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The Audi Urban Future Award aims to stimulate new visions for cities and urban mobility; research collaborations with academic and cultural institutions worldwide; interactive events and workshops that bring together experts from many fields; and an internal interdepartmental think tank dedicated to issues of urban mobility. According to Audi, by 2050 two-thirds of all people will be living in large cities, a development which will pose major challenges for society and raises the question: what will be t

The Highways Agency has unveiled three possible route options for a new link road between the M54, the northbound M6 and the M6 Toll in Staffordshire. The plans are on show at exhibitions starting today, marking the start of an eight-week public consultation for the scheme, which will reduce congestion on local roads, improve safety and support economic growth in the surrounding area – all part of the government’s long term economic plan. Highway Agency Project Manager Bill Birkett said: “It is import

Bolivia aims to start work on the first of five new cable car lines in the capital next year, part of US$2.5 billion planned investment in infrastructure projects in 2015. The La Paz-El Alto cable car system's second phase, which includes an investment of US$450 million for the five new lines, will be completed by 2020, said César Dockweiler, CEO of state-owned operator Mi Teleférico. Bolivia's government plans to increase its 2015 public spending budget 37% to US$6.18bn, economy minister Luis Arce sa

A wide range of Brigade Electronics’ vehicle safety products is now certified to E-Mark (UN ECE Regulation 10, Revision 4), in line with new regulations which came into force at the end of October. Only electrical products carrying the E-Mark can be fitted to approved vehicles in advance of registration without the vehicles then requiring further homologation testing as ‘complete’ or ‘completed’ vehicles. To comply, Brigade reviewed its product range and ensured all of its main lines are certified. St

A new study, Autonomous Driving, by Roland Berger Strategy consultants finds that automatic driving will generate additional revenue volume of up to US$40 billion in component sales in the period through 2030. In addition, new software solutions needed for automated driving will reach a global market volume as high as 20 billion dollars by 2030. There are specific technologies to be mastered, to a large extent unknown territory for both OEMs and suppliers and considerable investments will be needed to de

Swiss wireless communications specialist and Australia connected vehicle technology provider Cohda Wireless have joined forces to develop an advanced vehicle to vehicle/infrastructure (V2X) solution. Offering best in class performance, the MK5 was recently demonstrated at the 2014 ITS World Congress in Detroit and is suitable for first-mount automotive electronics, aftermarket products and roadside infrastructure. Cohda’s dedicated short-range communications (DSRC) based V2X system uses accurate satel

French funicular railway group POMA has formed a joint venture between Algiers metro company Entreprise du Métro d’Alger (EMA), and the Algiers urban and suburban transport company Entreprise de Transport Urbain et Suburbain d’Alger (ETUSA). The new company, Entreprise de Transport Algérien par Câbles (ETAC) will design, develop and construct the urban ropeway transportation network in Algeria. Algeria is the largest country in Africa, with a population of 39.21 million. It is also the country with the m

According to research by Bury-based online car supermarket JamJar Direct, which indicates that 47 per cent of Greater Manchester motorists claim to have been affected by the construction works, communications around the M60 smart motorway improvements are sorely lacking. Almost two thirds of Greater Manchester motorists (62 per cent) are aware that the M60 is being turned into a smart motorway, but over 40 per cent, equivalent to 81,000 vehicles per day using affected stretch of M60 between junctions 8 a

New projections, released today by the International Transport Forum (ITF) at the OECD during the COP20 climate change negotiations in Lima, Peru, highlight a critical choice for policy makers: whether to pursue urbanisation based on public transport or on private transport with cars and two-wheelers. Big cities in China, India and Latin America with over 500,000 inhabitants will more than double their share of world passenger transport emissions by 2050 to 20 per cent (2010: 9 per cent), if current urba

A European Parliament/Council deal on a life-saving automatic emergency call system for cars, agreed on Monday evening, was backed by Internal Market Committee MEPs on Thursday. The in-vehicle eCall system uses 112 emergency call technology to alert the emergency services to serious road accidents automatically. This enables them to decide immediately on the type and size of rescue operation needed, helping them to arrive faster, save lives, reduce the severity of injuries and cut the cost of traffic ja

A successful consortium led by the UK’s Transport research Laboratory (TRL) has been selected by Innovate UK to deliver the GATEway project (Greenwich Automated Transport Environment), one of three projects awarded to test driverless vehicles in UK urban locations. The US$12.5 million project will see three trials of different types of zero emission automated vehicles within an innovative, technology-agnostic testing environment set in the Royal Borough of Greenwich. The ‘prime meridian’ was establi

Part of the Finnish intelligent transportation strategy, a new booking service for Russia-bound traffic at the Vaalimaa border crossing point in Finland aims to evaluate ways of reducing future peak-hour traffic, with the objective of streamlining traffic flow and increasing road safety by smoothing traffic volumes. The service becomes available for freight traffic on 15 December and for passenger traffic on 19 January 2015. The service is free of charge for users and is mandatory for all drivers using t

The International Bridge, Tunnel and Turnpike Association (IBTTA has responded to a new report released by the Eno Center for Transportation. How We Pay for Transportation: The Life and Death of the Highway Trust Fund looks at the current political, economic and legal forces behind the US Highway Trust Fund, including an examination of other countries and their lessons on providing long term sustainable funding for transportation. Patrick D. Jones, IBTTA executive director and CEO, said: “We salute the

Traffic management barriers developed by Belgian access control systems are being used on the Norra Länken motorway project in Sweden, supplied through its local partner Swarco. Built in cooperation with the city of Stockholm and co-financed by the European Union, Norra Länken is five kilometres long with four kilometres in tunnels and is said to be northern Europe’s largest road tunnel project. Two types of barrier have been installed on the project, the BL77 security barrier and the extra long BL52

Recently released publications from the Intelligent Transportation Systems Joint Program Office (ITS-JPO) include the United States-Japan Evaluation Tools and Methods fact sheet and the United States-Japan-European Union Probe Data fact sheet.