Traffic Control System Design

This assignment focuses on designing a traffic control system to minimize congestion in busy streets. The proposed system utilizes IR sensors to detect vehicle density and prioritize roads based on traffic volume. Additionally, it incorporates RFID tags to grant emergency vehicles and VIPs expedited passage. The project report details the implementation process, challenges faced, and future enhancements for this innovative traffic management solution.

COMPETENCY
DEMONSTRATION REPORT
Career Episode 1
NAME

CE 1.1 Project Information
Name of the project: Design of an Intelligent Auto Traffic Signal Controller with
Emergency Override
Location of the project: [PLEASE FILL]
Project Duration: [PLEASE FILL]
Organization: [PLEASE FILL]
Role and Designation during the time: [PLEASE FILL]
CE 1.2 Project Background
CE 1.2.1 Characteristics of the project
The world is facing the problems off traffic congestion in day to day life. Monitoring and
controlling of such huge traffic in a busy city is a hectic job for anyone. Taking up this problem
as a research topic for my project I came up with the idea of working to improve the controlling
and monitoring system of a buys city street would help the traffic control to have some load
taken off their head. The flow of traffic changes from time to time, time off the day and also the
day of the week. It wold be a hard project to implement the theory of this topic into the practical
field. Due to the limited amount of resources available for the construction of the infrastructure it
would have to be an intelligent controller for the implementation of the traffic lights. For this
projects implementation I have selected the use of radio frequency identification tagging system,
infrared sensors and high speed microprocessor s with controllers to achieve the best results.

CE 1.2.2 Objectives developed for the project
For the implementation thee main objectives which I had followed to implement the
project and deliver the best project are as follows:
 To design an automated intelligent traffic signal controlling system.
 To identify the roads where the amount of traffic is high and to manage the traffic with
correct timing.
 To identify any emergency vehicles in the road which is being monitored.
CE 1.2.3 My area of work
I was responsible for putting together the different components to create the prototype of
the project that I had thought of implementing. I had first thought of using image processing
mechanism to identify the emergency cars in the roads but later found out that the harsh weather
conditions like rain and snow would affect the camera feed very badly making it impossible to
recognise the vehicles. This is the reason I changed by project to use the infrared coupling
sensors and RFID tags for the emergency vehicles.

CE 1.2.4 Project Group
Figure 1: The hierarchical division of the project group.
CE 1.2.5 My responsibilities throughout the project
I was responsible for making the prototype which would then be transformed into a fully
functioning traffic controlling system. As I was doing this project single handily I had taken the
help of my supervisor to understand the use of the IR sensors and the RFID tags. Compiling the
project codes was easy as I had used a high tech C compiler.
CE 1.3 Distinctive Activity
CE 1.3.1 Comprehending the theory of the project
The main module of the project is the use of the PIC 16F877A microcontroller. This is
the brain of the module. The other components of the project are the power supply, a RFID
reader and the IR receiver. There are two other modules of the product which are the RFID tags

and the IR transmitters, LED lights and a LCD display. PIC16F877A microcontroller is the first
module of the device. It is a 40 pin microchip with a flash based 256 bytes of data memory. The
LCD, IR sensors and other accessory modules are attached to the microcontroller for the working
of the project. The next module is the RFID tag. These are installed into emergency cars which
makes the roads change to high priority and clear out the road faster than the other roads. The
final module is the IR sensors. These are installed on opposite foots of the roads to monitor the
density of the congestion of the street. If the connection between the IR pair changes the street is
changed to a priority state. This makes the road to be cleared out fast to avoid congestion.
CE 1.3.2 Engineering knowledge and skills applied in the project
The knowledge which I had applied for the implementation of this project pertains to the
field of knowledge learnt in electronics engineering course. The use of microcontrollers and
RFID tags were the basics which are taught during the course of study. Research materials were
collected from internet which helped me to understand the working procedure of the RFID tags
and IR sensors. Before I had started to assemble the modules I had first studied individual
modules separately. The microcontrollers were connected separately to learn about the different
functions which are there. The RFID tags were checked accordingly with the system before
programming them to act with the complete module.
CE 1.3.3 Accomplishment and task performed
The following circuit diagram shows the implementation of the project using the
PIC16F877A microcontroller, RFID tag and IR sensors.

Figure 2: The circuit diagram of the proposed module
The microcontroller has been programmed to understand the signals from thee RFID tags
and he IR sensors with the help of a high tech C compiler. The program has been embedded into
the microcontroller using this software. The circuit has been designed using the Proteus software.
The LCD has been used to get the status information of the working environment of the module.
The system has been made to control the traffic the lights form four roads at the same time. The
IR sensor pairs are connected on each roads which calculate the traffic density on the road. When
the relaying signal is cut out the road is considered to be of high congestion. So the program
changes the road to one of the highest priority. The system will change the priority based on the
density of the congestion of the traffic on the roads. The importance is given to the emergency
ambulances and the VIP cars and changes the road they are on to high priority. The

microcontrollers 2, 3, 7 and 5 puns are connected to four IR sensors which generate a square
wave of 38KHZ with an addition of 50% duty cycle implemented into the wave.
CE 1.3.4 Identified issues and their solutions
For the implementation of this project I had first thought about implementing the camera
system and use Matlab to analyse the image feeds collected from the cameras. However during
implementation I found that the images would be of low quality and a separate system had to be
installed in the controller office to analyse the images. Moreover the images would require a
certain amount of time to complete the analysis and when the image was finally analysed thee
traffic had congested. This caused difficulty to keep up with the objectives. To remove this
problem I had changed from the process of using cameras to the use of IR sensors and RFID
tags. This proved to be a faster process as the microcontroller would be able to do the calculation
instantly from the feed received.
CE 1.3.5 Plan to produce creative and innovative work
For the future work I have thought of using RFID tags only in every car in the city. For
this, I would have to talk with the car producers to know if they would be interested in
implementing this process. The use of RFID tagging would also be helpful for locating any car in
the city. This would indirectly help the police to locate any car in the city. The RFID innovation
can be also used in different vehicles to understand what type of vehicle is travelling on the road.
The system can be changed then have a better understanding of the different types of vehicles
running on the road.

CE 1.3.6 Collaborative work
I had done the project on my own with the help from my senior supervisor at my
university. I had taken up this project to learn more about the implementation of the RFD tags
and the IR sensors. I had also taken help from the local traffic control centre to learn about the
working procedure of the existing traffic controlling system.
CE 1.4 Project Review
CE 1.4.1 Project Overview
The proposed system reduces the probability of traffic jams in busy streets and the easy
passage for emergency vehicles. The IR sensors have been used to find the density of thee traffic
in the roads. When the IR pair in the street is cut off the road becomes a road of high tension.
The traffic of this road needs to be cleared first before moving on to any other road. For
emergency vehicles and VIP cars I have use the implementation of RFID tags. The tags are
installed in the vehicles and the microcontroller in the roads read the tags the system gets akerted
about the cars and the road becomes a high priority lane. The program was implemented
correctly and was burned onto the microcontroller to provide the best type of the projects
implementation.
CE 1.4.2 My contribution to work
I had done the project single handily from the collecting of research information and
documenting the final findings and then documenting the results as a project report. I had use a
high tech C compiler to implement the calculation part of when the timer would set off or the
lights would change. This was completed after doing extensive research on the topic of traffic

signal controlling. Studying a lot of research papers implied the use of camera and the use of
Matlab to find out the density of the amount of vehicles on the road. I found the drawback in this
type of implementation of the project and later devised the use of IR sensors and RFID tags. I
had learned a lot of things during the implementation of this project.