Hi All,
may be its time we used the IT infrastructure and the already available infrastructure to get people learn some traffic rules
My opinion would be to outsource technology, infrastructure and marshaling to high end cameras and monitoring systems to take care of traffic rule violations and imposing of fines and make the process devoid of traffic police interference and in the process take the big burden off the heads of the Traffic police and let them stick to their more important job of managing the traffic -
using technology would let the TP (traffic police) make a note of repeated offenders and would help in auto collection of fines through third party system,
The above may be well known to all- but the reason to mention it out here is that - it needs to be at least tried out in a pilot way to find its effectivity -
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Its already underway via BTRAC/TMC
Via BTRAC-2010, polie has already added a lot of automation. I would say surf around for keywards BTRAC and TMC (Traffic Management Center), and you could then propose what things BTP (Blr traffic police) could do on top of what they have already spent the money on.
Exactly - they have spent
Exactly - they have spent money - and we see results - but 5 high res cameras and a few interceptors(per the website) are not going to help,
I am looking forward for the BTP to get the citizens of Bangalore to follow the rules and abide by them -
What everyones knows that the bandwidth of BTP does not envisage them to go to a extent where you can strongly put down the unruly road goers.
There should be some sort of private and BTP partnership to get this going. There should be a high res enforcement camera at all signals to start with - handled by a local image processing center who can then send out challans and at the same time input into a database with proof the details of traffic violation - which is then available to the BTP on their blackberries
Technology being just a part - its the people who should learn to respect others on road and this may only be possible through stringent means,
Maybe the road infrastructure also has a part to play and so are other issues- but one has to take one step at a time
Panning cameras
The cameras which are installed at many traffic junctions via the BTRAC project , are not upto the mark.
They should have installed cameras which can be panned and controlled from the Control room.
If you see the images from those cameras on the BTIS website, most of the camera are focused at the centre of the junction. or there are few wires dangling just in front of the camera blocking the clear view. I wonder how do the cops get the clear idea of the traffic.
The below image is from the camera at the Cash Pharmacy Circle. Wouldnt it made a better sense if the camera was focussed towards the Richmond Circle flyover. That would have shown the traffic pile up at the signal.
Somedays back the cable thats dangling on the right side was at the centre of the camera's focus.
Plus traffic lights also to be added
I agree. I go one step further. Once pannable cameras ready, traffic lights also should be linked to control room. So that traffic lights can be controlled centrally if required with help of ground staff. Last Saturday , I see Sony World signal Koramangala was put on manual mode locally and even switched off for a while. Result was a mess.
They should have installed
They should have installed cameras which can be panned and controlled from the Control room.
These cameras can be panned 360 degrees and zoomed in to get closer look at the vehicle. They can be controlled remotely from the control center as well. They are as good as you can get anywhere.
I hope you were not expecting to do all that on BTIS site :)
All these are available!!
Irfanulla/ksnandan/Bheema,
All the points you have suggested here are already available - up and running for the last couple of years. A Praja team had visited the BTP's Traffic Management Cewnter last year. See http://praja.in/en/events/2009/08/visit-bangalores-traffic-management-center for details.
To add onto what IDS has mentioned, there were 80 of these last year itself. The target for BTRAC is/was to have a total of 160 such cameras. I cant vouch for how many of those are working at any point in time and how many of them are available for public access through btis.in.
Not only are the cameras good, they are connected to the control center through a dedicated broadband line. Bandwidth availablity is in great excess of the need!!
Also, the traffic lights are connnected to and controlled by the TMC. Always note, the 'standard' traffic lights work best in 'normal' circumstances. If the traffic lights are switched off or in manual mode, they will be due to 'extreme' traffic conditions. Police personnel will be able to judge the needs of the traffic flow from different roads at a junction and optimise the time distribution accordingly. So, the total throughput of the junction will be maximum in manual mode, rather than the 'central standard/automated' mode - since there are more chances of idle time in automated mode.
Update : Sorry, I now read the above mentioned post - and realise that the numbers I quoted here are incorrect. But yes, I do remember that they were planning to add more. Cant be sure of the exact number anymore :)
-Srivatsava V
Thanks Srivatsava !
I was not aware of all these. More homework to do :)
If they are already there ,
If they are already there , then Kudos to BTP :) I take back my criticism
Thanks idontspam and srivatsava for giving the info :)
I hope you were not expecting to do all that on BTIS site :)
i wish i could do that ;)
results
I hope they put the infra they have to good use, point is to use these not only to monitor or control the traffic but also get on and start imposing fines -
I would like to know how perfectly can they zoom camera's - and if they can start penalizing based of images taken up from the camera.
a quick google search led me to this http://www.jai.com/EN/Traffic/Products/Pages/VehicleImagingSystem.aspx
and http://magicvalley.com/news/local/article_a2c10ccf-d8fb-5e9b-bbec-c455c30be17e.html
the current cameras can take decesions on controlling the signal lights and that would take a lot of effort off the control room, but donno how that would help in our city.
I am only looking forward to have more and more people adhereing to traffic rules bcos its life at stake and here it seem implementing rules and penlazing is the only way -
http://www.jai.com/EN/Traffic/Products/Pages/TicketExpresssystem.aspx
the above link is one of the way to automate the traffic offence penalizing process
and this is where we can get it in India http://www.jai.com/EN/Contact/Pages/India.aspx
as we have just 5 high res camera's - we need more of these and atleast 2 on each signal - and strict imposition of fines,
please note that I am not an agent or rep of the above mentioned - but just found them on the Inet
I was surprised by the one located near the Sadnagar policestation - it looks so big and bulky - my friend in US showed me an image took by a camera in a signal which is like a foot long 3 inch tube mounted on the traffic signal pedestal and he could see his face and license plate crystal clear - and yes not only fines - but a visit to a RTO for getting retrained in the rules would hit people in face.
RGDS
IRfan
Delhi police using Facebook
Just read an article here http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/02/technology/02traffic.html
Would it work for Bangalore?
-Shastri
Fantastic ! I have on earlier
Fantastic ! I have on earlier occasions suggested some such similar vigilante photography things but I think there might be serious privacy violations. But from what I gathered from an interview with Praveen Sood on Citizen matters collection of fines/ enforcement of traffic rules is not a high priority for Bangalore police.