Driving through Frankfurt can really get on your nerves - whether you're in a car or on a bike. A new app aims to help ensure that your journey isn't constantly slowed down at red lights. The app offers a city-wide switching time forecast at traffic lights, which was developed by the city of Frankfurt am Main as part of the "NOx Reduction Master Plan," funded by the German government's "Immediate Clean Air Program." Its purpose is to enable citizens to experience the information coming into the traffic control center every second from 441 traffic lights.
Thus, the trafficpilot app, which is available free of charge for Android and iOS devices, shows the correct speed to stay within the "green wave" when driving through the city. The app - which cost around 256,000 euros to develop and received half of its funding from the federal government - uses the coordination of ongoing switching times at traffic lights and can be used by bike or car. Colors symbolize how reliable the forecast is and how one should adjust one's driving behavior to get through the traffic light when it turns green: If you drive too fast or too slow, you leave the "green wave" and drive in the red zone. The display of the current speed also helps. As a cyclist, you can get through the next intersection relaxed, and as a car driver, you can save fuel and reduce emissions. If you do come to a stop, you are given a time, if available, until the traffic light turns green again.
Functions and benefits of the app are also available in a explanatory movie on Youtube as well as at mainziel.de.
For the head of the Road Traffic Department, Petra Lau, the trafficpilot is a next step in the digitalization of traffic systems: "For years, we have been working successfully to make mobility in Frankfurt am Main fit for the future. The result of our investments in the technical infrastructure and our work on optimizing and coordinating the traffic lights can now be accessed in an app on your smartphone. We are now able to share our data directly and make connected driving individually usable. The app promises fewer stops at intersections for bicycle and car traffic and thus makes an important contribution to increasing traffic safety and efficiency with the effect of reducing noise and air pollutants. With trafficpilot, after extensive testing, we have now achieved a forecasting quality that we can release for public use. Of course, the product will also be continuously improved."
More information about trafficpilot is available on the city's traffic information portal mainziel.de and at trafficpilot.eu.
