A Traffic Jam Preventive Technology Devised by Honda

Technology is advancing every second and this can be witnessed in the Satellite Navigation system for cars which can extract real-time traffic congestion information and suggest alternative routes that are low on traffic and can be preferred by the driver. Honda Motors keeps quite a different and innovative approach towards handling the rising traffic conditions. This Japanese firm has devised a new technology which is capable of detecting if a traffic jam is likely to be created because of a person’s driving  and if it is likely then the system encourages the driver to drive in a way that can keep the traffic flowing.

Everyone must have witnessed at least once a traffic jam on the freeway without any specific reason like accident or lane closure etc still the traffic jam takes a long to clear. This situation is very clichéd and it always bugs the driver; the overall result is increase in travel time, fuel consumption and also in the chances of rear-end accidents. A research was conducted in 2007 at the University of Exeter on traffic jam and it was revealed that the basic reason for such jams is not necessarily accidents or road blocks; the jam is basically caused by a ‘backward traveling wave’. This wave is triggered by the slowing down of one driver which causes the car behind to slow down more and the car behind to slow down a bit more and so on; this whole scenario is known as ‘accordion effect’ and finally somewhere down the line the traffic completely stops.

The technology formulated by Honda is the first in the world in which the system detects whether a traffic jam is possible due to the driving pattern of a vehicle and if yes then how it can be avoided. The system achieves this by monitoring the acceleration and deceleration patterns of the driver and if the system determines the potential for a probable traffic jam it suggests more fluent driving through a color-coded display. According to Honda Motors, the system can be connected to cloud computer for improved functioning which will allow the Adaptive Cruise Control (AAC) system of the car to get activated automatically at the right time and sync its driving pattern to the vehicle ahead of it and maintain a constant distance between the vehicles.

This highly-advanced system was tested by Honda and Tokyo’s University’s Research Centre for Advanced Science Technology together. In the test conducted, the cloud connectivity was not included and the ACC system increased the speed of the cars by nearly 7 percent and enhanced the fuel efficiency of the cars trailing in the traffic by nearly 3 percent. With the help of cloud computing both the figures are expected to improve to 23 percent and 8 percent respectively for average speed and fuel efficiency. To bring the concept in the market, Honda Motors will debut the public-road testing of this neoteric system in May this year in Italy and will be followed in Indonesia in July. 

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