Level 6 Autonomous Driving Concept, & An Appeal To Elon Musk To Make Smart Traffic Lights – CleanTechnica

February 3rd, 2020 by Daryl Elliott

Have you ever sat at a red traffic light with no other cars or pedestrians on the road and had to wait? Was it frustrating? If you were in a gasoline or diesel car, did you feel bad about polluting the air?

Have you ever sat at a traffic light with 30 cars in each direction waiting to go straight, and the traffic lights instead allowed the turn lanes to go first even though there were no cars in those turn lanes?

In 1978, I attended the Toward Tomorrow Fair at the University of Massachusetts. I heard Buckminster Fuller, the inventor and futurist, speak. Among his other creative insights that he shared, he railed against traffic lights for being so wasteful. He was right. They’ve gotten slightly smarter and more efficient since then, but there’s still much room for improvement. With the advent of some new technology, the time has come to move into a new age with smart traffic lights.

Dumb Traffic Lights Will Be a Thing of the Past

Dumb traffic lights could be a thing of the past, and relatively soon. The technology exists to make it happen. Guess who has this technology? Elon Musk and Tesla.

As a part of the endeavor to create autonomous vehicles, Tesla has created cameras that can recognize all of the items needed to make smart lights a reality. These include: small cars, big vehicles (SUV), buses, vans, semi trucks, pickup trucks, motorcycles, pedestrians, bike lanes, bicycles, dogs, road cones, solid lines, dashed lines, double lines, stop markings on the road, arrows on the road, trashcans, railroad crossings, lane poles, parking spaces, and parking signs.

While there are more parts of the puzzle needed, the large portion of the work has been completed. Many large intersections where this technology would be utilized already have traffic cameras installed that have fine enough vision to capture license plate characters.

Level 6 Autonomous Driving

“Level 6 Autonomous Driving,” which is being proposed here on CleanTechnica for the first time, is when we have a number of networked transportation components operative to keep traffic flowing smoothly and safely:

1. When all (or most) vehicles allowed on public roads will be Level 5 autonomous-capable vehicles, and also have Level 6 networking software.

2. When these vehicles operate within the framework of a fully integrated, and networked transportation system.

3. The networked system will include:

A. the vehicles, including autos, ambulances, vans, buses, trucks, motorcycles, law enforcement, military, government vehicles;
B. stop lights;
C. train crossings;
D. toll roads;
E. parking lots and other paid-entry facilities;
F. low-clearance bridges;
G. restricted areas with vehicle approvals such as corporate facilities, university campuses, gated communities, airports.

4. Traffic will be monitored and managed at regional control centers performing tasks such as:

A. re-routing traffic for construction, accidents, flooding, bridge outages, landslides, icy roads, large public events, sink holes, other obstructions or disturbances in the roadways;
B. Amber alerts straight to vehicles;
C. tornado, flash flooding, or other weather communications;
D. balancing traffic flows on different roads to prevent traffic jams.

What do you say, Elon? You game to make smart traffic lights? If you’re interested, I’ll happily cede the domain www.TrafficLightManagement.com to you in exchange for saving us all from the wretched dumb traffic lights.

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