Please ensure Javascript is enabled for purposes of website accessibility

West Bank Town Becomes ‘Big Prison’ as Israel Fences It In

2 days ago

Trump Says He’s Willing to Let Migrant Farm Laborers Stay in US

2 days ago

US Electric Vehicle Tax Breaks Will Expire on Sept. 30

2 days ago

Eyeing Arctic Dominance, Trump Bill Earmarks $8.6 Billion for US Coast Guard Icebreakers

2 days ago

Trump’s Sweeping Tax-Cut and Spending Bill Wins Congressional Approval

2 days ago

Americans Celebrate Their Independence With Record-Breaking Travel Numbers

3 days ago

US Supreme Court to Decide Legality of Transgender School Sports Bans

3 days ago

Nvidia Set to Become the World’s Most Valuable Company in History

3 days ago

Poll: 41% in US ‘Extremely Proud’ to Be American, Near Historic Low

3 days ago
Researchers Show AI Car Features Can Ease Road Congestion
gvw_ap_news
By Associated Press
Published 3 years ago on
November 26, 2022

Share

As millions of people travel the interstates over the long Thanksgiving weekend, many will encounter patches of traffic at a standstill for no apparent reason — no construction or accident. Researchers say the problem is you.

Human drivers just don’t do a good job of navigating dense traffic conditions, but an experiment using artificial intelligence in Nashville last week means help could be on the way. In the experiment, specially equipped cars were able to ease rush hour congestion on Interstate-24, researcher Daniel Work said on Tuesday. In addition to lessening driver frustration, Work said less stop-and-go driving means fuel savings and, by extension, less pollution.

The professor of civil and environmental engineering at Vanderbilt University is one of a group of engineers and mathematicians from universities around the U.S. who have been studying the problem of phantom traffic jams after a simple experiment in Japan a dozen years ago showed how they develop. Researchers there put about 20 human drivers on a circular track and asked them to drive at a constant speed. Before long, traffic went from a smooth flow to a series of stops and starts.

“Phantom traffic jams are created by drivers like you and me,” Work explained.

One person taps the brakes for whatever reason. The person behind them takes a second to respond and has to brake even harder. The next person has to brake even harder. The wave of braking continues until many cars are at a standstill. Then, as traffic clears, the drivers accelerate too quickly, causing more braking and yet another jam.

“We know that one car braking suddenly can have a huge impact,” Work said.

Last week’s experiment showed that a few cars driving slowly and steadily could have an impact as well, for the better.

The experiment utilized 100 cars that traveled in loops on a 15-mile section of I-24 from about 6 a.m. to 9:45 a.m. each morning. Working on the premise that if 5% of the cars on the road were acting together, they could lessen the prevalence of phantom traffic jams, the researchers equipped those 100 cars to communicate wirelessly, sending traffic information back and forth.

They also took advantage of the adaptive cruise control that is already an option on many new vehicles. This technology lets the driver set a car to cruise at a certain speed, but the car automatically slows down and speeds up as needed to keep a safe distance from the car in front. In the experiment, the adaptive cruise control was modified to react to the overall traffic flow — including what was happening far ahead — using artificial intelligence.

The cars’ decision-making occurred on two levels, Work said. At the cloud level, information about traffic conditions was used to create an overall speed plan. That plan was then broadcast to the cars, which used artificial intelligence algorithms to determine the best action to take. The researchers were able to evaluate the effect the connected cars had on morning traffic flow using a special 4-mile stretch of I-24 outfitted with 300 pole-mounted sensors.

The experiment is a project of the CIRCLES consortium, a group that includes several automakers and the U.S. Energy and Transportation departments. Other lead researchers are based at the University of California, Berkeley; Temple University; and Rutgers University-Camden.

Liam Pedersen is deputy general manager for research at Nissan, a CIRCLES consortium partner who was in Nashville last week for the experiment. He said one of the exciting things about it is that it builds on technology that is already in many new cars.

“This is not autonomous driving,” he said. “This is something we could realize very soon.”

Asked if automakers will be willing to cooperate to ease traffic, Pedersen said, “I certainly hope so, because the system works best when lots and lots of cars participate.”

Last week’s experiment built off one Work and his colleagues conducted in 2017 at the University of Arizona. That repeated the Japanese experiment, this time with a single self-driving car thrown into the mix. The self-driving car smoothed the flow of traffic so that there was 98% less braking. That led to a 40% increase in fuel efficiency and a 14% increase in distance driven.

Researchers are still crunching the numbers on last week’s experiment, but Work said it “demonstrated that these jams can be reduced through the novel automated vehicle technologies we developed. It’s unquestionable that enhanced automotive technology can significantly reduce phantom traffic jams when implemented at scale.”

Still, he cautioned that the technology is not going to suddenly eliminate congestion.

“When there are more cars on the road than the road can support, there will always be traffic,” he said. “But this can make that congestion less painful.”

RELATED TOPICS:

DON'T MISS

What Are Fresno Real Estate Experts Predicting for 2025 and Beyond?

DON'T MISS

First California EV Mandates Hit Automakers This Year. Most Are Not Even Close

DON'T MISS

How Trump’s ‘Big, Beautiful Bill’ Will Make China Great Again

DON'T MISS

What’s Caitlin Clark Worth to the WNBA? A Lot More Than Her $78,066 Salary.

DON'T MISS

Trump to Sign Tax-Cut and Spending Bill in July 4 Ceremony

DON'T MISS

Madre Fire Spurs Evacuations Across 3 Counties, Grows to More Than 70,000 Acres

DON'T MISS

Clovis, Sanger, Madera, and Bass Lake Will Light the Sky With Fireworks Shows Tonight

DON'T MISS

Oil Dips Ahead of Expected OPEC+ Output Increase

DON'T MISS

613 Killed at Gaza Aid Distribution Sites, Near Humanitarian Covoys, Says UN

DON'T MISS

Fresno County Authorities Investigating Suspicious Death of Transient Man

DON'T MISS

West Bank Town Becomes ‘Big Prison’ as Israel Fences It In

DON'T MISS

Israeli Military Kills 20 in Gaza as Trump Awaits Hamas Reply to Truce Proposal

UP NEXT

Meta’s Instagram Down for Thousands of Users in US, Downdetector Shows

UP NEXT

Google Hit With $314 Million US Verdict in Cellular Data Class Action

UP NEXT

US Senate Strikes AI Regulation Ban From Trump Megabill

UP NEXT

Apple Loses Bid to Dismiss US Smartphone Monopoly Case

UP NEXT

Teamsters President Urges Congress to Scrap AI State Law Ban

UP NEXT

Massive Security Breach: 16 Billion Passwords Leaked From Apple, Google, Facebook Accounts

UP NEXT

SpaceX Starship Rocket Explodes in Setback to Musk’s Mars Mission

UP NEXT

Meta in Talks to Hire Former GitHub CEO Nat Friedman to Join AI Efforts, The Information Reports

UP NEXT

Texas Instruments Plans $60 Billion US Investment Under Trump Push

UP NEXT

Musk’s xAI in Talks for $4.3 Billion Equity Funding, Bloomberg News Reports

Madre Fire Spurs Evacuations Across 3 Counties, Grows to More Than 70,000 Acres

2 days ago

Clovis, Sanger, Madera, and Bass Lake Will Light the Sky With Fireworks Shows Tonight

2 days ago

Oil Dips Ahead of Expected OPEC+ Output Increase

2 days ago

613 Killed at Gaza Aid Distribution Sites, Near Humanitarian Covoys, Says UN

2 days ago

Fresno County Authorities Investigating Suspicious Death of Transient Man

2 days ago

West Bank Town Becomes ‘Big Prison’ as Israel Fences It In

2 days ago

Israeli Military Kills 20 in Gaza as Trump Awaits Hamas Reply to Truce Proposal

2 days ago

Valley Crime Stoppers’ Most Wanted Person of the Day: Rachelle Maria Blanco

2 days ago

Russia Pounds Kyiv With Largest Drone Attack, Hours After Trump-Putin Call

2 days ago

Boxer Chavez Jr Expected to Be Deported to Mexico to Serve Sentence, Mexican President Says

2 days ago

How Trump’s ‘Big, Beautiful Bill’ Will Make China Great Again

Can you hear it — that loud roar coming from the East? It’s the sound of 1.4 billion Chinese laughing at us. Thomas L. Friedman The New Yo...

17 hours ago

Solar Farm in Riesel, Texas
17 hours ago

How Trump’s ‘Big, Beautiful Bill’ Will Make China Great Again

Caitlin Clark Signs T-Shirt
17 hours ago

What’s Caitlin Clark Worth to the WNBA? A Lot More Than Her $78,066 Salary.

President Donald Trump speaks during a press conference in the Roosevelt Room at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., May 12, 2025. (Reuters File)
2 days ago

Trump to Sign Tax-Cut and Spending Bill in July 4 Ceremony

The Madre Fire burning near New Cuyama has scorched 70,801 acres as of Friday, July 4, 2025, afternoon, making it California’s largest wildfire of the year, with only 10% containment and multiple evacuation zones in place. (CalFire)
2 days ago

Madre Fire Spurs Evacuations Across 3 Counties, Grows to More Than 70,000 Acres

2 days ago

Clovis, Sanger, Madera, and Bass Lake Will Light the Sky With Fireworks Shows Tonight

A pumpjack operates at the Vermilion Energy site in Trigueres, France, June 14, 2024. (Reuters File)
2 days ago

Oil Dips Ahead of Expected OPEC+ Output Increase

Palestinians gather to collect what remains of relief supplies from the distribution center of the U.S.-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, June 5, 2025. (Reuters File)
2 days ago

613 Killed at Gaza Aid Distribution Sites, Near Humanitarian Covoys, Says UN

Billy Wayne Sinisgalli, a 54-year-old transient known locally as Wayne, was found dead along a rural Fresno road Wednesday in what authorities are investigating as a suspicious death. (Fresno County SO)
2 days ago

Fresno County Authorities Investigating Suspicious Death of Transient Man

Help continue the work that gets you the news that matters most.

Search

Send this to a friend