New A.I. at Detroit intersections to make crossing safer
DETROIT (FOX 2) - Crossing the street at Jefferson and Randolph is a daunting task.
Even more so when you hear:
"Detroit has the highest per capita death rate of pedestrians for a major city," said William Foss with DERQ.
More people die crossing the street in Detroit than anywhere else. So Dubai and Michigan based company DERQ have installed the U.S.'s first-ever artificial intelligence technology that measures and captures data about who's going where and more importantly how to make sure they're safe when they're crossing.
The data from this intersection is being fed to the Michigan Department of Transportation.
"We're helping them understand when do people turn into tunnels? How many? From where? And at what point? Now that has an implication for tunnel use, bridge usage and implication for road and highway congestion so they actually get the benefit of that application," Foss said.
Eventually all cars will be built with a component that can interact with the technology, so cars will alert drivers of someone nearby-avoiding accidents.
"Right now those sensors are collecting information, they are recording in real time. Our algorithms are then sitting on those with video feeds to predict what will happen and then in the center of the intersection there is a communication device and it is broadcasting out these messages," Foss said.
Eventually this will all help with driverless cars. But it will be used before that too. Cadillac CTS will be one of the first to adopt it inside its cars -- the entire Cadillac brand will have it in all of its cars soon after.
MDOT and DERQ working with a commercial fleet to retrofit vehicles putting components in, helping avoid accidents. The intro that's gathered through this will end up in the commercial fleets.
"They have a disproportionate amount of miles they drive on the roads which correlates with a disproportionate amount of risk that their drivers face so working with them and where their drivers operate and making those individual drivers save her we believe that will ultimately save their lives," Foss said.