Don't Pass the Red Light

Ok I'll ask a few questions before I give my opinion:

Who's driving these cars?

How large are they?

"Cars" as in passenger cars or "Cars" as in rail cars?

Are they on some sort of track?

Where in the world is this located? Or are you envisioning a worldwide system?

What is the end goal of such a project? Increase efficiency? Save lives?

normal passenger cars rolling on city streets with people in it

when some one passes a red light there will be a good chance for an accident i'm thinking "as a start" to connect the braking sys. of our cars to a micro controller "simple and small pic16f877a " that will receive a signal from the traffic light when it comes red to prevent from crossing the red light

this will save lives of course

this is the general idea

What happens when the circuit connected to the braking system goes wrong? As it always will do?

What about emergancies where going through a red light is not only desireable but necessary?

So the car is travelling at 30 miles per hour and just clips the red light jamming on the brakes.... Where is the car going to end up?.... Yes right in the middle of the road junction - very helpful...

Will the brakes be applied suddenly and at what force?

I think the safety aspect hasn't been thought through... Instead of applying the brakes why not have the electronics take a picture of your car crossing the red light and then the police can, at a later date contact the driver and issue a warning or whatever....

Ohh.. hold on, that's what they already do in the UK isn't it... and it works!!

John.

well ......

the transmitters are along the road far enough from road junction as the car come closer the brakes go harder so we reduce speed until it stops completely

for police and ambulance there is a sys "which is already in use" that controls the traffic lights and change it to green while stopping the rest that wont be a problem ,also we can turn off the sys when ever we want "just like air bags sys , and the ESP sys"

the aim is not forcing people not to do some thing or t punish them but increasing safety for passengers

What would happen when you're driving while it's snowing and your car skid on ice?? What would your car do when you apply the break on ice?? What would happen to you car?? YOU WOULD LOOSE CONTROL!! What happen then??

MidniteFighter

When the way is ICE I think that the brake control system can be turned off

What happens when the circuit connected to the braking system goes wrong? As it always will do?

The system can be design in such way that when something is wrong the brake will be on. So the car will be always on if there is something wrong with the bracke system.

What about emergancies where going through a red light is not only desireable but necessary?

I think the system id for those who the emergency can be driven by 911 in USA. Or 066 here in México. This mean, normal people.

So the car is travelling at 30 miles per hour and just clips the red light jamming on the brakes.... Where is the car going to end up?.... Yes right in the middle of the road junction - very helpful...

For sure the system has to be design to allow the user to get the control of the system whenever is needed.

Will the brakes be applied suddenly and at what force?

Here can be used a Fussy logic, with some inputs like... Velocity of the car and load of the car. The same used on the washing machines :).

Thanks for the quick response….

I worry that in many emergency situations you might not want the car to stop by itself at a red light. Here's a few quick examples off the top of my head.

An ambulance is trying to get through and intersection and youre blocking its way - you need to move forward through a red light to allow passage.

The traffic signal itself has malfunctioned and is stuck on Red.

There's an officer directing traffic ( Normally what happened when the light malfunctions.)

The roads surface is covered in snow/ice - I'm trying to come to a controlled stop but given the conditions its not possible. Now the computer sensing a red light will be applying my brakes harder? (Never good on snow/ice)

The car behind me can't stop in time and I'm trying to move out of the way.

Personally I feel as drivers we would all benefit from less automated systems. These systems tend to make us feel safer then we really are and in turn we focus less on what we are doing.

If I had to support a system like this I guess I'd like an audible alarm to sound if I was about to run the light. I'll admit there are times I've missed a light while driving through a new area - but I certainly wouldn't want the brakes in my car to suddenly apply themselves.

the transmitters are along the road far enough from road junction as the car come closer the brakes go harder so we reduce speed until it stops completely

for police and ambulance there is a sys "which is already in use" that controls the traffic lights and change it to green while stopping the rest that wont be a problem ,also we can turn off the sys when ever we want "just like air bags sys , and the ESP sys"

the aim is not forcing people not to do some thing or t punish them but increasing safety for passengers

How about a system that alerts the driver with a 90dB horn in his ear that he's about to run a red light? I'm extremely leery of automatic controls of the sort you suggest. What's to keep me from stealing or building a signaling system and carrying it around town for my own amusement?

Here in Houston, we're implementing another solution. Cameras take your picture when you run the light. You pay a fine for every offense - and thus learn not to be an idiot - and the city gets rich.

This idea should be tossed away, hopefully no one ever tries it. It would in my opinion cause for accidents than save them.

If the car overshot the intersection and was sitting perpendicular to oncoming traffic would the system put the car in reverse and back you out of the way? If so, why don't they just automate all cars, no input from the driver at all???

What about regions that allow you to turn right on a red light? Before the brakes applied would the car ask you if you are turning right and if you reply no, then would if apply the brakes?

This is just a silly idea in general. Millions of dollars would be spent to kill thousands of people.

The idea isn't practical in its current form (and the automotive industry is harder to break new ideas into than just about any other industry in existance!). At the very least it should take into account the orange light for braking control.

This would make a great school project thou, and its complexity can be scaled for different levels, right up to university. Has PLC, logic, electronics and control system theory written all over it.

Hmmmmmm , perhaps some sort of mechanical barrier instead that flies up out of the ground when the red light comes on. That would be entertaining. Costs for the system could be paid for by the panelbeaters and car manufacturers .

"Hmmmmmm , perhaps some sort of mechanical barrier instead that flies up out of the ground when the red light comes on. That would be entertaining. Costs for the system could be paid for by the panelbeaters and car manufacturers ."

Like this.......Red Light :-)

or

Stop Red Light - I can see it now

Yes, that's the one. I knew someone would have the video links for those somewhere.

Several posts present reasons for not having an automatic stopping of vehicles.

Controlling a vehicle is the legal responsibility of the driver.

Some localaties/cities are photographing any vehicle crossing an intersection on a red light or "running" the red light. First time a warning, next a fine or trip to traffic court and a fine.

The thought that went into this idea is commendable though the idea itself is not practical. If this were to be implemented, total remote control of the cars would be required, not just the brakes. The system would control the speed of the car; the system would determine at what distance the brakes need to be applied; the system would automatically detect if emergency vehicles need the road and automatically keep the lights green and steer the cars to the side; we could go on an on. For that matter, if this were to happen, what use would there be for traffic lights? Since there's no use signalling the passenger (no more drivers), traffice lights would no longer be required. The system just gets too complicated and requires a lot of thinking. Plus, the oddball who decides that he's going to bypass the system and drive the way he wants to: manually.

To comment on bollards, those things are a menace. I can see its usefullness for entry into high security areas but not in public places. They should be removed.

that is the big picture and my project is the first step

we are aiming to make life easy and the best way is to automate every thing around us

Sorry Jon, but this is by far the worst idea I have heard proposed in a long time. But don't be discouraged. Keep up the creativity and maybe you'll hit on something. I did really enjoy those videos of vehicles crashing in one of the posts. No pun intended.

I would guess that such a system would merely be one step in the road to development of smart highway systems. Would this be the penultimate (the actual) thing which your discussion topic is "driving at"?

The rail industry has a number of systems that can be studied for comparison in connection with such a development.

The 1950 Rule Book for the nationalised UK railways lists seventeen instances where a driver may pass a signal at danger (red aspect signal).

"Automatic Warning System" [AWS] was developed initially by the former Great Western Railway [GWR] in England in the early part of the 20th Century so as to give the driver a warning that a signal ahead was giving a danger indication. It was at first a contact system, in that the locomotive carried an electrical contact shoe arranged so that when it passed over a ramp between the rails it lifted, starting a timer on the locomotive. Unless the ramp was energised from a low-voltage source, cancelling the timer, the system gave the driver 5 seconds to accept an audible warning otherwise the brakes were applied. The system was very successful at preventing accidents and the GWR achieved an exemplary safety record. During the second half of the 20th century the system was altered to operate with permanent- and electro-magnetic devices between the rails instead of contact devices. It still gave the driver the option of accepting the warning and controlling any braking. AWS is the prevailing safety system in use on the national network today, and although precious it is showing a need for improvement. There are severe constraints to the operation of passenger trains if the on-board AWS is out of order.

"Automatic Train Protection" is a modern development of AWS. It relays a permitted speed and braking distance envelope from trackside equipment to the rail vehicle equipment by short-range radio from the track side. The system cannot be over-ridden by the driver; indeed, there are times when the driver need not have a hand on the controls and the train will operate itself in complete safety.

Many modern light-rail systems, like the Docklands Light Railway in London, operate without a driver at the controls.

Given the ease with which road vehicles cross national borders, a complementary safety system for roads needs to have the potential for application to all countries across the globe. Its adoption by the many vehicle manufacturers and road agencies would be a mammoth task. Consider this: upon completion, would they really be "cars" and "roads" any more or would they be something else (rhetorical question)?

There are many years since 1950 when not a single passenger has been killed on UK railways; these days, a train that has a minor "earth fault" in a siding becomes national news.

Sadly the plight of the >3500 fatalities on the UK's roads each year rarely makes it to page 17 in the national press.

This post is a deep question with many facets and is highly worthy of discussion and consideration.

do you have links or references for that

I'd like to learn more

Yeah, great idea. I'm stopped at a red light, I look in the rearview mirror and see an overloaded 18 wheeler barreling at me out of control doing 60 because his brakes failed. I try to accelerate out of his way through a red light, even though there is no on coming traffic to save me and my family, but some idiot thought it might be a good idea to put a control on my car that applies the brakes when I try to go through a red light. CRASH We're all dead.

Lighten up...it was just an idea.

This is just an idea.

For sure the main problem to crash the car is that... there is a car involve in this situation.

It is just the point of view :)

Thanks, but no thanks. Although I despise people who run red lights, I think the driver should have complete control of the motor vehicle. I've been hit from behind by a driver that wasn't paying attention to the light when I stopped, and I would rather have the option of getting out of the way.

For this case I will think in a RF signal send to CARs behind us that I have stoped.

There is red light in the back of the car for this purpose but when a person is sleeping or making up his/her face they will not see it.

For sure will be helpfull for blind drivers to became into the drivers life :).

I do prefer a warning system... like a alarm inside the car to warn the car driver for a RED light coming or in use.

Also it can be implemented in a STOP sign.

What I do not like from this is the amount of noise it will do specially here where I live that each 200 meters there is a Stop sign or a trafic light :(.

Permission to speak freely,

Thank you.

That's a really stupid idea Sir.

Why don't you just make a gps transponder that is in each vehicle and alerts the authorities when you violate a traffic law. Then increase the penalties for traffic violations such that you are fined a base rate plus a percentage of the value of the vehicle. After so many violations, you face stiffer penalties, eventually even maybe execution. Oh and maybe a warning in the car but not audible, make it an electroshock, pavlovian response training. And, you make the penalties and warnings mandatory stricter for law enforcement and their families.

It's not needed. A mobile telephone already has this facility. To escape detection, and a fine for using it while driving, one could switch it off.