More for less with traffic control centre technology

Rich pickings are now available in a maturing market supplying screens and processors for traffic management operations. Jon Masters reviews what’s on offer.

Competition in supply of technology for traffic management and control centres has increased significantly in recent years. Suppliers introduced better products and customers are changing the way they operate, which benefits traffic authorities and emergency services alike. These are the views of 6683 Electrosonic’s control rooms solutions sales manager Paul Brooks. Electrosonic styles itself as an audio-visual solutions specialist with a technology-agnostic view of its markets. This is a company that no longer manufactures its own screens or processors; focusing instead on integrating others’ equipment in building systems for its clients. “We are also getting more involved in the very early stages of projects, acting as a client advisor,” says Brooks.

This gives Electrosonic a good vantage point from which to comment on the technology market for traffic operations. One of the firm’s recent roles involved advising Dublin City Council as design consultant for the authority’s new traffic management centre. “They wanted to talk to someone that’s done it. Clients are becoming more knowledgeable about the technology and what they want from it,” Brooks says.

Greater competition is promoting bespoke solutions at lower cost. The supply base has grown significantly, with the number of processor manufacturers worldwide doubling in recent years. “Manufacturing costs have reduced and greater choice is allowing clients to select what is most appropriate for their needs. Clients are realising there is often a lot of functionality offered that they do not need,” says Brooks.

Simplicity is available if that’s what’s needed. Likewise, display technology – virtually a commodity item now, says Brooks – has also benefited from greater choice. “There is a lot of very good display cube technology on the market nowadays, but many customers are selecting LCD screens with LED backlight technology rather than rear projection cubes, mostly on cost grounds,” he says.
“Traditionally, a big problem of LCD display walls is maintenance but now individual screen mountings have improved so the wall does not have to be taken apart for maintenance. Bezel thickness around screens is down to about 3mm for screens up to 60 inches in diagonal size and [LCDs are] about a third the cost of a display cube. LCDs require less space and deliver high resolution.”

Other market trends relate to changes in operations, Brooks says. Electrosonic is encountering more instances of multiple display walls being ordered for a number of different functional areas of control rooms rather than one big display.

Greater collaborative work and sharing of resources is resulting in a growing presence of emergency services and multiple operators, such as bus and light rail operators, in control rooms alongside traffic management teams.

“The impact is a need for more shared equipment in peripheral areas or rooms of control centres, streaming images to meeting rooms or ‘gold command’ units for managing incidents,” says Brooks.

“This already happens a lot in Police control rooms and we’re seeing it more in traffic management centres. More people are asking for video conferencing due to these collaborative approaches. We’re offering this as a managed service so that video conferencing can be pulled into special control rooms.”
A greater number of applications is another expanding feature of modern traffic management centres, due in part to a lot more sensory equipment being deployed on road networks. Brooks gives the example of the A3 Hindhead Tunnel beneath the Surrey Hills in England. This is monitored for fire and air pollution as well as general traffic conditions. It also employs fire suppression and evacuation control technology.

“There are generally more monitoring systems in use on road networks and applications for streaming images and other data to displays if needed. IP cameras are the big thing here. There are different types, all streaming at a standard n-code but manufacturers have their own decoding all of which has to be managed.”

However, the highways sector is certainly benefiting from development of this technology and its transfer from other markets, particularly in the Middle East where demand is currently high. Brooks adds: “There is much more choice, and good competitive choice. Generally it all achieves similar results. Interfaces and functionality may be different with opportunities to expand systems, or it can be more basic. A lot of customers are asking for that.”

Christie mounts charge with modular platform

Display systems specialist 7336 Christie has enhanced its offer to the traffic management sector by upgrading its portfolio of digital displays, while developing its new Phoenix content management system.

“We have developed our display screens across 50 to 80 inch diagonal sizes, to provide the brightest possible outputs at minimal power consumption, taking LED solid state illumination technology to the point where we’re offering the best that can be found today,” says John Stark, the firm’s senior director of product management.

“For processing data to feed information to displays, Phoenix is a highly modular piece of technology, a small appliance that provides a lot of flexibility. It can take just a couple of inputs to drive this information to displays, or the great power in the system comes from the ability to use more than one to create display walls. More Phoenix boxes can be added to handle more inputs and provide greater scale, and all operators or screens can share access to all feeds.”

Christie is targeting Phoenix at a broad range of markets. “It’s designed to apply to the vast majority, including traffic control, security, financial and military sectors, commonly problem solving in maintaining and sharing information,” Stark says.

Applications can include mobile or temporary traffic control centres and rapid expansion or amalgamation of existing control rooms. “The units are very straightforward to allocate to tasks and have been designed to distribute data via IP networks, which is key,” says Stark.

“From a technical point of view, the reality of modern data management and displays is IP networks. That is what we are using to carry high resolution information for control room environments. It eliminates the need for AV translation technology because it takes all common data formats and pushes the feeds out onto IP networks. It is also quick and easy to set up. The operator just has to plug in, search for the first node, then configure from there.”

Software boost for processing power

Advances in processing technology have improved the feasibility of mobile or temporary traffic management centres (TMC), says 7361 Hiperwall’s chief executive officer Jeff Greenberg.

The challenge, he says, is getting sufficient communication bandwidth. Wireless connectivity generally means less bandwidth and so a need for less demanding technology. The H.264 digital format for delivering compressed video over wireless networks is helping reduce demand on bandwidth, so more can be achieved with existing networks.

Alternatively, specialised equipment is increasing functionality, plus control room technology such as display screens are getting lighter and thinner with less heat output, which is critical for controlling the energy demands.

Furthermore, with new communications equipment, everything can now be done over a standard IP network. “You just need a fairly standard network switch,” Greenberg says.

However, with video walls what is needed is powerful processing, which is where Hiperwall comes in. “Control centres have traditionally required a large specially built box of tricks with expansion cards for every input and display output. That’s no longer needed. With Hiperwall, everything just connects to the one switch which is ideal for a mobile operational centre with limited space,” Greenberg says.

The key offer from Hiperwall is clever software that replaces functionality traditionally provided by control centre hardware. “It’s software that can accept data in different formats and deliver it to all displays in a mobile control centre. It’s not bounded by any restrictions on signalling technology,” says Greenberg.

Uses of Hiperwall vary widely. Value, Greenberg says, comes from being able to visualise any content required for decision support in almost any environment. One example is in Stuttgart, Germany, where Hiperwall’s processing software is used for precisely tracking train movements across the city. The system uses Google Maps as a background, with train positions overlaid in high resolution.

“We believe this type of application will become more prevalent and is an indication of what’s to come in highways,” Greenberg says. “With more people connected and reporting information via their sat navs and smartphones, real-time traffic data is getting much better. Traditionally the only way of doing this monitoring has been with images from cameras, but with vehicle tracking and new control room technology there are better ways of visualising what’s going on to aid decision making.”