In Brossard, a suburb of Montreal, Canada, utopia and dystopia are meeting for the future. Tests have begun on the first of a series of "educational" traffic lights that reward only those who respect the speed limits. Handsome? Ugly? 50% and 50%? Similar things have been seen for a while in Europe too, but this model reaches excellence.
Meet FRED
For friends, their name is FRED. For lovers of acronyms, however, it is the "Feu de Ralentissement ÉDucatif". In summary, these intelligent traffic lights remain red until they detect the arrival of a car, but not for everyone: they only turn green if the car is traveling at an adequate speed.
Reckless drivers are forced to stop longer and maybe (the developers say) to reevaluate their lifestyle choices.
The traffic lights friends of the schools
Authorities installed the first of the FRED traffic lights near a school, in an area that had a tendency for drivers to hit the accelerator a little too hard.
The mayor Doreen Assaad lets know that the tests will last a total of 3 months, but the first days have already given interesting signals: before installation, the average speed was 40 km/h: now it has dropped to 29 km/h.
Not bad, if you take into account the fact that speed is directly responsible for at least 25% of accidents in urban traffic.
The potential of smart traffic lights
We have talked about it in several articles: traffic lights will also be useful in the possible next era of autonomous vehicles. What's more, they will acquire new "powers", and I'm not just talking about the infamous "fourth light“: in addition to road safety, they will become valuable hubs for collecting data on traffic, pollution and other factors. In many years they could even, properly equipped, create 3D maps of roads in real time, helping to realize “virtual twins" Some cities.
In summary, the traffic lights of the future will end up becoming real "lymph nodes" in the "urban circulatory system".
For this reason, FREDs could mark a step forward in promoting more responsible and safe driving, especially in residential areas. Maybe configured for mobility even smarter: for example, by regulating traffic based on parameters such as the state of the roads, or weather conditions.
What are you saying? Shall we turn it on?
