Drivers’ phone data to beat traffic jams

DATA from motorists’ mobile phones is to be used in an attempt to ease a city’s traffic jams.

York City Council plans to use phone signals from inside cars in order to track vehicle movements and get ‘ the city moving as efficiently as possible’.

Mobile phone data will be collected via the internet or from roadside detectors fitted to bollards, lights and other street furniture.

Each phone device has a unique code – called a ‘MAC address’ – that it broadcasts while searching for wi-fi networks or Bluetooth devices.

The code will be collected from the phones of motorists and used to compile data about vehicle movements in the city.

The data will be used to do things such as changing traffic light sequences and to plan road improvements and junction re-designs so that traffic flows more smoothly.

Members of the public would only be able to opt out of the new system by turning off the Bluetooth and wi- fi on their phones.

The system will also collect data about weather patterns so that traffic light sequences can be changed to make traffic move more efficiently in different weather conditions.

A grant of £450,000 from the Department for Transport will fund a pilot scheme, launched this month, on the A59 entering York.

This will then expand across the city, funded by £2.85million from the Government.

If the scheme is successful it could be extended across the country. The council said the project was made possible because of the ultrafast fibre broadband in the city.

Ian Gillies, leader of the city council, said the plans will make York ‘one of the most advanced cities in the country’.

He said: ‘Being able to build things like traffic light signalling based on the journeys people really make every day will mean better decisions, less congestion and improved air quality. We can’t simply build more roads in the city, so this is a really innovative way to get the city moving as efficiently as possible.’

The council said the data ‘will be stored in a secure cloud subject to UK government security principles’ and will ‘fully comply with data protection regulations’.

Peter Dew, another city councillor, told The Daily Telegraph: ‘Our famous historic city hasn’t got the space for more roads, so we have to use technology as much as tarmac to get our network fit for the whole of the 21st century.

‘ What happens on York’s roads over the next couple of years will help to define how traffic is managed in the UK. This is a genuinely pioneering approach to making our roads safer and air cleaner.’

A DfT spokesman said: ‘ We are always looking at ways to use technology to revolutionise the way we travel.

‘ That’s why we invested £3million in this innovative scheme in York, which will help us to explore how vehicle technology can be used to improve road networks for drivers.

‘We can’t build more roads’