A traffic forecasting system capable of predicting traffic conditions seven days in advance will go live to the public in California on Wednesday.
Alongside the weather forecast, viewers of KXTV News 10 in Sacramento can now get 3D animations of their local road network, showing not only where the gridlock is but also where it is likely to be...
The system takes real-time sensor information from major routes and junctions as its inputs. In addition to this it uses alerts on traffic related weather conditions, road incident alerts, road works and even some calendar events such as sporting events, in order to make its predictions...
In the coming months the company is planning to roll the system out to 19 major cities in the US, including San Francisco, Los Angeles and Atlanta. In time, Gueziec hopes, traffic forecasts will become a staple feature of TV, much like weather forecasts.
http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn7605