News

A joint venture between Egis Projects and Sanef is paving the way for a new Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) and transponder-based ‘hub’ for nationwide tolling interoperability in the US. The joint venture, called Secure Interagency Flow LLC, has an agreement with the Alliance for Toll Interoperability (ATI) and operations are due to start by the end of this year. The final contract signings took place at the recent IBTTA conference in Vancouver and within the joint venture Egis will focus on opera

Development engineers from leading image processing companies worldwide met at the end of October under the patronage of G3, comprising the three international machine vision associations EMVA, AIA and JIIA for this years’ second International Standards Meeting. The experts discussed the development of the current standards used in image processing and tested the products and their compatibility with the standards. Key discussions included: The GenICam software standard meeting agreed to force the devel

Spanish technology company Indra will demonstrate its smart city solutions at the Barcelona Smart City Expo World Congress for applications such as energy efficiency, smart and sustainable urban transport, security and e-Government. The Indra urban platform for smart cities management and safety will be demonstrated, showing the company’s solution for major city management that facilitates the exchange of information between various systems and offers a complete overview of activities in order to adapt s

The Thai government hopes to immediately kick-start its infrastructure investment spending as soon as the US$63.26bn borrowing bill is passed. The massive investment is expected to help reduce logistics costs and turn Thailand into an Asean transport hub. The plans include building four-lane roads and widening existing two-lane roads to four lanes, construction of five dual track rail lines and improvement of existing routes, some of which could begin immediately, together with 41 new customs checkpoints. F

A study by business consulting firm Frost & Sullivan predicts Brazil’s electric vehicle fleet is set to increase 46-fold over the next four years as local energy firms prioritise the development of carbon-free technology, and by 2017 will boast 5,700 electric cars, up from 125 at the end of 2012. Brazil ranks as the world's fourth most important automotive market, with [an] electric vehicle (EV) and supporting infrastructure market that has immense potential for growth if automakers decide to invest in i

The busy ferry port of Salthomen, close to Gothenburg, Sweden has resolved its parking problem with the installation of a Sensit wireless parking sensor system developed by Dutch parking specialists Nedap. Parking bays are equipped with floor-mounted Sensit wireless sensors to detect in real-time whether or not a bay is occupied and for how long. The sensors are integrated with the Gothenburg’s existing P-IN parking management systems and information on available spaces is displayed on dynamic messages s

Japanese wireless technology expert Kyocera Corporation and Telenor Connexion, provider of connected business solutions for M2M, have announced a partnership agreement to supply M2M solutions for the international premium car market. The companies say OEMs with applications in need of high speed connection and instant access such as car telematics and on-board units for intelligent transport systems, smart metering, telemetry and security will benefit from reduced time to market and future-proof connecti

A special report, US Managed Lanes, by Fitch Ratings sees toll express or managed lanes (MLs) as especially difficult to assess for financial viability, saying that they vary enormously one to another and are likely to demonstrate very different performance and be subject to greater volatility than regular toll roads. But they say there is now sufficient experience with managed lanes (MLs) for some lessons to be learned. ML time savings compared to the regular lanes has been seen as the fundamental drive

The European Union (EU) will use US$831,000 from the Ten-T Programme to co-finance study on the creation of an intermodal hub in the Spanish region of Asturias. The aim is to foster intermodality and modal shift from road to other modes of transport. The study, which was selected for funding under the 2012 TEN-T Annual Call, will support the construction of an intermodal hub located within the area of industrial and logistic activities of Asturias (ZALIA) near the Spanish cities of Aviles, Gijon and Ovie

Smart parking solutions from Swiss-based Tinynode’s are to be added to Swarco’s road safety and traffic management portfolio in a partnership that sees the technology also added to Swarco’s own traffic solutions. Tinynode’s wireless vehicle detection systems for outdoor and on-street parking are used as part of smart parking solutions which enable motorists to locate a free parking space. The company says there are several million parking spaces in Europe alone that could utilise the system. The Swarco

Jenoptik’s Traffic Solutions division and its local partner Telco International are to install over 60 stationary speed and red-light enforcement systems in Qatar as part of the country’s initiative to improve road safety. The order, from the Qatar Ministry of the Interior, is for Jenoptik’s TraffiStar systems which use non-invasive sensors instead of in-road detectors to monitor traffic in both directions and across several lanes simultaneously. The systems will be housed in the new innovative design

OnLane, the lane departure warning system developed by US commercial vehicle safety technology provider Meritor Wabco is now available as an option on Freightliner Cascadia and Freightliner Cascadia Evolution models. Powered with SafeTrak technology by Takata, OnLane is a forward-looking, vision-based lane departure warning system designed to monitor road markings and the vehicle's position in the lane. The one-box solution integrates a camera and electronics system and delivers distinct and separate au

Following a report analysing the transport situation in the Bratislava region (BSR), the government is to invest some US$483.73 million into new transport projects in the region by 2015. Projects include the construction of infrastructure, improvement of public transport and the development of all types of transport, through the current Operational Programme Transport (OPT) and future Integrated Operational Programme Infrastructure. By mid-2014 the Transport Ministry plans to select an advisor for th

Peru's private investment promotion agency ProInversión plans to grant 37 transport, energy, infrastructure and water projects in the next two years, its executive director Javier Illescas said. Although ProInversión has launched tenders during 2013 for several major infrastructure projects, many of the original deadlines have been postponed numerous times. Among the projects postponed is the US$74 million concession for the Amazon waterway, initially set to be awarded in quarter four 2013, which has bee

The European Traffic Safety Council (ETSC) has welcomed the publication of a European Commission study which evaluates the effects of the implementation of Directive 92/6/EEC on speed limitation devices. The study recommends, as ways of improving the Directive’s effectiveness, exploring the options of introducing intelligent speed assistance (ISA) to the vehicles currently covered by the legislation, as well as extending its requirements to some light commercial vehicles. “ETSC welcomes today’s publicati