Informal working teams are currently working on public transport topics (specialising in parking, vehicle speed and public transport), the development of advanced in-vehicle assistance systems and autonomous driving (through the Annotation Centre), and simulation and visualisation in transport (the creation and use of virtual environments through the U SMART ZONE polygon and drivers' behaviour research using the Vehicle Simulator).
In the context of everyday parking on residential estates and in cities, you will often come across a range of curiosities from "we park where we can" to "I'm risking other people's lives and I don't even know it". In fact, the often insufficient capacity of legal parking spaces leads to illegal parking, the risk of which some drivers are completely unaware of. This ranges from obstructing sight lines at junctions or pedestrian crossings to preventing large vehicles from passing through and thus, for example, making it difficult or delaying the intervention of firefighters or ambulances in life-threatening situations. Not to mention the general deterioration in local quality of life due to vehicles parked everywhere, the uncertainty of finding a parking space, etc.
We focus on many issues in our traffic calming surveys, including determining the risk of vehicle parking in the area in question. Thanks to clear maps, we are then able to illustrate very easily the extent of the identified risk and show which locations represent an unacceptable risk and should therefore be a priority for improvement.
For cities, we are then able to create a so-called "Catalogue of Deficits", which is a list of risk phenomena in the addressed area that directly create a risk of traffic accidents or exacerbate the consequences of potential accidents. For each deficit we then define the risk and recommendations for a corrective action. In most cases, these are higher tens of deficits that the city can use as an action plan to improve the situation. Measures range from "add a sign" to "implement comprehensive road improvements". This makes it easy for the City and its officials to know what modifications are needed, their anticipated cost, and what risks such modifications will eliminate.
You can read in detail about our activities in this area, as well as sample outputs, by reading our posts on Parking and Traffic Calming or on Parking Vacancy Navigation Systems.
Ing. Jiří Zeisek, zeisek@fd.cvut.cz, +420 720 071 343
Ing. Martin Scháno, schano@fd.cvut.cz, +420 606 771 763
The Department Děčín deals, among other things, with a number of activities in the field of road transport safety, such as measuring speed and traffic intensity by means of mobile radar.
Our radars deliberately do not look like measuring devices so that vehicles passing by cannot be affected in any way. When a vehicle passes by, the date and time, vehicle speed, dimensions, category and several other pieces of information about a particular vehicle are recorded. So what is the purpose of such a measurement in the first place?
If someone suspects that a vehicle is driving faster than it should be in their community, they can contact us and we will temporarily place a mobile measuring device at that location. We usually measure during the week, as drivers behave differently when driving to work or school than they do when driving for recreation at the weekend. After this week, we will provide clear statistics on the vehicles passing, the number of vehicles exceeding the speed limit and much other interesting and useful information, including recommendations on how to improve any identified risks.
You can find out more about this activity in the article Tackling vehicle speeds in the district, and you can see some of the locations measured in the Radar Map Visualisation.
Ing. Jiří Zeisek, zeisek@fd.cvut.cz, +420 720 071 343
Ing. Martin Scháno, schano@fd.cvut.cz, +420 606 771 763
From a completely different point of view, you can also see a number of activities in the field of simulation and visualization in transport. One of them is the virtual polygon U SMART ZONE.
U SMART ZONE is an area located in Ústí nad Labem. Its history begins in 2018, when a feasibility study was completed in cooperation between CTU FD and KPMG for the city of Ústí nad Labem. The aim was to identify a suitable location in Ústí for testing advanced vehicle assistance systems and autonomous driving.
The Department Děčín subsequently created a virtual model of this circuit for testing experimental traffic and vehicle systems in the safety of computer simulation.
To learn more about this project, we refer you to the separate post U SMART ZONE.
Ing. Martin Scháno, schano@fd.cvut.cz, +420 606 771 763