09 December 2019
Road authorities and private parties are starting a new test to improve traffic flows around Amsterdam. In the event of imminent traffic jams, drivers will be offered an alternative route via their navigation system. Thus, the traffic will be spread better over the total road network, resulting in fewer traffic jams. The new services are offered by TomTom, Be-Mobile (Flitsmeister) and BrandMKRS (Livecrowd Mobility).
Prediction of traffic jams by sharing data
Navigation advice is currently based on avoiding traffic jams that already exist. The advice is therefore reactive. This test looks ahead to provide proactive route advice. To achieve this, road authorities and market parties must work closely together. They share their available information and combine it to get a complete and accurate picture of the current and near-future traffic situation.
This real-time traffic information is combined with historical traffic data, to calculate the probability of a traffic jam in the next 15 to 30 minutes. As soon as the analysis reveals that there is a substantial probability of congestion, test users in Amsterdam are offered an alternative route via their navigation service. Users of the service not only spend less time in traffic jams themselves, but also contribute to reducing traffic jams on other routes.
With this use case we allow individual drivers to travel more efficiently from A to B, taking into account the collective interest. This is perfectly in line with our mission and vision and it is extremely cool to be able to use the community of 1.6 million users for this test.
Jorn de Vries, Business Unit Director Flitsmeister
Test users wanted
Road users who regularly drive in the Amsterdam region can register as a test user via socrates2.org/register. After registration you will receive instructions from the service provider on how to install the service on your smartphone. With a number of short surveys, test drivers are asked about their experience with the improved navigation services. The trial runs from December 2019 until the summer of 2020.
About SOCRATES2.0
The test is part of the European project SOCRATES2.0. Tests are taking place in Amsterdam, Antwerp, Copenhagen and Munich. The innovative aspect of this project is not only the technical realization of the improved navigation services, but also the way the public and private partners set up the cooperation. The public and private partners in this project want to gain insight into how they can organize the cooperation the best and whether this cooperation actually leads to improved services for road users.
That is why a trial is starting in which the road authorities and various market parties will start exchanging, processing real-time information and jointly providing travel and route advice. If road users are informed on time, consistently and if necessary with explanations about traffic jams, roadworks, events or environmental zones via navigation services, it is expected that advice will be followed more often, leading to faster, greener and safer traffic.
The test in Amsterdam is being carried out by Technolution, MAPtm, HERE, Be-Mobile, TomTom, BMW Group and BrandMKRS, in cooperation with the road authorities in the Amsterdam Practical Trial (Rijkswaterstaat, province of Noord-Holland, municipality of Amsterdam, Vervoerregio Amsterdam and National Datawarehouse for Traffic Information - NDW).
