Audi has just added a few more cities to its newest technology, vehicle-to-infrastructure. V2I wirelessly sends traffic light information to your car using LTE and can provide data like, how much longer a red light will stay red, or if you can make your next approaching green light. In the instance where you may not make the green, Audi will tell you to coast to the intersection to save gas or speed up to make the light (speeding up would be the norm I assume).
Audi’s advance system will display timers on the dashboard and give tips on if you have enough time to queue up a song you would like to play. Of course, all of these features will come at a premium. You will receive the first six months free, but afterwards the pricing starts at $199 for six months, or $599 for 18 months if you wish to keep the feature.
Right now, only 4,700 intersections are supported, or 13 U.S. cities, with Audi slowly getting more partnerships as time goes on. Unfortunately, Philadelphia is not one of the supported cities and the closest city being Washington, D.C. Still, this is a wonderful advancement in automotive technology that can save time, gas, and patience.
source: https://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/audi-traffic-light-information-expansion/
Ami Parekh says
I think this is really interesting! I didn’t know a feature like this existed and I think it’ll definitely revolutionize smart cars/driving. Something that worries me about this is that technology is not perfect. Because the signals are being sent through LTE, there is room for error through malfunction or malicious behavior. I think its similar to self driving cars in that it will take a long time before the technology is accurate and adapted by a large population.
Alexander B Goldstein says
This article is very cool because I believe roads are definitely the next step for the IOT. There is a ton of data about traffic and car accidents that can be collected. Audi is making the right choice by starting this new system. Hopefully, this will become cheaper and available in other cars as well. It should be able to decrease car accidents as well as improve fuel efficiency if the driver and the car is able to receive relevant information about traffic lights and the road itself.
Khuong Trong Tang says
I think this is very interesting. I didn’t know that this technology has been invented. While this technology is pragmatic in that it can prevent auto accident, Its expensive price tag would deter large adoption and relegate this to . To increase its expansion and adoption, Audi should have license it to other car manufacturers for more consistence income and take advantage of the network effect to become the leading company. This strategy would allow more customers access to the technology which mean the market size will increase and allow Audi to spread its fix cost to more customers.