Skip to main content

Cisco’s low-cost fibre optic solution for traffic monitoring

Cisco’s display focuses on a novel way of detecting traffic speeds, congestion and incidents without the use of loops. The company is using a fibre optic cable positioned alongside the road and down which it shines a light. Vibration created by passing vehicles create vibration which disrupts the passage of the light. Cisco has developed algorithms that can translate these disruptions to determine what type of vehicle is passing, in which direction, the lane it is using and the speed it is travelling. The
March 21, 2018 Read time: 2 mins
Niels van den Berg

1028 Cisco’s display focuses on a novel way of detecting traffic speeds, congestion and incidents without the use of loops. The company is using a fibre optic cable positioned alongside the road and down which it shines a light.

Vibration created by passing vehicles create vibration which disrupts the passage of the light. Cisco has developed algorithms that can translate these disruptions to determine what type of vehicle is passing, in which direction, the lane it is using and the speed it is travelling.

The fibre optic cables run in lengths of up to 80km and are divided (virtually) into five to 15 metre sections for detection purposes and it is said to be far cheaper and less disruptive to install and maintain than its traditional counterpart.

According to the company’s Niels van den Berg, the Dutch authorities have proved the new system’s accuracy by comparing it with the current loop-based results.

Stand: 11.209

%$Linker: 2 External <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-16"?><dictionary /> 0 0 0 link-external www.cisco.com Cisco website link false https://www.cisco.com/ false false%>

Related Content

  • Bird acquires California-based EV firm Scoot
    June 19, 2019
    Scooter-share firm Bird is to acquire Scoot, a San Francisco-based electric vehicle (EV) company. Scoot began deploying electric scooters in San Francisco in 2012 and has expanded in Santiago, Chile and Barcelona. Travis VanderZanden, founder and CEO of Bird says the partnership will work toward replacing “car trips with micro mobility options for all”. Scoot will continue to operate under the same name but as a subsidiary of Bird.
  • Enhanced WISETRIP final event
    August 20, 2014
    The Enhanced WISETRIP final event, which takes place in Brussels on 29 August, will provide an opportunity to showcase the achievements of the Enhanced WISETRIP project and contribute to the debate on priorities for delivering EU-wide multi-modal travel information. Enhanced WISETRIP has developed a unified intermodal planner for international journeys which incorporates functions for planning, booking and travelling multimodal journeys adapted to user needs including multiple trip criteria, environment
  • RobotTuner explores autonomous accreditation at Intertraffic
    March 19, 2018
    A newcomer at this year’s Intertraffic is RobotTuner which is displaying software for monitoring and remote control of autonomous vehicles and its simulation software for assessing object detection and classification safety systems. At Intertraffic it will highlight the ‘Digital driving license’ project it is undertaking with the Netherlands Vehicle Authority and the Netherlands Driver Exam Authority. The project aims to establish new methodology for the certification and type approval of autonomous
  • Contributions now open for ITS World Congress in Copenhagen
    September 15, 2017
    The call for contributions at the ITS World Congress in Copenhagen are now open under the theme ITS – Quality of Life, deadline 29 September 2017. The 25th congress will focus on ITS solutions that contribute to livability, greener environment and lower congestion and will provide experts with the opportunity to present the latest ITS solutions and mobility technologies.