This year, an intelligent transportation system (ITS) implemented by Kapsch TrafficCom began operating on the Monterrey-Saltillo highway in Mexico. The main objective of the new system is to improve safety on the highway, where low visibility caused by fog during certain times of the year increases the probability of accidents.
Supported by other operational processes implemented by the concessionaire on the highway, the result has been a visible drop in the number of serious accidents. Even with increasing traffic in 2022, the number of serious accidents on the highway continues to fall, according to data from the concessionaire.
“Our purpose as a company has always been to protect human life and we have a very serious commitment to work safety and the safety of highway users,” says Victor Michelet, systems director for Mexico at Roadis. “That is why in late 2017 we started looking at how technology could help us and we decided, along with a series of investments, to also invest in the technological part.”
The project by Kapsch includes the improvement and modernization of the entire intelligent transport system. This includes both legacy equipment as well as the incorporation of new state-of-the-art equipment and systems to improve the ability to monitor the highway and ensure the functionality and operability of the traffic management software. For this, the latest version of EcoTrafiX was implemented, integrating more than 100 devices for its operation along the 96km of the highway. This makes Monterrey–Saltillo one of the most highly equipped highways in the country.
“We opted for the EcoTrafiX solution because of the versatility and the manageable part of what it presents in preventive terms, such as constant monitoring of what happens on the highway, and also in reactive ones, such as action plans and automatic protocols,” says Michelet. “What we wanted was to have the centralized knowledge of everything that is happening, and now we have the ability to visualize almost the entire highway and make proactive management decisions.”
“We cooperated with the concessionaire for the design and adaptation of the project to maximize the functionalities and meet the requirements,” says On Santiago Rosas, solution consulting manager for Kapsch TrafficCom Mexico. “This includes the creation of response plans based on low visibility conditions and reports focused on the specific needs of the concessionaire.”
