No More Rush Hour Jam: Your Car Could Soon Warn You About Virginia Traffic

Your car may one day tell you when there’s road work up ahead or if there’s a car tailgating you.

It’s all part of a test underway by the Virginia Department of Transportation. Researchers will use a section of Interstate-66 in Fairfax County as a test bed for the connected-vehicle and connected-infrastructure technology.

How it will work: Officials say drivers will eventually be able to buy cars already installed with  the technology — similar to buying a car with upgrades like bluetooth off the lot — or install it on their own through through an external tool, similar to a GPS.

“With connected vehicles, we can send a message to a particular vehicle saying they need to move left. The messages are very targeted,” said Cathy McGhee, associate director for safety, operations and traffic engineering with VDOT. “It’s very proactive as opposed to putting a message out there.”

Connected vehicles are currently being tested in a lab environment, but will be launched on the street the end of this year or early next year, McGhee said. The test bed will be located on a 4-square-mile portion of I-66 between the Interstate 495 and Nutley Street.

The area will have 43 locations with wireless units and two additional mobile wireless units to collect data. Twelve research vehicles — four of them motorcycles — will collect information. The test fleet also includes a bus and semi-truck.

“We are testing vehicles that have the system in it and testing vehicles that have an after market device. To see how drivers respond to the applications,” McGhee said.

“In the future when vehicles are communicating in real time with the roadway. We can time the signals much more effectively,” McGhee said.

Would you buy in to technology that could tell you about road conditions? Tell us in the comments.