Colombia. Many cities globally are finding that one of the answers to traffic problems in metropolitan areas lies in the use of real-time imagery.
The Citizen Perception Survey of the Network of Cities How We Go 2015, conducted among 12,548 Colombians residing in 10 different cities in the country, gives a glimpse of how the inhabitants see security and mobility on the main roads of Colombia.
The study determines that on average, 56 percent of citizens think that the development of the area where they live is on the right track being Manizales, Medellín and Barranquilla, the capitals that feel most satisfied in this aspect. However, the survey in the road mobility segment shows that Bogotá, for example, has aroused negative opinions, since about 52 percent of respondents say that today they spend more time reaching their destinations vs. the previous year. The same was said by 58 percent of the Bumangueses and 52 percent of the Cartagena people, of the traffic in their respective cities.
Regarding satisfaction with the city's roads, Manizales and Medellín occupied the first places, 76 and 61 percent respectively, while Bogotá and Ibagué are in the last places with 13 and 19 percent.
Part of the technological lag in many cities is due to the fact that, despite the considerable number of cameras installed, these are not technologically suitable for controlling the flow of road mobility.
This issue highlights the need to have more control over what happens on the roads to make an intelligent traffic management. The good news is that, as the concentration of vehicles in large cities increases, technology is also advancing to reduce the impact, as some pioneering experiences are evidencing.
Video surveillance cameras can be a source of accurate, detailed and real-time information about vehicles circulating on streets, urban highways and highways. These devices allow effective traffic management to reduce and prevent accidents, speed up traffic to avoid episodes of congestion, support the oversight work of the authorities and, in general, modernize operations for the benefit of users – as many cities are already seeing around the world.
An example of the use of this technology in transport is the solution implemented by the Ruta del Maipo highway in Chile, which connects Santiago with the southern part of the country, becoming a key route for the national economy. This concessionaire adopted a system of video surveillance cameras provided by Axis Communications, whose information has contributed to the reduction by 40 percent of the number of incidents in its 237 kilometers of extension.
Similarly, the traffic inspection authorities of the Sverdlovsk region of Russia, an agency under the Ministry of the Interior, implemented a video surveillance system with cameras in HDTV resolution from Axis Communications, complemented by analytical functionalities that have allowed to reduce by 25 percent the incidents, crimes and risks on the routes.
In the case of the city of Pratto, in Italy, the authorities are using a video surveillance system that incorporates a real-time counting analytical solution to plan and optimize the flow of traffic in its streets, tunnels, bridges and roads, by obtaining a source of detailed statistical information on the number, type and speed of vehicles that circulate daily.
On the other hand, in the city of Maastricht, in the Netherlands, video surveillance technology is also positioning itself as an ally to ensure safety and traffic control, but in this case, of its main means of urban transport, the bicycle. The authorities developed an ambitious plan to massify its use, for which they have deployed a centralized fiber optic monitoring system with Axis cameras, complemented with software whose objective is to analyze and provide real-time information on the status of the parking lots available for bicycles in the Central Station and the urban area of the city, for the benefit of users.
These are some inspiring examples that are emerging and that point to a future in which people will be able to arrive earlier at their offices, return to their homes in a shorter period of time, even reducing the emission of harmful gases into the air. In this scenario, alerts will be generated to a monitoring center from the presence of people crossing a highway or vehicles in the opposite direction, those who park in double row near the schools will be automatically fined, and offending vehicles will be identified as soon as they leave their garages, with the possibility of discovering the road that a newly stolen vehicle is making, for example. It is an existing path, from which we are not far away and to which a country like Colombia undoubtedly needs to reach.
