Intelligent traffic system to ensure help is just 10 minutes away on Delhi-Mumbai e-way
The 246km Sohna-Dausa stretch of the expressway was inaugurated on Sunday by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the highway is expected to open to traffic on February 15, said officials. Final touches are being given to the road to ensure that it is absolutely safe for motorists, they said
Commuters on the newly opened stretch of the Delhi-Mumbai Expressway will be able to get assistance within 10 minutes of any accident or incident on the highway, National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) officials said on Monday, adding that a state-of-the-art traffic control room has been set up on the highway at Alipur in Sohna, to monitor traffic, check violations, and respond immediately to incidents on the highway.
The 246km Sohna-Dausa stretch of the expressway was inaugurated on Sunday by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the highway is expected to open to traffic on February 15, said officials. Final touches are being given to the road to ensure that it is absolutely safe for motorists, they said.
The control room in the first phase will monitor traffic up to 78km of the stretch (till Alipur), while in the second phase it will be able to monitor traffic on the entire expressway. Smaller control rooms will be set up to monitor the highway package wise, said NHAI officials.
NHAI officials said learning from the experiences on the Kundli-Manesar-Palwal (KMP) Expressway, Intelligent transportation system and advanced traffic management system has been deployed on Delhi-Mumbai expressway. With the help of this system, NHAI officials said they will be able to monitor traffic, check violations, and ensure immediate dispatch of response vehicles for incident management.
“Our target is that patrolling teams deployed on the highway must be able to reach those in need of help within 10 minutes of being called or alerted. They will be equipped with mobile tablets and their vehicles will have multiple cameras to ensure that the control room is able to view everything at the incident spot,” said Manohar Meena, intelligent traffic system consultant, NHAI.
Highway officials said the system deployed at the control room is called “Sajag (alert)” and the patrolling cars are called Prahari (sentinel). “These two systems have been integrated and the entire intelligent traffic management system has been developed in-house with learnings from other countries. Our focus is on saving lives by effective monitoring, detection and prevention of accidents,” said Varun Agarwal, intelligent traffic system consultant, NHAI.
On Sunday, Union transport minister Nitin Gadkari and Haryana chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar had instructed the traffic control room at Alipur to ensure that each and every inch of the highway is tracked.
To that end, the NHAI has deployed cameras at every kilometre, which are able to record every movement on the highway as well as 500 metres to the left and right of the road. “The cameras are powerful and high resolution devices capable of generating clean images even at night. The traffic monitoring CCTV camera system is for surveillance and automatic incident/accident detection on the entire stretch,”said Meena.
“Traffic violations such as speeding, wrong side driving, wrong parking, and lane violations will be immediately detected and the operator in the control room will be alerted. This data will be analysed and a fine will be issued to the violating vehicle and also shared with local traffic police for execution,” he said, adding that number plate detection, management of congestion and other functions will be carried out through this system.
NHAI officials said to prevent speeding, which is one of the prime cause of accidents on expressways, they have installed speed cameras, speed radars and automatic violation detection system every 10km of the highway. “The response time for any incident will be around 10 minutes and this will ensure that accident victims get timely medical aid,” he said.
The speed limit on the highway is 120 kilometres per hour (kmph), and any vehicle that goes above 126 kmph will be automatically fined, said NHAI.
To provide timely information to commuters, the authority has installed both fixed signage as well as digital signboards, which shall share real time information on congestion, accidents and other information relevant to drivers. “Emergency telephones are installed at every 2km for users to contact the traffic management centre in case they need any assistance,”said Meena.
At any time, the control room will have five persons to monitor the multiple screens and they will be in constant touch with the patrolling staff, said the highways authority.
In order to make the system foolproof, the intelligent system also reviews the health of computers and other hardware that is part of this system. “Any anomaly or weakness will be corrected beforehand to ensure there remains no gap while monitoring the road,” said Meena.
