Initially deployed in Bangkok in August this year, the BlipTrack queue and flow management system from Danish company Blip Systems is being expanded to cover additional roads in the Thai capital.
Thailand’s Department of Highway (DOH) has been so impressed with the traffic data collected by the BlipTrack queue management system that it is now expanding the technology to cover additional roads in Bangkok. The expansion will provide city engineers with travel times and congestion alerts to ease traffic problems, and provide drivers with real-time traffic information via the DOH’s smartphone application. The city is considered to have some of the worst traffic congestions in the world, especially during the holidays in January and mid-April, which are notorious for causing major traffic gridlocks, as millions leave the capital to celebrate with their families.
Faced with the challenges of trying to ease traffic and reduce the gridlocks, the DOH needed a solution to help provide live and detailed traffic information. To help manage the challenges of measuring and providing travel time and traffic flow information, and predict traffic build-up, the BlipTrack solution was selected in 2015 and deployed earlier this year. The DOH mobile app, which provides information on travel times, fastest routes and other traffic information, is continually updated, in line with the actual behavior of road users. So, by considering their route and the time they depart, motorists themselves are helping to keep the traffic moving. The BlipTrack data will ultimately deliver economic benefits through reduced travel times, fuel consumption and vehicle emissions.
“The solution works by placing BlipTrack sensors at strategic points along the roads. The sensors, covering roughly a 600km (373 miles) section of highway in and around Bangkok, detect Bluetooth or wi-fi devices found in cell phones and in-car audio and communication systems,” explained Christian Bugislaus Carstens, marketing manager at Blip Systems. “By re-identifying devices from multiple sensors, specific and accurate statistical information, such as travel times, average speeds, dwell times and movement patterns become available.”
