BMW wants smarter traffic lights

By: Drivers.com staff
Date: Monday, 21. December 2009

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Here at Drivers.com we've written for years about intelligent roads, intelligent cars, intelligent drivers. Now it's the turn of intelligent traffic lights.

Recently, at a test Track near Munich, Germany, BMW's Traffic Technology and Traffic Management group has been busy checking how management of traffic light timing could produce greater fuel efficiency and improve traffic flow. The group's engineers say they were able to almost double the fuel economy of a 530D test model from 22 mpg to 42 mpg by creating "green waves" for drivers.

Now the BMW group has been meeting with U.S. Department of Transport officials to discuss how smarter traffic lights might dramatically improve fuel economy and traffic flow.

Currently, traffic lights are rarely more sophisticated than sensor loops in the roadway to detect the presence and speed of vehicles. Apparently, BMW is figuring the improving the intelligence of traffic lights with greater sensing capabilities has more potential to improve fuel economy than the minor improvements it can achieve by incremental improvements to the efficiency of its engines.

The future may see intersection control systems that can "see" traffic in all directions, measure its speed, and manage light timing for greater fuel economy.

Soon, the irritations of sitting at a red light with no traffic in sight in any direction may be a thing of the past.

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