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Highways England has appointed six joint-venture companies to design and build ten smart motorways across England as part of a US$2.3 billion investment. Three of these projects will start in autumn this year: two in the Midlands on the M1 J19 to J16 in Northamptonshire and the M5 J4a to J6 in Worcestershire, and one in the north-west on the M6 J16 to J19 near Stoke-on-Trent. The smart motorway schemes, part of the US$23 billion government investment Highways England is delivering between now and 2021

The Jacobs Engineering Group has been awarded a contract to provide design services for the Construction Package 2-3 (CP 2-3) of the California High Speed Rail, the continuation of construction on the California high-speed rail system south towards Kern County. Jacobs is the lead designer for the Dragados-Flatiron joint venture for the design-build contract and is responsible for the infrastructure design. The California High Speed Rail is the first true high-speed rail being constructed in the United S

Automotive electronics supplier Visteon Corporation has received a Global Innovation Award from Nissan Motor Corporation for a pioneering 7-inch display instrument cluster with advanced graphics, featured in the all-new 2015 Nissan Murano. Based on Nissan's mid-sized crossover platform, the Murano features Visteon's first cluster program with an integrated seven-inch thin-film-transistor (TFT) display developed for Nissan. The cluster's advanced graphics were specified by Nissan to give the driver quick

Two US security experts have demonstrated security flaws in a Jeep Cherokee by taking wireless control of its systems from ten miles away. Writing on technology website Wired, Andy Greenberg, who was driving the jeep at the time, tells how Charlie Miller and Chris Valasek first toyed with the vehicle’s air conditioning, entertainment system and windscreen wipers, before cutting the transmission and causing the jeep to slowly come to a halt. Greenberg says, “The most disturbing manoeuvre came when they

US transportation systems specialist McCain is to partner with TrafficWrapz to enhance its traffic cabinet offerings. Under the agreement, McCain will represent the TrafficWrapz patent-pending line of anti-graffiti and chemical-resistant protection that turn intersection cabinets into custom pieces of art. Many civic improvement projects are spoilt by graffiti and the high costs of its removal. Unlike paint that may fade and need to be reapplied after a few years, TrafficWrapz technology offers communiti

From early November 2015, the multi-million pound Humber Bridge project will introduce the UK's first electronic toll collection (ETC) and open-road tolling system to the bridge, enabling motorists who apply for a HumberTag account to pay the toll automatically using an electronic tag linked to a personal online account. The middle lanes of the bridge won’t have any booths and will be for account holders only – enabling drivers to cross the bridge without stopping. The outside lanes will still have booth

Iteris participated in the grand opening of Mcity, the University of Michigan’s (U-M) 32 acre testing facility for connected and driverless vehicle technologies. Iteris has been a key part of many initiatives intended to advance connected vehicle technologies including developing the US Department of Transportation’s Connected Vehicle Reference Implementation Architecture. At the grand opening, Iteris featured several currently deployed technologies including multi-sensor detection systems, travel time

The Balfour Beatty Vinci joint venture has been awarded a contract by Highways England to deliver a smart motorway package worth up to US$792 million, the largest of Highways England’s three packages within its US$2.3 billion Smart Motorway Programme. The joint venture will deliver smart motorway upgrades to a ten mile stretch of the M5 Junctions 4a to 6 in Worcestershire; a 12 mile section of the M6 Junctions 2 to 4 in the Midlands and a 32 mile stretch of the M4 Junctions 3 to 12 in London and Berkshir

TomTom has added navigable maps for thirteen new countries to its global map database, which now covers over 45.6 million kilometres and 4.3 billion people worldwide, and features full navigable coverage for 134 countries. Global map enhancements include the launch of navigable, turn-by-turn maps for Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Peru, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Panama, Costa Rica, Honduras, El Salvador, Iraq, Ghana, Rwanda and Burundi; Address Points have also been introduced to enable better geocodi

The Research Data Exchange (RDE), a web-based data resource provided by the US Department of Transportation's Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) Program, collects, manages, and provides access to archived and real-time multi-source and multi-modal data to support the development and testing of ITS applications. The RDE now contains two new data environments associated with intersection queues and weather sensing applications, which were demonstrated during the 2014 ITS World Congress in Detroit an

Frost and Sullivan’s latest report indicates that following a series of high-technology head up display (HUD) roll-outs, the automotive industry appears keen to adopt the imaging technology with the widest field of view (FOV) of up to 12 degrees x 5 degrees. Another HUD product feature to improve considerably is the brightness of virtual images, which increased up to 15000cd/m², even with lower power consumption. Digital light processing (DLP) and laser display are emerging as compelling alternatives to the

Siemens new Sapphire journey time measurement system (JTMS) offers a low cost, simple to deploy solution for recording and analysing journey times and network performance, says the company. The system uses the Bluetooth technology commonly found in mobile phones, aftermarket accessories, in-car communication and audio systems and is compact and simple to install, minimising street clutter. The system is fully integrated into the Siemens Stratos hosted traffic management system, providing all the necessar

The University of Michigan has opened Mcity, the world's first controlled environment specifically designed to test the potential of connected and automated vehicle technologies that will lead the way to mass-market driverless cars. Mcity was designed and developed by U-M's interdisciplinary MTC, in partnership with the Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT). The 32-acre simulated urban and suburban environment includes a network of roads with intersections, traffic signs and signals, streetligh

Kapsch TrafficCom has implemented its automated access control system in the city of Prato in Tuscany, Italy, to regulate access into the city and protect its historic heritage and environment. The system, installed in the Limited Traffic Zone (LTZ) started operations in early July 2015 and consists of a central system, software managing and issuing the permits and cameras placed at six gates that mark the access points to the city centre. This solution replaces the old system based on paper permits and

The UK government has launched a US$30 million competitive fund for collaborative research and development into driverless vehicles, along with a code of practice for testing. The measures, announced by Business Secretary Sajid Javid and Transport Minister Andrew Jones, will put the UK at the forefront of the intelligent mobility market, expected to be worth US£1.4 trillion by 2025. The government wants bidders to put forward proposals in areas such as safety, reliability, how vehicles can communicat