MACHINE CONTROL

Evening Post, Volume CXIII, Issue 10, 13 January 1932, Page 3

MACHINE CONTROL

FOR LONDON^ TRAFFIC

A new traffic'control device which might be described .as a," machine, with a mind,' 3 is on show at the Public Works, Eoads and Transport Congress and Exhibition, at the'Bojral' Agricultural Hall, Islington, saj-s ta.e: "Daily Telegraph." . :•■- ■■■-;• • .•■•>■ :.-y.-*.'"-.-■■' An experimental' Installations has been ordered.by the Cprnmissioner of City Police, and '-will be tried- out at the : Bracechurch street and Cornhill crossing!""" ' .• ...:' .. •■■■ '"'■■■ The machinery will "be Of British construction. In appearance the device is similar to the traffic lights in Oxford street, but in the new system vehicles themselves control the lights as they pass over sections of; rubber set :flush with the load surface some distance from the crossing. .: These detectors have no moving parts and are unaffected by;'snow, ice, rain, or hail. The brain, bif the wonder stands unobtrusively by" the roadside, a complicated-piece of machinery;resembling an elaborate, wireless set. It is inside this little box that the "first come, first served" principle is observed—the - first venire to-pass over the detector'section secures the right of way;. . ■ ■ •/. ■■■'.■ ■ ' "''... In a thoroughfare like Oxford street detectors would be placed only in the side streets, so that; the" "main-traffic stream would not be-interrupted-Tinless a "vehicle was actually -waiting to cross. The invention, it is stated, has been working for a considerable time in, two hundred Amejican. citi,es,.and accident statistics, compiled from. an. average of eight intersectionsin three of the towns show a reduction ,of. 60.5. per cent. The device is. known as. the A.T.li. electromatitf- street traffic control system, vbut stallholders at the exhibition call the machine "Bobbyi" '