Efficient Traffic Management System

Abstract

Traffic Management is a big issue which impacts us almost daily. Use of technology such as IoT and image processing can lead to a smooth traffic management system. The common reason for traffic congestion is due to the lack of an efficient traffic prioritization system. The internet of things is a network of devices. The embedded systems includes sensors, actuators, and electronics.With software and connectivity locally or over internet  helps in  transfer of data. Each of these devices is uniquely identifiable in the network and are highly interoperable. Image processing using OpenCV is a technique that is used to process an input image and obtain the traffic densities along various lanes in a junction. Existing traffic management solutions include using RFID tags on vehicles to obtain a vehicle count. This can also be done using ultrasonic sensors. The problem with these methods is that when implemented in a large scale, the cost of the entire system can be exponentially higher than an image processing approach as each vehicle will have to be fitted with an RFID tag. Hence, implementing this model at a largescale level, for example in a metropolitan city will be time consuming and expensive. This has led to the development of our algorithm, which uses image processing and IoT along with CCTV cameras. This system is efficient, as it uses CCTV cameras that are already present in traffic signals of most major metropolitan cities. Hence implementing the system at a largescale level is feasible. This algorithm also takes care of corner cases like heavy utility vehicles and motorbikes. It can also be used at night and during unfavorable weather conditions.The algorithm used detects the density of traffic as opposed to the count of vehicles by taking input images from a CCTV camera, comparing it with a sample image of an empty road and obtaining a match percentage. The traffic density can be found easily using this since it has a disproportionate relation with the match percentage. The traffic signals can be altered accordingly using the traffic density. The output is then sent to the ThingSpeak cloud where it can be analyzed.