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New contactless technology is being pioneered on the UK's M6 toll, which is operated by Midland Expressway. The technology is being developed in partnership with the UK bank Barclays and will enable drivers to make contactless payments when using the road with their debit and credit cards. Midland Expressway is currently installing the necessary contactless payment terminals ahead of the launch.

INIT, Innovations in Transportation, has signed a contract with the Utah Transit Authority (UTA) in Salt Lake City for the installation of an intelligent transportation solution to be fitted on more than 35 FrontRunner commuter rail vehicles. Fifty per cent of the vehicles already have existing automatic passenger counting technology from INIT and will be upgraded with the new system components.

UK police forces are a step closer to having equipment to test motorists suspected of drug driving, Home Office Minister James Brokenshire announced today. The Home Office has produced the specification for a new police station-based drug screening device. The document sets out what the device will do and the standards it must meet.

Some 26 electronic signboards installed in West Coast Highway, Dunearn Road, Bukit Timah Road, Jalan Anak Bukit and Woodlands Road, in Singapore, have started displaying information about incidents and traffic jams on arterial roads and expressway running parallel to it. The signboards are part of the Arterial Variable Message Signs (AVMS) that will display the information based on a live video footage.

Jenoptik's traffic solutions division has received a major order for systems and equipment for traffic monitoring from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The customer is Dallah Trans Arabia, located in Jeddah, and the scope of supply includes several hundred stationary systems for monitoring red light and speed violations. About 100 systems for mobile and stationary speed monitoring as well as a comprehensive software solution of Jenoptik have already been in use in Saudi Arabia since last year. The total equipme

A joint initiative of Ertico – ITS Europe, the European Commission and Eurocities, a Forum on ITS for Urban Mobility was held in Brussels yesterday to discuss and provide feedback on the draft guidelines for the deployment of ITS in urban areas, developed by DG Move’s Expert Group on Urban Mobility. As Nicolas White reports, the guidelines discussed focused on three crucial aspects of urban ITS: multimodal information services, smart ticketing and traffic management & urban logistics.

Siqura, manufacturer of advanced video surveillance solutions and member of TKH Group, has announced that it is currently developing an advanced camera platform that puts entire video analytics systems in stand-alone devices at the edge of the network. The company says that taking analytics to the perimeter of a surveillance system not only enhances the overall efficiency of the system but ensures more accurate and effective analysis of critical video material.

Coulomb Technologies has celebrated a significant milestone for the ChargePoint America programme. At a ceremony in Exposition Park hosted by the Honorable Antonio Villaraigosa, Mayor of Los Angeles. US Energy Secretary Steven Chu and Coulomb Technologies founder and CTO Richard Lowenthal unveiled the 500th ChargePoint America station available now on the ChargePoint Network. Others attending the ceremony included ChargePoint America programme vehicle partners Chevrolet, Ford and smart USA as well as electr

Bentley Systems, the specialist in software solutions for sustaining infrastructure, has acquired InspectTech Systems, a Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania-based provider of field inspection applications and asset management services for bridges and other transportation assets. Among current InspectTech users are federal and state departments of transportation, major transit agencies, toll authorities, counties, cities, and national and local consultants across the United States, as well as a major roadway authority

Electric vehicles (EVs) have gained significant attention over the last few years from various European governments as they look to promote the deployment of EV charging infrastructure. According to new analysis from Frost & Sullivan, contained in 'Strategic Analysis of the European EV Charging Station Infrastructure' there are strong indicators that the EV market will grow from less than 10,000 public charging points in 2010 to close to two million public charging points by 2017. Some three per cent of thi

Public safety officers in Las Vegas, Nevada, are on the air with a 700 MHz Band 14 LTE (Long Term Evolution) solution through a pilot programme to demonstrate the potential of next-generation wireless broadband technology. Harris Corporation is providing Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department (LVMPD) the system that delivers the power of LTE through modems installed in department vehicles. The system puts integrated, mission-specific information into the hands of public safety officers who respond to mill

The Victoria Park Tunnel, a significant infrastructure improvement to connect the Auckland harbour bridge to the Central Motorway in Auckland, New Zealand, has deployed a SwiftGate automated lane closure system. At the heart of the infrastructure project is an additional on-ramp built to increase the accessibility of the northbound highway lanes directly from urban downtown streets. This additional access is only available during peak hours when a movable barrier is shifted out, which meant that the ramp en

A French study cliams that nearly one-tenth of car accidents causing bodily injuries are associated with the use of mobile telephones. Compared to drivers who do not have phone conversations while driving, the risk of an accident increases threefold whether a driver is talking directly into a mobile phone or using a hands free kit. At any given moment, it is calculated that roughly six per cent of all drivers are talking on their mobile phones or hands-free kits.

The South Korea Times reports that a government automotive policy advisor suggested that the installation of video data recording devices in all vehicles may be mandatory in the country within a matter of a few years. Kim Pil-soo, professor of Daelim University, said discussions are already underway, led by a special government committee set up last year.