AI technology is being tested to alert drivers and authorities more quickly to someone driving the wrong way down a motorway and to assist the police in their pursuit of the individuals.
Ireland’s Minister of State for Road Safety Seán Canney outlined the possible move as he separately said new tougher laws to tackle a spate of recent wrong-way motorway driving incidents will be drafted next week and could be in place by the end of the year, reports RTE.
The move comes after Fine Gael TD Catherine Callaghan called on the Government to examine road safety measures used in other European countries to better protect innocent road users from the devastating consequences of wrong-way driving.
Deputy Callaghan said recent events have left many families and communities shocked and heartbroken, and that every possible step should be taken to reduce the risk of similar tragedies occurring in the future.
Speaking to reporters at Government Buildings after an initial meeting with gardaí, Transport Infrastructure Ireland and the Road Safety Authority, Minister Canney said it is crucial Ireland makes wrong-way motorway driving an “intolerable” act in this country.
“Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII) are strengthening their road safety efforts and are trying new tech to deal with challenges like this,” says Valerann’s Olga Gonzalez. “Valerann’s Lanternn AI-powered incident detection platform is one of those solutions. It is already deployed on the TII’s strategic network and uses the installed PTZ cameras to detect wrong-way driving. In addition, it processes data from multiple sources to contextually process information and provide holisstic real-time traffic information.
“We constantly update capabilities of our product and we have recently added wrong way driving detection as a new feature. TII are one of the customers that are combining computer vision tech with data fusion to have better anomaly detection on the network and to provide a timely, relevant response.
“This is one of the issues with the social media phenomena that influences young people to adopt wrong behaviour. So to combat this authorities need to constantly update technology for traffic management.”
The Independent TD said this includes the potential use of AI technology in conjunction with the existing road camera network, which he said could help to better protect the public by providing quicker safety warnings.
“There is an opportunity with AI and the camera technology which we have at the moment,” he said.
He added: “The M50, for example, is well covered with cameras, and on the road to Cork there is a lot of camera networks there.
“What we need to do is continue with AI technology to help us detect quicker what’s going on, maybe have alerts quicker, and also the gardaí would then maybe be better placed to see how they deal with it.”
Minister Canney separately said his department, which will have formal responsibility for any upcoming law changes, will meet with Department of Justice and other officials “next week” to draft new legislation to address wrong-way motorway driving
Pressed on what it would involve and why any new legislation is needed when the act is already illegal, he said “the penalty” would be tougher, but did not elaborate, later confirming he believes potential new laws will be part of the new Dáil term’s priority legislation, and that he wants them in place by the end of the year.
He said other road safety measures are being examined based on protections for the public in place in other countries, name-checking the US.
Mr Canney was also separately asked if he has confidence in the Road Safety Authority’s most senior officials, saying he has “full confidence” in the organisation.
(Picture: Valerann)
