A Wireless Mesh Network-based Platform for ITS

Although efficient and safe transportation of people and goods is paramount transportation problems continue to soar. Traffic congestions are of the most visible of transportation problems in large urban areas. Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS), exploits and extends information and communication technologies to reverse the deterioration in transportation systems performance. ITS depends, essentially, on gathering and processing real-time traffic information. In this paper, we describe a prototypical proof-of-concept implementation and test-bed of a new Bluetooth and wireless mesh networks platform for traffic network monitoring. The platform uses traveling cars as data collecting sensors or probes and uses wireless municipal mesh networks to transport sensed data. Our platform assumes that cars or drivers' mobile devices are equipped with the widely-adopted low-cost Bluetooth wireless technology. Our platform is able to track cars traveling at speeds up to 70 km/hour. We track cars as they travel and turn on the city roads. In addition, we are able to approximate car speed using two different methods. Our preliminary results indicated an accuracy of ≈ 10–15%. We plan to incorporate more advanced algorithms for calculating accurate speeds in the future.