Improving road safety and transport efficiency using cellular networks in Tanzania

Abstract

Road transport takes about 70% of the transportation systems in Tanzania. With the increasing number of vehicles and urbanization, the number of road accidents has been rising now and then leading to an increase in the number of casualties and deaths. Efforts must be made to make sure that the number of road accidents is reduced. Wireless technologies have come as a solution to such road safety and transport efficiency issues. Recently, the promise of wireless technologies to support vehicular communications and hence improving road safety has led to much research work. Integrating traffic information from traffic unit into cellular networks and finally broadcasting the information to road users can help increase road safety. Simulations using North Chiang Tung University Network Simulator (NCTUns) show that using cellular networks at a particular point to broadcast traffic information to road users can increase road safety. This dissertation discusses the causes of road accidents, the different wireless technologies that are commonly used in vehicular communications to increase road safety and improve transport efficiency and finally describes the model that can be used to provide traffic information. It focuses on the use of cellular networks based on mobile phones to provide road traffic information to road users.