The tolling market comprises of electronic-toll lanes with either automated gates or freeflow toll lanes where enforcement is accomplished by the use of ANPR cameras. Freeflow ‘Non barrier’ tolling reduces traffic congestion and has positive impact on environment. ANPR is utilised to identify and enforce non payment of toll charges by producing images of vehicle number plates.
Electronic Toll Collection (ETC) systems take advantage of vehicle-to-roadside communication technologies to perform an electronic monetary transaction between a vehicle passing through a toll station and the toll agency. ETC systems require Onboard units (OBU), vehicle detection and classification as well as enforcement technologies.
Essentially, ETC equipment substitutes for having a person or coin machine to manually collect tolls at toll booths. In addition, it allows such transactions to be performed while vehicles travel at high speed. ETC systems are also emerging as the most efficient way to implement congestion pricing.
With PIPS market leading recognition and read rates increasing numbers of customers see ANPR technology as the way forward as the primary means of payment replacing Tag/DSRC technology.
Benefits include :
- Increase in toll lane capacity/throughput = revenue
- Reduction in motorist waiting time
- Convenience for toll payers
- Fuel savings and a decrease in mobile emissions by reducing or eliminating waiting times/congestion
- Reduction in toll collection costs and enhancement of audit control by centralising user accounts
- Greatly enhances the possibility to implement congestion pricing by breaking technical barriers: non-intrusive toll collection requires much less infrastructure, automatic vehicle counting and classification and automated accounting systems.
- ANPR cameras can accurately and efficiently identify toll violators.
