A number of UK roads are lookin' a lot brighter now, and it's all thanks to the SolarLite smart stud. Produced and marketed by Astucia, these active markers trump the traditional passive reflectors by storing up solar energy all day and then emitting light from dust 'til dawn in order to improve visibility from around 90-meters to 900-meters. The LED-based units reportedly extend driver reaction time from 3.2-seconds to over half a minute when cruising at 60mph, have an expected lifespan of eight to ten years and are said to have reduced night time accidents in certain areas by over 70-percent. Unfortunately, we've no idea when (or if) these things will show up on roads in other nations, but this would sure beat toggling one's brights off and on to get a better look ahead while simultaneously infuriating oncoming motorists.
[Via
Autoblog]
posted Nov 21st 2007 4:58PM
Typo:
"from dust 'til dawn"
Eh? Dust?
In dusty conditions, light is needed on the road. He's completely correct. What did you think he meant, Dusk? Ha Ha, No.
Smart Stud?
I wish I had a dime for every time I was called that.
@ mickey jones comment, if you had a dime every time that hapenned.. you'd probably end up owing somehow.. moron!!! what the hell kinda comment was that?
I wonder if they will last in snow areas where big plows may rip them right off the road.
"...emitting light from dust 'til dawn..."
I wasn't aware there was a time of day known as dust. Maybe these are only on gravel and dirt roads?
Yea because nobody, especially us dummies on a tech blog would have never known what he really meant.
Yeah because it wasn't a light hearted joke. You should take anonymous comments MORE SERIOUSER!
The Internet. Serious business.
Srsly.
The Internet. Seriouser business.
This is a great idea. I don't know how many times I've almost run off an unfamiliar road at night because I couldn't see an oncoming turn until I was right upon it.
To improve upon the idea, when the weight of a car drives presses on top of them, it should generate additional power (by a downward force) by adding a piezoelectric generation or some other force dynamo in to the "reflector"; allowing it to gain an additional charge during inclement weather or overcast days. Such a system would not replace the solar charger but would be an augmentation and would work to assure a charge remained throughout the starry night.
re: I LOVE THE CAPS LOCK KEY
Only if you enjoy driving along the edge of the road or with your wheels dangerously close to the center of the road. :)
I dread to think how much this would cost to install!
Instead of wasting it on the whole road. This is only needed on a curve road and you really dont need to have them on a straight road.
@Bloobie
It will work. Not every car will hit it, many will stay with in the line but some will stray out side or on the line. We have all run in to the reflectors or gone too fast in to a curve only to find ourselves slightly in the other lane and then correct the matter a moment later.
@James Cameron
It's not a waste - since moving from the UK to mainland Europe I hate the fact that so few roads have "cats eyes" or their equivalent. In poor weather conditions and especially in heavy rain, straight line paint markers are totally useless and you can't tell what lane your in. In the UK they're a god-send as they help to keep you from straying into other traffic or off the road.
No they don't, I hear almost everybody drives on the wrong side almost all the time in britain.
2 Rants.
1. I think people go to blogs just to be Grammar-esque Nazi's. Because obviously most people care about everything but the subject matter.
2. What is up with that Apple ads. Is it not proper internet etiquette to have ADs with audio, uh, MUTED. Therefore unmuted by people who have an interest in said ad. THX FOR THAT REALLY LOUD ANNOYING AD.
Side-Note, I think the LED's are cool. I personally would love to see it come over state-side. But imagine the fool who's high off drugs, thinking the highway is some kind of rave panel. Hence a higher increase in high-speed pursuits, or crashes.
I think you're an Ad-Nazi. Plus, did you not see the other, multiple posts about that ad? How many comments sections are we going to have to talk about this thing in?
If you couldn't read, I was not regarding the Ad taking 50% of the screen (which was the purpose of that post).
No, I was regarding the fact that maybe 1 out of 5 times I load EnGadget, it plays the Apple Ad unmuted.
I think you're an interweb-Nazi. But I won't tell anyone else. ;)
This is why AdBlock was invented.
"Nazis"
I have these around the corner where I live, and they are totally great
Drivers can now fully act out their pilot fantasies...just try not to land..its still a highway and not runway
F-ZERO!!!!!!!
Am I the only one who thought that when i read this? yeah? Okay I'm a dork....
What happens in the winter?
Around here, it'd be great for those roads without streetlights (which is most of them), but we're just a short drive from Buffalo and "seven-feet-of-snow-days."
I was wondering that too. I suppose they've a way to keep the plows from shaving them off but in of places which you speak, it gets deep fast.
They would have to be recessed into the road like the current passive reflectors, so they don't get plowed out by snowplows.
They aren't so much recessed (they've been around for a couple of years now on the A38) as they are plungers. They have sloped sides and push down into the road (we've had cats eyes for a *long* time now and they don't get torn up every year!) which, IIRC, actually causes them to get wiped by spring loaded rollers and cleaned up :) It is an odd sensation when you realise you can see the cats eyes glowing *behind* you as well as infront!
We don't get days like that in Britain (except on rare occasions, and maybe in Scotland). It would only be a problem if they took it abroad.
Why couldnt a few of these evey couple meters be equipped with rfid, allowing a car with gps and rfid reader drive itself?
Because then the tinfoil-hatters would whine about how the government is trying to keep them down by tracking their movements with RFID.
Technically, you wouldn't need RFID. You could have then all emit infrared light that an on-board camera tracks on.
Which is so silly, since the majority RFID tags are PASSIVE, letting them do absolutely nothing in terms of tracking anything. Now, if the cars had tags in them, and the studs had readers, that would be a different story. But hey, who bothers getting it right when you have paranoia on your side?
Imagine how much it'd cost?
"Technically, you wouldn't need RFID. You could have then all emit infrared light that an on-board camera tracks on."
And then sit at the side of the road running people into the ditch with a TV remote. Awesome!
If it was programmed correctly, you'd track several infrared sources, verify they are in a relatively straight/gradual curve line and that single iR remote or a collection of goofs standing next to a ditch would trigger an alarm in the car alerting the driver of a loss of tracking and the car slowing down. That is of course, if the iR tracking was poorly programmed and couldn't sort out random dots from a line of dots. I'm pretty sure image processing has gone beyond what you could do with an iR remote.
Great! So now I can drive with no headlights, and pretend its 1978 and I'm playing the old driving arcade games.
Perhaps they can equip these with those retina burning lasers so they can burn through the layers of snow and ice.
And how are they attached to the road?
How solid are they?
After how many vehicules (cars, but also heavy trucks) driving on them will they be squashed?
I'm guessing they work like the current reflective inserts. It's basically a metal casing with a reflector between two metal "protector" walls:
http://longford.ca/landscapes/albums/userpics/roadreflector-killashee.jpg
Hopefully there won't be too many people driving close enough to the edge of the road to run them over.
how do current reflectors survive? They do. So there is no reason these won't either. Plus if you read the whole thing they last up to 10 years.
These are being used for some areas in New Zealand now, and they rock!
Cool, where abouts exactly, do you know?
Does this remind anyone else of 'Night Driver' on the Atari 2600?
Yes... totally lame game, even for it's time.
We have these on a major road not far from where I live. These are a huge improvment over the old 'cats eyes', but I always find them a distraction as they can be seen in the rear-view and side mirrors behind me, unlike the older ones.
Oh, now that's a problem :( They should be set in the ground facing traffic only.
well who says they arent facing traffic? because your going forward the ones that are facing the opposite side of traffic would be in you eyes from the mirrors... but they really should only shine on your left side...
Also makes a great landing strip for UFOs.
In Ancaster , Ontario Canada there is a couple of km of highway with these LEDs in them.. kinda neat.
Ya, it really makes a difference in the rain. Much better than the reflective painted lines.
Definatley makes a big difference (London, On here) they have them on some curvy bits of the 401 and I've seen them around hamilton. Wondered how they powered them tho. Couldn't really get out and have a look.
Reminds me of that old black and white video game called Night Driver. All you saw on the screen were white dots that you had to follow. Some people were SOOOO good at that game.
It was just an excuse to cut the graphics budget ;)
We have those things on some roads here in Brampton (Ontario). Only difference is they only come on if the power goes out.
Sure they look cool, but even cooler is the fact that a desolate highway is now able to senselessly add to light pollution.
These do not produce enough light to add to light pollution. They're less bright than your car's interior light.
I'm sure these could eliminate the need for floodlights in other sections of road, thus eliminating light pollution, too. These are probably more efficient, too, because they are lights aimed directly at drivers eyes instead of lights trying to reflect off of black asphalt.
@Chad
"These do not produce enough light to add to light pollution."
Are you sure? And how much light pollution would one car interior light per meter per painted line per highway per visible radius add, each of them aimed slightly above the horizon?
@MEAT
Less than your car headlights and the streetlights that these could prevent.
@Chad
Yes, dimmer than car headlights and streetlamps, but a desolate highway with these lights will still add to light pollution, whereas a desolate highway without them wouldn't add any. These only seem useful on a seldom-used highway anyway, as it's easy to see where the road leads on one with many cars on it.
Isn't there a reason why you have highbeams? It's bright, the car moves on, the light pollution drives away.
They get sun in the UK?
I have seen these (or another similar product) on Highway 403 in Hamilton Ontario (Canada).
I just keep thinking how funny (or fucked up) it would be to cover up the existing lights and make a new route into a tree, ditch, etc.
Just have them cross eachother. Maybe even put up a sign. "Warning: 180° flip ahead."
This is nothing new, we've had LED Cat Eyes for ages in the UK, especially around bridges and tunnels or wherever they want to control which lanes can be used and for which direction of traffic.
Same here in Australia, they control the flow of traffic at different times of the day by changing the lanes with the led's.
Mexico has blue flashing LEDs along mountainous highways. They flash randomly and are actually really beautiful. I wish we had them here.
The only LED on-road lighting we have is at the light rail crossings downtown.
As a road safety engineer working for one of the state governments in Australia I can tell you that these things are great but expensive. Astucia (and other companies) make a variety of Internally Illuminated Pavement Markers some are solar powered, some are hardwired. and some use this weird induction thing so that essentially they pump heaps of electricty in wires under the road surface and let the markers run off induction coils. The hard wired ones are about the size of a spindle of CDs/DVDs at sit almost flush with the surface (4mm or less) so they can be ploughed etc. the solar powered ones ususally sit on the pavement surface and interestingly only take about 3 hours of sun to have enough power for about 10 days.... so yes they can even be used in the UK.
Also being LEDs they power requirements are quite low (perhaps not as low as some of the sodium globes used in street lighting on a lumens per watt basis but still low) and since they are focused and use as a direct light source instead of an indrect one you get pretty good value in terms of maintenance dollars.
Guys, snow plows? Did you not read that this was in the UK.
We rarely have snow as it is, just pouring rain, so im sure when these hit the states you're local government will have thought this through.
Come on!
our government think something though? do they know how to do that?
As it is in the UK one wonders why they need solar power, can't they run a line to them, they do have electric current in large part of the UK don't they?
And another thing, why don't they put reflectors on the side of such curves, it all seems pretty strange.
Hello Night Driver!
Does anyone else not think that extending driver reaction time to over half a minute could be a bit dangerous? No? 'Oh look, 15 school kids in the road' *30 seconds later* 'oh dear, I hit them' *brakes*
i was thinking the very same....someone in the article doesn't understand very well the relationship between time and latency lol!
shorter time=less latency=quicker reaction
lol @ your school kids comment too :)
hmmm... this was exactly what i was thinking.... and you even used my example, you bastard.
But this won't help us see the cute fuzzy animals on the road in time to prevent oopsies...
They have these in Hawaii already.
Never seen this particular model, but we've been using a similar product (From Carmanah Technologies) for several years on the highways here in B.C. They are indeed excellent, especially in foggy conditions.
they have lights like these on the highway in brantford in ontario I saw them the other night i thought it was some crazy new reflectors but when i looked back they were still lit up on the highway it was soo cool looking
We've had these for a long time in Australia (at least 5 years), though I believe they're powered by cables laid under the road. They are very, very cool!
So, these will clearly illuminating where the deer is standing, without illuminating the deer itself. This could be a problem.
I thought driver reaction time was the time it took for a driver react. So this half minute figure confuses me.
Actually in Boca Raton, Fl down A1A right next to the ocean it is in use its really cool i noticed it today
Oh! that's so great, they can useful from LED light.
...just for reference, we DO have these in the states. I've seen them around Boca Raton, FL. They really do a good job at night when visibility is low.
"extend driver reaction time from 3.2-seconds to over half a minute"
I was pretty sure that lower reaction times were better to have on the roadway, you know, to cope with issues.. but I guess by adding shiny things to the road surface, you cause drivers to not be able to react to obstacles on average with a delay of half a minute...
I'm pretty confused by this statement.
This has been in use in Bangalore, India for quite some time now & in other parts of India, if I am not mistaken. They are a great innovation, but tend to have 2 serious problems: (a) Road maintenance activities (incl. tar re-laying) and vehicles going over them tend to push them down a bit out of sight in some places & (b) when there's no rains for a while, like in Indian summers, the dust/dirt tends to cloud up the lights. Additionally, I strongly doubt the durability claims - the ones here (imported from the UK, I think) seem to fizzle out pretty soon. Not sure if these problems are more to do with our climate & driver habits here
We have had these in Spain for the last 3 years.
umm..."extend driver reaction time from 3.2-seconds to over half a minute"?
that's not good...
don't you mean "reduce"?
These have been in use in Jerusalem (Sorotzkin Street) for over a year, to illuminate upcoming speed bumps.
They actually have a small test section on the 403 (approx 3KM) in Ontario Canada with these lights, i noticed them last time i was driving home to London from Toronto
OH WOW! Not new technology, we have had this in the Ancaster suburbs of Hamilton Ontario for at least oh, 5 years now, at least. I find these much better then shitty reflective painted lines. It also cuts down the use of huge bright lights on the highways which turn night into day for some homes. Night is supposed to be dark, this is a great way to keep it dark for homes, and bright on the highway.
OH MAN! i read an article on this somewhere... i think on the SATs or something.
people will steal those things
I haven't seen these yet, but hopefully these will become standard like the coloured cats eyes did in the UK.
Btw, that road pictured isn't a highway (or motorway as we call them). It isn't even a main road, it is a B road.
I've seen these here in the U.S. but at a busy traffic intersection in Illinois. They're actually hard wired into the turn lanes that extend out into the street and when one direction gets the right of way to turn, the correct lanes illuminate. Great idea, especially in bad weather.
Walt Disney World in Orlando Fl has had those on some of its roads for a couple years now