On 4 April, the Compass4D consortium presented its latest achievements and demonstrated live its services in Helmond, in the Netherlands. During the morning dedicated to the European deployment of C-ITS (Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems) in cities, over 150 stakeholders representing cities, public institutions, the European Commission, automotive industry, road authorities and users participated in an interactive workshop organised by Compass4D.
“Compass4D is creating an urban smart corridor between Helmond and Eindhoven. Indeed the project will deploy real usable services, which link our ambitions of being a living lab for innovation and mobility with our needs to find smart solutions for environment and mobility challenges”, said Mayor Elly Blanksma-van den Heuvel.
Investing in smart mobility
Compass4D is deploying harmonised C-ITS services in 7 European cities. In Helmond, Compass4D will deploy the three services Red Light Violation Warning, Road Hazard Warning, and Energy Efficiency Intersection while 7 trucks, 25 electric cars, 5 buses and 5 emergency vehicles will be equipped with interoperable onboard units, usable also in the other six Compass4D cities across Europe.
Helmond and other partners already invested during the last couple of years, and will further invest, in building an effective C-ITS infrastructure. Helmond is not new in terms of deployment of C-ITS and smart mobility solutions. For instance FREILOT, another successful project finalised in 2012, developed a new approach to deal with traffic congestion and to reduce CO2 emissions by providing priority and speed advice at intersections to logistic trucks and fire brigade vehicles.
In 2013 all traffic lights and cooperative equipment from the FREILOT project were upgraded to the latest standards. In Compass4D two additional intersections will be equipped and upgrades of the existing ones will be made. This will result in a real intra-urban and inter-urban C-ITS corridor running from Helmond to Eindhoven via the highway A270.
“We thank the city of Helmond for hosting this event and all consortium Partners – cities, industry, research, users – for their excellent cooperation to deploy and evaluate ITS services for urban mobility. The ERTICO Partnership sees the potential of ITS to make urban mobility more sustainable and works with cities and other stakeholders to realise it”. Hermann Meyer, ERTICO CEO, stated during the workshop.
Representing the industry point of view, Klaas Rozema, Chief Technology Officer at Imtech Traffic and Infra, added that “Compass4D is a way to create sustainable ITS harmonised across Europe that uses smart cooperative mobility to improve safety, create a more efficient, more environmentally friendly and cost effective transport”.
In addition to Helmond, Compass4D will equip the cities of Bordeaux, Copenhagen, Newcastle, Thessaloniki, Verona and Vigo with cooperative ITS services. These cities are all very committed in terms of cooperative systems deployment and they are all willing to further invest in road safety, energy efficiency and congestion reducing measures. But they are not alone; Compass4D has already attracted other cities as associated partners of the project. After Amsterdam, Eindhoven (both in the Netherlands) and Tampere (Finland), the city of Mechelen (Belgium) became the fourth associated city in the project.
The project is coordinated by ERTICO – ITS Europe and consists of 33 partners: City of Copenhagen; City of Helmond; Newcastle City Council; City of Vigo; City of Verona; Region of Central Macedonia; French Ministry of Ecology, Development and Energy (MEDDE); Centre for Research and Technology Hellas (CERTH); Automotive Technological Centre of Galicia (CTAG); Equipos de Señalizacion y Control (ESYCSA); EUROTAXI; Federation Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA); GEOLOC Systems; Institute of Communication and Computer System (ICCS); IDIADA Automotive Technology; French Insititute of Science and Technology, Developments and Networks (IFSTTAR); IMTECH Traffic & INFRA B.V.; INFOTRIP; IRU Projects; Mathias Paul Ewald (MAT Traffic); PEEK Traffic B.V.; Imtech Traffic & Infra A/S; Siemens; Swarco Mizar; Telecom Italia; TOPOS Aquitaine; TNO; University of Newcastle; Vialis; Vitrasa; Volvo Technology; V-TRON.
