UA researchers, city aim to improve traffic with new technology - Tucson News Now

The city of Tucson and University of Arizona are developing technology to make it easier and safer for you to be on Tucson’s roads.

The group of UA researchers is working to connect vehicles with devices that allow them to "talk" to each other.

“It is really exciting to be partnering with the city to do research for the people,” said Larry Head, professor of Systems and Industrial Engineering at the University of Arizona.

Sensors and radios are being used to listen and communicate to the cars that drive by. Eventually, cars will be able to slow down or even stop automatically.

“We are looking at a lot of different options for technology in the transportation world to make it safer, more efficient and to give travelers those options,” said Jorge Riveros, city of Tucson’s Transportation Administrator.

In the future, the information sent by the cars will be transmitted to UA’s Transportation and Research Lab where they will be able to change traffic signals to clear up congestion.

“The cars are talking to each other and all we have to do is listen and be like, ‘Oh there’s a bunch of cars out there and they are stacked at a traffic light. Maybe we should manipulate the cars in an efficient way to get the cars to flow through better,’” Head said.

The information will be helpful for the city as well.

“We can measure the performance and we can tell the city traffic engineers if there’s a hot spot that is not operating very efficiently. We can go out and fix it,” Head said.

The work done in the Transportation Research Lab is all about traffic, traffic flow and optimization.

“Our goal is to try and make traffic systems operate better, safer, more efficient,” Head said.

Head and his group hope to implement the new technology in emergency vehicles.

“If I knew it was a fire truck, ambulance or a police car, or I knew that it was a transit bus we could do different things to the traffic light signal to make them operate better,” Head said.

The researchers get together every week to figure out what grants to apply for to get money to develop the technology.

“We are trying to bring the money into Tucson to get this done. Last year, 34,000 died in traffic accidents so now we have a new technology that is really going to make it safer,” Head said.

Now there’s an opportunity to outfit some cars with these communication devices.

“The more cars we get equipped the more benefits we get from (the program,)” Head said.

If you are interested in participating, email Larry.Head@arizona.edu.

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