sri Lanka launches new highway traffic management system

Sri Lanka has recently opened the new highway traffic management system (HTMS), implemented by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, (MHI) on the country’s Southern Expressway. The installation is the country's first full-scale system of its kind, and it is expected to contribute significantly to improved safety and reduced congestion on a local expressway. The expressway, which opened in 2013, stretches 120 kilometres from Colombo, the largest city in Sri Lanka, to Matara. Construction work was performed under
August 11, 2015 Read time: 2 mins
Sri Lanka has recently opened the new highway traffic management system (HTMS), implemented by 4962 Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, (MHI) on the country’s Southern Expressway. The installation is the country's first full-scale system of its kind, and it is expected to contribute significantly to improved safety and reduced congestion on a local expressway.

The expressway, which opened in 2013, stretches 120 kilometres from Colombo, the largest city in Sri Lanka, to Matara. Construction work was performed under a grant-in-aid provided by the Japanese Government (Japan International Cooperation Agency [JICA]).

MHI handled all aspects of the project from engineering, procurement and installation to adjustment and operation training. The system includes some 30 sets of full-colour traffic information signboards, approximately 40 sets of vehicle detection cameras, weather sensors and other roadside equipment, as well as the central computer systems for data processing, operating status monitoring, etc.

The expressway will eventually be connected into neighbouring expressways already in operation. New expressway construction is currently under way in the country in preparation for an anticipated dramatic increase in vehicle traffic in the coming years.

The new HTMS is designed to provide expressway users with timely traffic information during bad weather or accidents, helping to prevent congestion and accidents caused by natural disasters and improving traffic management.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Kapsch wins Latvia traffic contract
    February 9, 2023
    Drivers on E-67 highway around Latvian capital Riga will benefit from real-time info
  • Need for performance standards for road user charging systems
    February 2, 2012
    GNSS-based road use metering systems need performance metrics, as well as ways to test and reliably compare them. Bern Grush and Joaquín Cosmen write about the function of the GNSS Metering Association for Road-use charging (GMAR), recently set up to address this issue
  • The great pay divide
    April 2, 2014
    Public acceptance is crucial for the acceptance of managed and express lanes as Jon Masters discovers. Lists of proposed highway expansion projects introducing variably priced toll lanes continue to lengthen. Managed lanes, or express lanes to some, are gaining support as a politically favourable way of adding capacity and reducing acute congestion on principal highways. In Florida, for example, the managed lanes on the 95 Express are claimed to have significantly increased average peak-time speeds on tolle
  • Integrated weather and traffic data aids winter maintenance
    October 10, 2012
    A US pooled fund study group has developed a system of software aimed at taking the concept of winter maintenance decision support to a new level – a scientific ‘one-stop-shop’ of weather and service performance data. This report is by Charles Chambers and Benjamin Hershey. With advancements in environmental technology come new systems that assist agencies with better management of winter roadway maintenance resources. In the late 1990s the US Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) began work developing a pr