With the Intelligent Traffic Management System (ITMS) on the Mumbai-Pune New Motorway nearing completion, the state of Maharashtra’s transport system is about to undergo an enormous change.
The initiative, which is being directed by the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC), is set to launch on October 15 and promises to revolutionise traffic control and road safety.
The Joint Managing Director of MSRDC, Sanjay Yadav, emphasised that this programme has the potential to significantly raise the bar for Maharashtra’s transport infrastructure. The Mumbai-Pune New Motorway, positioned as the centrepiece project under MSRDC, will be essential to the state’s comprehensive ITMS plan. Road management and traveller safety are being elevated to previously unheard-of heights thanks to the use of cutting-edge technology and sophisticated surveillance systems.
Major advantages of the ITMS:
Enhanced Road Safety: AI-powered cameras will be able to spot a variety of traffic infractions, such as speeding, reckless driving, lane splitting, and driving on the wrong side of the road, among others, promoting safer road conditions.
Current Updates: In order to help drivers make educated judgements, a visual messaging system provides vital updates on weather, road closures, and traffic conditions.
Effective Traffic Control: The collaboration between various entities enables smooth traffic flow and quick response to accidents thanks to the 24-hour
Command and control centre in Kusgaon.
Partnerships between the public and commercial sectors ensure that high implementation standards are met and that performance is maximised.
Financial Commitment: The government has pledged to make road safety the most important thing by supporting an investment of Rs 60 crore.
Scalability: The technology is adaptable enough to be added to additional road networks, acting as a prototype for future traffic control systems.
The ITMS has 430 top-notch AI-driven cameras placed at 106 crucial intersections across the highway to monitor traffic safety. These cameras are designed to handle 17 distinct categories of traffic violations. Overspeeding, reckless driving, lane cutting, driving on the wrong side of the road, unnecessarily stopping, using a phone while driving, not wearing a seat belt, not using a tail light reflector, flashy licence plates, and overloaded cars are only a few of these infractions.
The Command and Control Centre (CCC) at Kusgaon will be open twenty-four hours a day, coordinating ITMS operations with highway police and regional transport officials (RTOs). Offences will be swiftly reported to the appropriate authorities, allowing for prompt enforcement measures such as the levying of penalties and traffic control.
The state of Maharashtra is prepared to usher in an entirely new phase of secure, effective, and technologically sophisticated transportation with the Mumbai-Pune New Motorway as this enormous project nears its launch date.
According to Sanjay Yadav, joint managing director of the project’s contractor, Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC), “We are planning to make the ITMS functional from October 15 of this year.”
The ITMS project, which includes technology like the adaptive traffic control system, automatic number plate identification system, red light violation detection system, and speed violation detection, seeks to maximise traffic efficiency by minimising traffic difficulties.
The project uses cutting-edge technology and sophisticated surveillance systems to enhance highway administration and safety.
430 top-notch cameras with artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities have been put at 106 places along the motorway as part of the project. The AI cameras can identify more than 17 distinct forms of traffic violations, including lane violations, speeding, and other dangerous driving practices. The system has a visual messaging component that makes it easier to communicate important information to highway users.
Additionally, an integrated optical fibre that runs alongside both ends of the highway connects the cameras. This connectivity ensures seamless communication and unbroken data flow between the cameras and the CCC. A public-private partnership strategy has been used to set up the ITMS programme, and it has received an investment of about Rs 60 crore.
The ITMS arsenal primarily features a visual message system that will act as a channel for transmitting crucial information to drivers using the highway. With real-time updates on traffic, road closures, and crucial information like weather forecasts, this technology is positioned to give travellers crucial insights.
“The deployment of ITMS on nine highways, including Mumbai-Kolhapur, Thane-Dhule, Nashik-Pune, Solapur-Beed, Nagpur-Chandrapur, Nagpur-Amravati, Ghodbandar-Achad, Ahmednagar-Pune, and Akola-Washim, has been announced in the state budget for the fiscal year 2023–24,” according to a report.
Recently, it was also reported that the Mumbai-Pune route’s diesel buses are gradually being replaced by all-electric e-Shivneri buses by the Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC). Only 30 diesel buses remain out of the 100 that were previously operating on this busy route.