In 1912, Lester Wire, a young police officer in Salt Lake City, came up with an idea. What if there was a tool to regulate cars at intersections instead of patrol officers, who needed to spend hours rooted to a platform through rain, heat, and hail? <\/p>\n
Wire came up with a wooden box on a pole. It had two light bulbs inside, colored red and green. The box was connected to electricity so the light bulbs could be switched from one to the other with the press of a button. That\u2019s something patrol officers could do from a booth at the side of the road. <\/p>\n
Since then, traffic light signals have evolved a bit. We now have yellow and don\u2019t need a patrol officer to press a button. But the original concept has remained largely the same \u2014 traffic lights change on a pre-programmed schedule. <\/p>\n
However, the state of our roads in the twenty-first century is much different than it was 100 years ago. We have more cars, bigger road networks, higher population densities, and constant traffic disruptions. <\/p>\n
Perhaps it\u2019s time to rethink the old and introduce a smarter traffic light system. <\/p>\n
A smart traffic light is an internet-connected vehicle traffic control system capable of adapting traffic light controls based on information collected from sensors, edge devices, and video systems. <\/p>\n
At the intersection, smart traffic lights look the same as regular traffic lights except for extra hardware elements such as IoT sensors and\/or connected CCTV cameras. On the back end, smart traffic light systems are connected to a cloud-based traffic management platform<\/a>. They are often powered by predictive algorithms for dynamically adjusting traffic signals. <\/p>\n A quick disclaimer before we go any further: A smart traffic light system can\u2019t miraculously fix all road issues, such as congestion, accidents, and rule violations. But they are a better preventive measure than traditional traffic lights. <\/p>\n As Dan Saffer, an author and the Creative Director at Smart Design, says<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\t\t\t\t