Amsterdam / Vienna, 20 March 2012 – Kapsch TrafficCom presents innovations for increased tunnel safety at the Intertraffic exhibition, one of the biggest international trade fairs for design, management and maintenance of parking, traffic and transport infrastructures, in Amsterdam from 27 to 30 March. The Kapsch 'Incident Detection System 2.0', a product for detecting traffic events, provides more efficient and proactive tunnel safety with its components Automatic Camera Calibration (ACC) and Alert Visualization (AlVis).
Up to now, calibrating cameras located inside tunnel systems has been an expensive and time-intensive activity. The ACC innovation by Kapsch makes the calibration of tunnel cameras up to ten times more accurate, while simplifying the operation. The system is mounted to a maintenance vehicle using a standard luggage rack and can be conveniently folded away after use. In addition, the ACC enables the camera calibration process to be reduced to a minimum of the previous norm. "Older methods of calibration took up to 50 hours in an average tunnel, while the same process can be completed in a maximum of two hours with ACC," confirms Marcus Brown, Product Manager for Video & Sensor Solutions at Kapsch.
Support for tunnel operator in risky situations
Monitoring tunnel cameras is important, but very monotonous. To better support the tunnel operator in an emergency, Kapsch developed AIVis. This is a program for the visualization and prioritization of procedures in tunnels. The software enables incidents to be played back, supported by seamless access to the video storage, and makes it possible to forecast and predict situations. "The program simplifies the tunnel operator’s everyday work by detecting risky situations early on and making suggestions for elimination," Braun explains Kapsch TrafficCom’s innovation. The focus was primarily put on optimizing operation, which is why the system's user interface is especially user-friendly.
Kapsch IDS 2.0 products for increased efficiency in road traffic
ACC and AIVis contribute significantly to making the monitoring and maintenance of tunnel systems more efficient. Up to now, tunnel and motorway sections occasionally had to be closed completely in order to carry out maintenance work, which can cost up to € 100.000. In addition to the enormous time savings, massive cost savings can now also be achieved, thanks to IDS 2.0.
"Kapsch TrafficCom is constantly working on the development of innovative solutions. With the IDS 2.0 products, we offer tunnel operators an extensive range of products for greater safety. In the near future, ACC and AIVis will also be used more frequently on the open road. On the A73 in Holland 67 of 134 cameras are already in use on the open road. In 2011 the existing system was calibrated with ACC, resulting in a huge increase of detection quality," concluded Marcus Braun.
Kapsch TrafficCom is a provider of high-performance intelligent transportation systems (ITS) in the application fields of toll collection, urban access management and traffic safety and security. Kapsch TrafficCom covers the entire value creation chain of its customers as a one-stop shop by providing products and components as well as subsystems as open market products, by integrating them into turnkey systems or by developing end-to-end solutions, including services for the technical and commercial operations of systems. Within its current core business of electronic toll collection (ETC), Kapsch TrafficCom designs, builds and operates ETC systems, in particular for multi-lane free-flow traffic. With 280 references in 41 countries on all five continents and with almost 70 million on-board units delivered and about 18,000 lanes equipped, Kapsch TrafficCom has positioned itself among the internationally recognized suppliers of electronic toll collection worldwide. Kapsch TrafficCom is headquartered in Vienna, Austria, and has subsidiaries and representative offices in 30 countries.
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