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Talking car technology making progress in EU

Smart car-to-car communication will one day make traffic jams obsolete and significantly improve road safety. That is the vision of several major car makers, which recently presented the technology under realistic driving conditions at a test track in Germany.

Several cars, motorcycles and a truck could be seen communicating with each other at the Opel test track in Dudenhofen, Germany, based on WLAN technology.

In principle, the technology works as follows: Car A is driving several kilometers ahead and sends information about an upcoming obstacle to car B, allowing the driver to choose an alternative route or to slow down.

It made a major breakthrough earlier this year when the European Commission made available an EU-wide frequency band.

Some 30 major car makers and other partners are grouped in the Car 2 Car Communication Consortium aimed at defining a uniform standard for the communication technology between vehicles and road infrastructure.

The EU is supporting the project, hoping to improve road safety and reduce traffic jams. The technology could be especially effective when it comes to issuing warnings about vehicle congestion, accidents or icy roads.

Traffic management centers can also inform drivers about a sudden road closure, the alternative route to take or speed limits. The information is sent to a transmitter detector along the road, which passes it on to the vehicles driving by.

“Getting critical messages through quickly and accurately is a must for road safety,” EU Telecommunications Commissioner Viviane Reding said, pointing out that the time Europeans spend in traffic jams could cost some US$102 billion by 2010 in lost working hours.
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