AI traffic lights could reduce waiting times at intersections

Ordinarily, traffic lights change color in response to predetermined rules and induction loop sensors embedded in the road. According to new research, however, making those lights artificially intelligent may keep traffic flowing faster and smoother. The study is being conducted as part of Germany's KI4LSA project – it's funded by the German Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure, and includes several partner organizations. One of those partners, the Fraunhofer Institute for Optronics, System Technologies and Image Exploitation, recently installed high-resolution cameras and radar sensors at a busy traffic-light-controlled intersection in the city of Lemgo. Over time, this setup recorded the number of vehicles waiting for the lights to change, the amount of time that each vehicle had to wait, and the average speed at which the vehicles went through the intersection.