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United States Technology

FCC Approves Highway Radiosystems 192

Posted by simoniker from the we-interrupt-this-program dept.
prostoalex writes "According to iWon/AP, the FCC has approved a range of radio frequencies to be used on US highways for transmitting important traffic information. The technology is still 5-10 years away from being implemented in cars and on the roads, but the FCC has set aside a special area of the spectrum instead of sharing the frequencies with other applications and devices. As for uses, there's currently a test running at an intersection in McLean, Va., where sensors can automatically warn a motorist when another car is approaching, thus helping to avoid a collision."
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FCC Approves Highway Radiosystems More

FCC Approves Highway Radiosystems

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  • FM SPec. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by JPriest ( 547211 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @08:55PM (#7749903) Homepage
    Does someone have a decent brakedown of the FM freq allocations? It seems like that space is getting crowded.

    • Re:FM SPec. (Score:4, Interesting)

      by mikewren420 ( 264173 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @09:00PM (#7749945) Homepage
      Spectrum is not crowded, it's a myth that the US Government likes pushing... What's the allocation between 230 and 400MHz? How about the 500-800MHz range? Look out for the black helicopters!

      In all seriousness, I'm intersted in what allocation was assigned to this new technology.
    • I couldn't find a reference in the article, but we can only hope they're not taking the frequencies away from someone who's actuially using them for something. Considering how BAD most FM radio is these days, I'm sure they can carve out a couple of Mhz worth of bandwidth in the Commercial FM portion that no one would miss.

    • Re:FM SPec. (Score:5, Informative)

      by Veovis ( 612685 ) * <cyrellia@gmail.com> on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @09:15PM (#7750008) Homepage
      You may find a FCC allocation chart for most frequencies at http://www.mysticunderground.net/fcc.html [mysticunderground.net]

    • Re:FM SPec. (Score:5, Informative)

      by awtbfb ( 586638 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @09:22PM (#7750062)
      a decent brakedown of the FM freq allocations?

      Allocation of the 5850 - 5925 MHz band (i.e. 5.9 GHz) as reported here with further links [itsa.org]. This is also knows as DSRC (Dedicated Short Range Communications) and has been around intelligent transportation for some time.

      Conceivable applications include:
      1. Toll tags for automated payment (already exist)
      2. Co-operative cruise control ("I'm car X at coordinates Y and I'm braking at Z rate") for improved speed management
      3. Autopayment at gas stations and McD's
      4. Notification of active emergency vehicles in your vicinity (cars cabins are getting better insulated and stereos are getting louder...)
      5. In-vehicle warnings relayed by intersections ("Car Y, someone is approaching the intersection from your left and it looks like they will hit you")
      6. and much, much more
      Researchers have been dreaming up applications in this space for a long time.

      PS - If I remember correctly, the cited intersection does not use DSCR, it simply tracks incoming cars and warns if it thinks someone may get hit. I think it's a high speed rural highway intersection. I've seen presentations on it but it's been a while.

      • Re:FM SPec. (Score:4, Interesting)

        by d34thm0nk3y ( 653414 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @09:34PM (#7750118)
        Co-operative cruise control ("I'm car X at coordinates Y and I'm braking at Z rate") for improved speed management

        thats a pretty good idea. Or better yet co-op speed limits.

        A display that shows how fast everyone else is going instead of some arbitrary sign. It is relatively well documented that more accidents happen where people are all driving different speeds than when all the people are speeding.

        • Re:FM SPec. (Score:4, Informative)

          by JPriest ( 547211 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @10:01PM (#7750241) Homepage
          The Cadillac XLR has an adaptive cruse control. You can set a following distance for the vehicle in front of you. If they slow down, you slow down etc.

          It's a good thing I can't afford the 76G to play with it, I would be testing it behind my brothers commaro at 150.

          Caddilac give the disclaimer: *Adaptive Cruise Control is not a substitute for the driver's personal responsibility to operate the vehicle in a safe manner. lol

      • If I remember correctly, the cited intersection does not use DSCR, it simply tracks incoming cars and warns if it thinks someone may get hit. I think it's a high speed rural highway intersection. I've seen presentations on it but it's been a while.

        Ok, I went and checked. The one I'm thinking of was this one (PDF, 322k) [dot.gov] which was actually installed on a public road. The cited intersection was a demo this past summer at a DOT research facility in McLean. Here are some movies [dot.gov] of the different demos in actio

  • Traffic information over the radio? (Score:4, Funny)

    by raehl ( 609729 ) <(moc.oohay) (ta) (113lhear)> on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @08:56PM (#7749911) Homepage
    What's next, putting people in helicopters that fly over highways to get the information to broadcast?

  • Pleeeeze (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Quasar1999 ( 520073 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @08:57PM (#7749916) Journal
    What the hell is to stop this from becoming as useless as the current emergancy vehicle light switching system (ala traffic lights), that used infrared frequencies? Some schmoe is going to make a device that makes your car think you're going to rear-end someone at his whim... Until finally the whole system will have to be thrown out, due to abuse.

    This thing will be abused before it's even anywhere near fully deployed... what a waste... and as per the article, how about getting people to focus on driving... as in paying attention to thing around you... how the hell is making sure you don't rear-end the guy infront of you not a normal driving task? WTF?

    • Re:Pleeeeze (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Carnildo ( 712617 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @09:02PM (#7749957) Homepage Journal
      What the hell is to stop this from becoming as useless as the current emergancy vehicle light switching system (ala traffic lights), that used infrared frequencies? Some schmoe is going to make a device that makes your car think you're going to rear-end someone at his whim... Until finally the whole system will have to be thrown out, due to abuse.

      The problem with the traffic light changers is that there aren't (or at least weren't) any laws dealing with abuse. Interfering with traffic to the degree of potentially causing an accident is already covered under any number of laws; someone stupid enough to make a device to abuse this system will get his ass sued six ways from next Wednesday, and a lengthly prison sentence to boot.
    • The failure in those traffic light control systems was they totally forgot to authenticate the requests. They just let a plaintext signal tell the lights what to do, and there wasn't even yet a law saying unauthorizedly issuing such a signal was illegal!

      Stupid design... and fixed in future releases. Let's face it, any form of user-authentication protocol could have done the trick here.
    • I actually have family members working with a well-known auto maker on this very problem. They'll be using users' public keys signed by a certificate authority once a day to validate. Think that hackers could crack RSA256 once a day just to cause havoc?
      • Think that hackers could crack RSA256 once a day just to cause havoc?

        Based on the rollout being up to 10 years... I say that whatever encryption is used, it will be cracked, and cracked easily by the time it's in use. So, the answer to your question is yes!

  • Wait a minute! (Score:5, Funny)

    by b_w_duncan ( 709534 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @08:59PM (#7749934)

    "where sensors can automatically warn a motorist when another car is approaching, thus helping to avoid a collision."

    Who would have guessed... they've invented traffic lights!

    • "where sensors can automatically warn a motorist when another car is approaching, thus helping to avoid a collision."

      Who would have guessed... they've invented traffic lights!

      A traffic light can tell you that cars on the other street should be stopped. This system can tell you that there's an idiot about to run the red light.

      • Re:Wait a minute! (Score:2, Insightful)

        by b_w_duncan ( 709534 )

        Red lights in my city detect a car approaching and automatically turn red, preventing any kind of motion whatsoever!

        On a serious note... I fail to see how a system can detect someone about to run a red light in time for you to take avoiding action. It can't conceivably notify you much before you see the car failing to slow down.

    • AWS (Ambiguous Warning System) (Score:5, Funny)

      by dhwang ( 93406 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @10:07PM (#7750271)
      I don't know about you, but I've already got the early warning system installed in my car. It's called a "passenger". Specifically, that passenger that suddenly shouts "OH, OH, OH, OH!" as you driving down the street.

      Then after you slam on the brakes to avoid an unseen danger (while hoping you don't get rear-ended in the process), your passenger continues, "I didn't know there was an In 'N Out here!".

  • Appropriate technology (Score:5, Funny)

    by El ( 94934 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @09:01PM (#7749949)
    ...there's currently a test running at an intersection in McLean, Va., where sensors can automatically warn a motorist when another car is approaching, thus helping to avoid a collision.

    Don't they already have a device that allows people to see around blind corners? I beleive it's called a "mirror"... but then, I guess they can't get a patent on that technology.

  • As useful as the 700nm-400nm spectrum? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Kelmenson ( 592104 ) <kelmenson@nospaM.yahoo.com> on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @09:03PM (#7749966)
    People ignore the data in that spectrum, and its right in front of their eyes!

  • If a tree falls in the forest... (Score:3, Funny)

    by dnaboy ( 569188 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @09:03PM (#7749968)
    Unless it calls people (OK, myself included), on their cell phone, no one will ever notice. Priorities: 1. The conversation about what bar to meet your friends at, 2. Lighting another cigarette, 3. The road, and finally 4. The radio
    • Unless it calls people (OK, myself included), on their cell phone, no one will ever notice.

      Do some research on RDS -- found in Europe. RDS radios have the capability to interrupt normal radio or CD/tape output and give the driver the traffic news, at a pre-set volume.


    • You have 3 and 4 reversed.

    • You: (driving your 2004 Toyota MallRunner) yeah I couldnt believe it, Dharma was standing on this table and Greg couldnt get her to--
      Phone: beepbeep
      You: Oh, hey I have another call, hold on a sec. *hit talk button*
      Phone: *in Majel Barrett voice* Warning. 18 wheeler on collision course. Impact in 15 seconds.
      You: *hit talk button* Heya mom listen, I gotta take this call. Call you back. No, you hang up. ... no, you hang up. ... No-- Agh!
      *your SUV crashes into another SUV
      Phone: beepbeep
      You: *talk button*
      M

  • Safer right-turn on red (Score:4, Insightful)

    by G4from128k ( 686170 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @09:03PM (#7749971)
    This technology could help save lives during right-turn-on-red accidents that happen at obscured intersections. Sensors on the cross-street detect triffic on the greenlighted street, relay a signal to the stop light, and warn the right-turners if it is unsafe to turn.
  • IMHO, it would be more economical to mandate that car manufacturers put some kind of collision detection hardware in the cars themselves. This seems like an unnecessary taxpayer expense that will be woefully out of date before it's rolled out.
    • Are you serious? Think about the beginnings of TCAS (onboard collission avoidance system for aircraft) -- until they got them communicating, there was always a danger that they'd tell planes to do the same thing -- ie: dive, or one go right and the other left (opposite direction), and proper use of these means a hell of a lot of trust in the instruments, which is what IFR instruction is all about.

      Now take your average motorist and see if he or she is going to listen to what a car-based version of TCAS is t
      • Perhaps someday we'll get past the idea that we have a RIGHT to everything and things like driving will be a privilege with tests that are actually difficult to pass, and a driving age that isn't shrinking toward the preteen crowd.

        Perhaps also at that time we will figure out how to get people and their belongings to school or work or hospital or supermarket without driving.

        Without this necessary requirement you will be cutting large groups of people from the society. As it stands now, the society as a w

        • Death for everyone else? I thought we were discussing death in the form of accidents. As a pedestrian, that seldom concerns me except when crossing the street. Or shall we talk about death by pollutants. I understand that asthma cases are reaching unprecedented levels, and I know that a morning jog in Toronto is probably making me less healthy. But I digress, even from your digression.

          I've taken buses just about everywhere, including to the supermarket (craziest trip yet -- 9 bags of groceries and a micr
          • I know how things are in Toronto. But move to Mississauga and in some areas you can literally die from hunger without a car. Buses come every hour if there is no snow. It's not possible to live this way. I don't say it is good, and I'd take a teleportation booth any time, it's just they don't have them over there :-) Territory is large, and it is not economically possible to cover it with buses; look at the buses - usually just a few people in each; they already pay for themselves and for the other riders w
  • over the X-Band
    • Why is this funny???

      The X-Band on radar detectors now implement SWS, Safety Warning System. Same system described here but over another frequency.

      http://www.adrawa.com.au/SWS.htm

      That's a link I could find

  • Yeah... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by mark-t ( 151149 ) <markt AT nerdflat DOT com> on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @09:07PM (#7749983) Journal
    Wanna bet this tech is gonna be used to track speeding and other unsafe driving violations?

    • Re:Yeah... (Score:2, Interesting)

      by anubi ( 640541 )
      Well, there are those "road warriors" that scare the hell out of everyone else on the road... maybe this system might be used to get the worst offenders tagged. I'd rather the assholes get nailed than have my insurance rates inexorably hiked to cover the inevitable mayhem.

      I see the biggest advantage of intelligent highway systems as being able to efficiently route traffic. Imagine if we tried to run the internet the way our present system works. Joe Schmoe's router catches fire and the system snarls for

    • Re:Yeah... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by LostCluster ( 625375 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @10:02PM (#7750246)
      And why not? The real point in car-to-car communication on a highway is to keep everybody moving at roughly the same rate of speed so that there are no crashes, because a crash slows everybody down.

      That's the principal behind most automated highway systems... everybody goes at the same high speed in tight formation until somebody indicates they want to leave... at which point the cars ahead speed up, the cars behind slow down to create space, the departing car departs, then the lead cars slow and the trailing cars accelerate so that the formation is reformed.

      Highways are a great situation where the tragedy of the commons come into play. Somebody wants to go faster than everybody else, faster than they themselves can go, and as a result causes a crash that ruins the ride home for everybody behind them.

  • Radar Detector + Long range Wi Fi + GPS (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Rob Cebollero ( 242701 ) <thecenterfordece ... m ['gma' in gap]> on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @09:08PM (#7749989)
    Has anyone thought of or has taken staps toward integrating a radar detector with wireless and GPS to create a long-range, fault tolerant radar/lidar detection network? Seems like this this is a patent wating to happen...

    • Has anyone thought of or has taken staps toward integrating a radar detector with wireless and GPS to create a long-range, fault tolerant radar/lidar detection network? Seems like this this is a patent wating to happen...

      What's the point? Radar can already be detected far enough in advance, and you can't detect lidar until you've been nailed -- everyone will benefit from this network except the guy who actually detects the lidar gun.
    • I did something like this a long time ago in University. I used 144Mhz band packet radio, and I didn't add the radar detector bit - just a signal, but that's not difficult. It was very effective. There is the Amateur Radio Position Reporting system that's built right into my Kenwood handheld radio, along with a 2400baud TNC. You connect up a GPS and it broadcasts your callsign and position. Pretty slick eh.

      Do you know what obstruction of justice means? This is what you would be charged with. Radar detector

  • You mean like RDS? (Score:5, Informative)

    by Graabein ( 96715 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @09:10PM (#7749993) Journal
    You mean like the RDS [rds.org.uk] TP/TA system which has been used in Europe for what, almost a decade now?

    FAQ here [radio-now.co.uk].

    • We have RDS in the states, you just need a tuner that can handle the piggy-backed data. RDS runs over existing FM frequencies, and requires the Radio stations to buy devices which allow them to put RDS data in their signals.

      This systems is a completely different band. It's Out of Band in regards to any existing broadcast system. The concept near as I can tell, is a municipalty would install some sort of sensor(s) at a high-risk area (like the intersection mentioned) that would allow directed broadcast to a
      • The main use of British RDS is to automate the switching of fequencies during long drives so that as a signal gets weak the radio can switch to another station that is airing the same program at the same time... basically it means every radio station broadcasts the identies of any adjacent stations who are airing the same network program. As synchronized network radio programs are not as common here as they are there, that's just not quite as useful...
      • Oh, so you mean like Trafficmaster [trafficmaster.co.uk], which has been around in the UK since the '80s and can be integrated into the radio so that the information received via Trafficmaster over-rides the current radio program or CD/tape?
      • > We have RDS in the states, you just need a tuner that can handle the piggy-backed data

        Yes, and practically none are available here in the US, and hence use by radio stations is very limited. In Europe just about all digital radios have it, even in lowly rental econoboxes. And while RDS and the FCCs proposal differ technically, they can be employed for many of the same uses. In the end I predict that the same thing will happen as in Europe: traffic info is boring and unlucrative, and eventually the da

    • No (Score:4, Informative)

      by Tailhook ( 98486 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @10:08PM (#7750276)
      ...like the RDS TP/TA system...

      RDS is designed to be super-imposed on an existing broadcast signal (double sideband suppressed sub carrier blah blah.) It is applicable to broadcasters that have a loud signal covering a wide area.

      Allow me to save many readers the 10 seconds it would take to discover what RDS TP/TA means: TP (Traffic Program flag) is a part of the RDS signal that indicates that a particular RDS broadcaster provides "traffic announcements" a some unspecified time. TA (Traffic Announcement flag) is another flag that indicates when an "traffic announcement" is being broadcast.

      If you want to use RDS (via existing broadcasters) to send a signal to a specific vehicle to prevent a collision, you have to multiplex the data gathered by a large number of sites into a single RDS stream, broadcast it, and then find a way for all the receivers to filter out irrelevant RDS data (thousands of other cars not about to collide.) Or you might scale down RDS to deal with things like individual intersections, but you would then need a reserved spectrum...which is exactly what the FCC just approved.

      A network of transceivers designed to monitor, signal and possibly control traffic has a number of obvious technical constraints that have probably never been considered by RDS. Off the top of my head I think of; latency guarantees, non-interference in confined areas, an elaborate definition of codes necessary to impart traffic relevant information in real-time, priorities, etc. RDS doesn't do all this.

      ...which has been used in Europe for what, almost a decade now...

      RDS is widely available in the US. I have it and I didn't even know it until my Bose started displaying song titles broadcast by local stations. It probably implements TP/TA for all I know. I've never bothered to look.

      • Re:No (Score:2)

        by Dr_LHA ( 30754 )
        RDS is widely available in the US. I have it and I didn't even know it until my Bose started displaying song titles broadcast by local stations. It probably implements TP/TA for all I know. I've never bothered to look.

        It may be widely available but the receivers are not common at all. I've rented alot of cars in Europe and the US, all of the cars in Europe had RDS. I only ever drove one with RDS in the US (I'm talking double figures here). In Europe it would be unthinkable for any car to come without an R

  • Closer than you think... (Score:5, Informative)

    by RedLeg ( 22564 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @09:13PM (#7750006) Journal
    It's definitely closer than this would have you believe....


    IEEE 802.11 [ieee.org] is working on this NOW. The Task Group is called WAVE (Wireless Access in Vehicular Environment), and the next meeting [ieee.org] is at the IEEE 802.11 Interim Meeting in Vancouver in January. IEEE Meetings are open to all, BTW. Just pay your registration fee, show up and participate.

  • Automated Driving (Score:3, Interesting)

    by ParadoxDruid ( 602583 ) * on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @09:17PM (#7750021) Homepage
    One of my long-standing dreams (realized in movies like Minority Report) is automated, self-diriving cars.

    That's where I think the technology should be heading. Look at TV remotes- they prove that the average Joe doesn't want to move 3 feet on his own to change the channel.

    If you got a car that reliably drove itself, even if it was expensive, you'd have people falling over to buy one.
    • No sane company would ever make one. The first time that self-driving car gets into an accident, and someone either gets seriously injured or dies - the automaker is going to get blamed because they programmed the thing. And you can bet that lawsuits will be flying everywhere. No automaker is going to put themselves in a position where they could get sued for a lot of money everytime someone gets injured or killed because of their self-driving cars.
      • Fully automated cars are inevitable. They will appear as soon as the profit from their sales exceeds the danger of the lawsuits.

        I can already make such a car, as a matter of fact, and right now if you want. I only need a monorail track installed all over the city, and my cars will be the only users. Then I will install triple collision avoidance system (computer, RF, IR, mechanical etc.) and that will keep me mostly out of trouble. Sure, they will be problems sometimes, but not fatal accidents.

        That was

    • The moment I switch on the "auto-pilot", I'm no longer responsible for the control of my vehicle; now the company that made the device is liable for any accident the vehicle causes. That being said, do you want to be the owner fo the company making the device? Won't anybody who gets into any accident with one of these in the car simply claim "the auto-pilot did it!" Even if you switch it on scant milliseconds before plowing into that group of pedestrians, it's still the devices fault, not yours! Now imagine
      • I don't think you can complete automate the end to end ride... the main applicaition is going to be automating the highways. You get yourself to the onramp the old fashioned way, then get in the special line for autopilot cars, and then the autopilot takes over. You travel in a specially marked autopilot lane at 100 MPH with only other autopilot cars until you reach your appointed offramp where you're dropped off and the car goes back to your own control.

        For most commuters, that takes out the longest and m
        • Magnets? In the center of the road? Try this instead...

          One thing that I've been thinking about for a while now is use of those metallic reflectors that seem to be cropping up everywhere between lane dividing lines, which, I suppose, aid vision at night, in bad weather, etc.

          Anyway, why not add whatever device to the reflector/marker? They're becoming extremely common, iirc. If you do that, you won't be adding more hardware to the road -- you're just letting the same device pull double duty: It visually mar
          • Yep... the transition definitely would need to happen at a complete stop, with the human doing something to indicate they'd like to move now. (Any human caught sleeping would presumably be awoken by a a horn from the driver behind them...)

            Lots of complicated steps in getting this done... but at least the "On which frequencies?" question now has an answer.
      • three words for you:
        little
        black
        box
    • ummm same problem that getting cars to switch to alternative energy sources has:
      it would have to pretty much be a massive all at once switch

      no one in hell would you see automated self driving vehicles alongside normal vehicles on the existing infrastructure.....

  • A great tool if not abused... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by TheDarkener ( 198348 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @09:19PM (#7750036) Homepage
    This sounds like a good tool. The only concerns I have are the following:

    1) It doesn't replace the people actually DRIVING the vehicle needing to be at their utmost alert. We've all seen what cellphones and driving do to people.

    2) It doesn't get used later on as a spammer's paradise. The last thing I want is that every car in the country comes standard with these alert systems only to hear, while driving down the highway, "ALERT! Your car's engine is not optimized! Go to carspeed.com to help!"

    3) It doesn't get used as a monitoring network. I'd assume since it would be sending personalized messages to cars given their position in traffic, cars around them specifically, etc., that you'd need some sort of unique identifier per car. Let's not abuse this like the FastTrack crap we heard about earlier, and have a constant, rudimentary GPS system in every car that uses it.

    Other than that, it seems like it'd be a great tool for informing drivers (non-invasively) on what's going on on the highways.
    • I recall that some states have signs that say "Tune Radio to 600AM (or there about) for Traffic Info". And in some states they have large LED type signs with info. In TX, they recently decided to put these every 10-15 miles on the Interstates. But, I have to agree with others that it's all for nothing as most people ignore "Right Lane Closed" until the last instant and expect to zoom up and dive into traffic. Unless it sets off an audible alarm or big light on the dash it's going to be ignored!
    • 1) It doesn't replace the people actually DRIVING the vehicle needing to be at their utmost alert. We've all seen what cellphones and driving do to people.

      No, that's a possible use of this bandwidth... car-to-car communications about the exact location and speed and its planned future actions is the key element in an auto-driving network system.

      This doesn't come anywhere close to completing such a technology, but it gives people developing such a technology a piece of bandwith that they'll be sure will b

  • wow! (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I thought that the AM band was already the unused frequencies they used for traffic reports.
  • ... through your radio.

    Truckin'- got my chips cashed in
    Keep Truckin' like the doodah man
    Together - more or less in line

    *LOOK OUT! YOU'RE GONNA CRASH!*

    Just keep truckin' on ...
  • RFID tracking of vehicles.

    • It is obvious, and Americans still haven't developed the suspicious frame of mind they need to even recognize the prison being built around them, brick by brick.

      Of course. A nationwide car detection system. Thus taking away the only relatively anonymous system of transportation we have.

      America in fifteen years? I don't want to live there.

  • The FCC? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Sqwubbsy ( 723014 )
    Why are they deciding who gets to broadcast over what frequency.
    It's not like they could stop you if you decided to start transmitting with a bunch of stuff from Radio Shack [radioshack.com]?
    What's this country coming to?
  • Sure they can set aside space for the frequency in the spectrum, but how easy would it be to DOS attack a system like this. I'm sure they would have specific security setup, but seriously, how annoying would it be to pass through a section of town and have all your warning lights sounds etc go off from someone saturating the spectrum....

  • There was an article a few days ago about smart billboards. The content of the billboard was based on the radio stations that the traffic was listening to.

    I know that not everybody listens to the radio, but maybe it would be a good idea to have "smart" traffic lights that could predict a car about to run a red light based on how fast the radio signal is approaching.

  • Collision Avoidance (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Tacoguy ( 676855 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @10:06PM (#7750267)
    Many years ago I remember a collision avoidance trial in a steel plant between locomotives. We were not sucessful due to interfernce from subsonic frequencies thru the high MegaHertz range. Microvave was not feasable at the time.

    I have believed that collision avoidance is quite possible but some mechanism to diminish "scattering" was necessary.

    Given the wavelength and directionality of this ... it seems to me that there is no specific need for a spectrum allocation.
  • "the FCC has approved a range of radio frequencies to be used on US highways for transmitting important traffic information."

    Didn't this happen a long time ago? I believe is was called AM radio,

  • Traffic cameras (Score:3, Interesting)

    by whovian ( 107062 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @10:23PM (#7750341)
    ok, so this can help drivers not to violate red traffic lights. Won't the traffic camers installed at intersections potentially record fewer violations of drivers going through the red light? (you know, take a snapshot of the car's license plate; send a bill to the owner.) Won't local communities demand a subsidy for the lost revenue due to this sensor system?
    • Actually, advertised traffic cameras have been found to have a worse side effect... drivers choosing to suddenly stop when they should have gone through, leading to the car behind them hitting their read end...
    • It's more advanced, so it might be able to record enough information to for other traffic infractions - which I wouldn't necessarily mind. Running a late yellow is technically legal (as far as a single camera can tell), but just as dangerous as running a red.

      It sounds like there could be enough data being recorded to reasonably charge people for dangerous driving with this type of system (given the hypothetical nature of the system at this time, yeah, why not!).

  • Two points to be made... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Scorpion_1169 ( 609426 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @10:24PM (#7750351) Homepage
    First of all, I remember a system similar to this from when I spent some time in Germany a few years back. I would be driving down the road and suddenly the radio would switch over to this emergency frequency. You could not switch the channel once it came on or disable the feature altogether. I found it to be extremely annoying and altogether useless. Second, how long do you think that it will take spammers/telemarketers to put this to nefarious use. I magine driving down the road and suddenly every station is interupted with an advertisement using the pirated system? Make the transmitter mobile and short range and you'll have roving advertisers all over the road. You drive within, say, 50 feet of their vehicle and you get the ad. Oh what fun that will be! Obviuosly, I'm not a big proponent.

  • ...a more secure Homeland... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Tailhook ( 98486 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @10:26PM (#7750366)
    From the blurb:

    "Smart radio technology means smarter highways, safer roads and a more secure homeland," FCC Chairman Michael Powell said.

    How, precisely, would a radio broadcast regulated to be useful no further than 100 meters away be useful in securing the "Homeland"? At first, I chalked that up to some sort of bureaucratic lemming syndrome where anything that happens needs to be connected to securing something. But then I put my brain in gear and figured it out; what a great way to create an industrial strength vehicle tracking system. Build out a collision avoidance system and, "discover" how useful it is in tracking bad people, and then...generalize!
    • Anything that helps the internal highways flow faster and avoid crashes that close the roadway better secures the homeland. The Interstate highway system was funded by the Federal government in part because it created high-speed ready roadways with a realtively small number of entry points... which in the event of a mainland war could easily be blocked off by local authorites to all traffic other than millitary vehicles. The Army would then be able to have convoys operate with whatever highway they needed a
    • na, all you need to do now is to make each car not only have a reciever antenna, but also a transiever. THEN it is a simple(cough) matter of making a distributed p2p car-network out their that uses TCP/IP rather than radio broadcast... Next time you are stuck in traffic you could surf the web, the more the traffic, the bigger the way*.

      *Assuming each car had some webcache system and/or hosted some type of information.
  • According to the Highway Research Center (tfhrc.gov) map [tfhrc.gov], that "McLean intersection" is really a federal facility next door to the "George Bush Center for Intelligence (CIA)".

    "Intelligent highways" kill two birds with one stone -- surveillance of the public plus assauging the public the roads are safe despite the 42,000 annual U.S. fatalities.

  • Basicly, you take existing electronic/GPS navigation device (the kind that give you directions on where to go).
    Then, you modify the map data to record speed limits for each road.
    Then, you have some facility (radio, sattelite, whatever) that can tell the device where there are roadworks, accidents, traffic snarls and stuff. It would then calculate the most efficent (i.e. fastest) way for you to get from point a to point b.
    Perhaps that new "send data over FM radio" thingo I heard about could be used.

  • Can't Wait! (Score:4, Funny)

    by 955301 ( 209856 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @11:53PM (#7750866) Journal
    Personally, I'm looking forward to driving around in a world full of vehicles with automated collision response systems. The first thing I'm doing is hacking the rear emitter so the next time some nitwit on a phone is compelled to tailgate me, I "inform" his BMW that I am now traveling BACKWARDS!

    Muahahahaha

  • 802.11 (Score:2, Informative)

    by Deitiker ( 732739 )
    The technology is 802.11 based. It is currently referenced as 802.11p. The standard implements IPv6, and modifies the MAC to enforce channel priorities (safety first, McDonalds drive through second). The standard currently includes no applications. It is generally expected that various industries (toll, ITS, entertainment, etc.) will each standardize applications for their respective industry. Expect to see fairly comprehensive security systems implemented in applications that are public safety or financi
  • This sounds like a high-tech extension of the programmable roadside traffic warning billboard (you know, those two-wheeled trailers with a big orange dot matrix billboard flashing useless info like "Men at work"). Extremely useful in theory, but in practice only as good as the information fed. In my town we have tons of these displays flashing information that's weeks out of date or so generic that you'd hardly need an expensive programmable display for that. The thing is, buying the equipment is only the f
  • going into nyc via the lincoln tunnel your radio gets taken over and they broadcast traffic info.
  • I wonder if the future hackers will modify this to notify of upcoming patrol cars. Bye bye speeding tickets.
  • your link to an iwon.com address tells me you are trying to use the slashdot effect to make some cash. since the editors have approved this I anticipate the floodgates have now been opened and we will see further putrification of submissions and articles here on slashdot.
  • The ARPA net nodes constantly measured how much time it took for at packet to reach a destination.

    The measurements was kept up-to-date for each route out of the node.

    When a packet arrived to a node, it was sent out via the fastest route to its destination using a simple table lookup.

    If we let some cars (e.g. taxis) report their progress back to a central system, the system can use that info to "route" cars to their destination - if and only if the system knows where the cars should go.

    A very simple tran
  • Can a licensee of a spectrum band choose to broadcast a digital signal on it at will? Is there commercial equipment that a municipality can deploy to provide an 802.11 network on it? How much FM bandwidth is necessary for an HDTV signal?

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