COIMBATORE: The Coimbatore city police plan to adopt innovative ideas showcased at a road safety hackathon held recently in the city in order to enhance road safety.
Around 3,000 participants from various states presented innovative and cost-effective solutions for accident prevention and road safety in the two-hackathon that was organized by the district administration, City Police, and Uyir, a non-governmental organization. A panel selected 16 ideas in the final round.
During the valedictory function, Minister V Senthil Balaji said the state government would implement some of the ideas. On Saturday, senior officials of the district administration discussed the implementation of some ideas.
Speaking to TNIE, G Manuneethi, Divisional Engineer (DE) of the State Highways Department (Road Safety), “Among the selected ideas was a sensor-based camera for detecting driver drowsiness. The camera, installed in the driver’s cabin of passenger buses, monitors the facial expressions of drivers and alert upon detecting signs of fatigue.
This technology can intervene before critical situations arise. Another suggestion involved using a VR driving simulator during vehicle driving tests and when issuing driving licenses at RTO offices.”
City Police Commissioner A Saravana Sundar said they have asked those who presented the ideas to implement them. Police and District Road Safety Committee and UYIR will monitor the results.
“Many impressive solutions were proposed to address issues faced by road users, such as detecting and listing potholes using vehicle-mounted cameras, identifying nearby available parking lots through applications, automatically operating signals based on pedestrian density, etc.
All these ideas will be piloted to assess their feasibility and effectiveness. Those that yield positive results may be implemented on a wider scale,” Saravana Sundar said.