Solar Powered RFID Interrogator to Monitor Traffic Flow

Filed in archive Implementation on November 20, 2006

Now RFID will be Monitoring traffic flow. Solar powered RFID interrogators are being tested by New York State Department of Transportation and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute which read the EZPass tags affixed to the passing cars. As a part of the trials, single RFID reader was tested on Jordan Road in New York.

This will emerge as a cost effective solution for monitoring traffic in situations where it is neither economical nor necessary to install permanent RFID reader. Most of the interrogators up till now relied on AC power and this new system is expected to change the trend altogether. At times it becomes difficult to offer a permanent source of power and in those conditions solar power comes handy.

Called as mGate, it is connected to a laptop through a USB cable and the batteries are solar panel charged. The unit is loaded onto a trailer and installed along a roadside and the encrypted tag ID, reader location and timestamp are transferred by the laptop through a wireless internet connection to the Rensellaer server.

The main idea behind this is to get to know the time it takes for the traffic to crawl from one RFID reader to another and hence depending upon the condition either divert the traffic or warn the motorists of slow traffic ahead.

Certainly if the trials bring positive results it would surely solve the traffic jam problems on some of the most congested road networks in the world. This would not only make the life of the motorists easy but also reduce the burden on the traffic cop on duty.