Texas A&M University Transportation Institute (TTI) announced Monday one of the first uses of its new RELLIS campus will be a partnership with companies to test, design and develop more efficient intersections.
Future intersections go beyond the sequenced traffic signals common on many city streets, including Houston. In addition to video cameras and signal timing that is relayed to crews back in a control room such as Houston TranStar, the signals and accompanying systems will be able to track traffic speeds, analyze information from one another and then possibly communicate that to vehicles.
A more robust system, then, could help vehicles reroute drivers to avoid hotspots such as crashes or road construction that’s slowing traffic.
The Smart Intersection Initiative research at TTI will be divided into three phases, moving from laboratory analysis and testing to a controlled environment on the RELLIS campus. Eventually, researchers plan to deploy some of the technologies at intersections in College Station.
Officials at the transportation institute said a critical part of the study is coordination with private companies working within the technology and transportation industry.
