London Trialing GPS Speed Governors
Although a GPS unit lost a recent court battle against a radar gun, in this case GPS units might be used to enforce speed limits.
Each car will have a special digital map of the city downloaded into their sat-navs, which has all the road speeds listed. The plan is that the proposed ISA device will then pinpoint the driver’s location and tell if they are exceeding the limit.
It will stop them from going too fast by taking control of the accelerator pedal and vibrating the throttle, or giving an audible warning to let drivers know they’re speeding. A TfL spokesman stressed it’s only a pilot project scheduled to last two years. But a line in the bid document, seen by Auto Express, says the organisation is “potentially looking for a longer-term partner which, if the initial trial on TfL vehicles proves successful, would be interested in working to promote the technology throughout London”.
Each car will have a special digital map of the city downloaded into their sat-navs, which has all the road speeds listed. The plan is that the proposed ISA device will then pinpoint the driver’s location and tell if they are exceeding the limit.
It will stop them from going too fast by taking control of the accelerator pedal and vibrating the throttle, or giving an audible warning to let drivers know they’re speeding. A TfL spokesman stressed it’s only a pilot project scheduled to last two years. But a line in the bid document, seen by Auto Express, says the organisation is “potentially looking for a longer-term partner which, if the initial trial on TfL vehicles proves successful, would be interested in working to promote the technology throughout London”.
According to the plan they will set up digital maps to be downloaded to consumers' GPS units. But who's going to download these maps if they effectively work as a speed governor? Not us!
