Wireless Street Lamps for Traffic Monitoring

RMH101 writes "The Register has a story about a UK initiative to create a country-wide wireless data network using street lamps. It's come to pass through a government initiative to monitor all cars' speed and location, all the time, everywhere. The company involved, Last Mile, are proposing an intelligent mesh of smart street lamps embedded with storage and wireless networking to create 200MBit network access across the UK, including remote areas not reachable by conventional broadband. Work is due to start this year."

vandalism just got a lot more fun for criminals...

[twiggy]

Just wait until criminals and/or bored kids know where these things are embedded... the metal box they're going to need to protect it from damage is probably going to block any chance of a wireless signal from coming out ;-)

While this sounds like a cool idea, I see too much room for abuse... Besides, they're using it to track all this traffic activity... do you want to use the government's internet connection so they can track that part of your life, too?

land of the free. home of the brave.

[wugmump]

holy christ i hope this never happens in the united states. RFID tags on license plates, convicted felon tracking, always-on monitoring. feh. oh boy, wireless everywhere. but the price is just too awful to consider.

Re:monitoring

[gowen]

Is there anything left in the UK that isn't being monitored

Err, yes.

Cameras on all the streets

Err, no. Cameras on some streets, but hardly everywhere.

wireless monitoring your speed

And damn right, too. Speaking as a cyclist, given the number of psychopathic, homicidal pillocks who are allowed to throw 2 tons of metal around on Britain's streets, I want even tighter controls on the speeders. The selfish little bastards put their (marginal) time savings over the safety of the rest of us. If I was as reckless with a gun as all-to-many drivers are with cars, they'd lock me in prison, not just suspend me from driving for a few months.

Don't like it? - Jam it!

[reality-bytes]

Initially, this could be implemented as a stipulation for your car to pass its MOT (MOT is the UK roadworthiness annual).

Then the police could check for the presence and operation of the device during road-side checks.

*So* Here's the trick - find its frequency and build yourself a nice little signal generator/transmitter to put out static at a higher power than the government device. (Duh, that was easy).

The thing that really upsets me about this is that you can almost guarantee the government will require car-owners to buy these units out of their own pockets.

Finally

[Interruach]

When people drive they accept the laws of the road. Why are they always so upset every time there's an initiative to stop people speeding?
So I'm a biased pedestrian, but it does seem to me that given the hundreds of car fatalities that occur *every day*, monitoring what people do so that the drivers who "get away" with dangerous driving are caught is a good thing.
You might get away with dangerous driving. But the longer you do, the more dangerous you'll get. And then you're putting people's lives at risk.
Maybe you can justify breaking the law when it comes to software. I'm sorry, you can't justify driving dangerously.
Ever.

Re:It's official

[Hatta]

I don't know about that. The war on drug users has been going on for decades. If there's a more essential liberty than the right to control ones own body chemistry, I don't know what it is.

Re:Great way to detect traffic jams

[Gordonjcp]

Well, for one thing, this would simply not be able to be fitted to most modern cars. What would happen is that the immobiliser system in the engine management system would detect tampering, and shut the whole lot down permanently. For cars without EMS, it would be trivially simple to disable. And, what about diesels?

My car has no electronics under the bonnet at all. In fact, the stereo is the only electronic thing in the car. How would you fit one of these things to that?

Re:monitoring

[gowen]

I could not agree with you more. However, we do need AK-47's to change the Congress if we need to

Just out of interest. Do you support Iraqi citizens being empowered to carry AK-47s in case they want to overthrow the change their US-Congress-imposed government?

Re:It's official

[jxs2151]

If there's a more essential liberty than the right to control ones own body chemistry, I don't know what it is.

It is the right to be free of the shared costs of potheads ruining their bodies and asking for my insurance fees to subsidize liver transplants.

Control your own body, I have no problem with that. Just don't ask for me to help you once you've ruined it.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:It's official

[MrAngryForNoReason]

Except most criminals aren't that dumb. The evidence suggests that CCTV cams just drive crime out of areas with CCTV.

Actually all the muggers do is wear baseball caps. As almost all CCTV cameras are mounted high up if you wear a baseball cap they have practically no chance of getting an identifiable shot of your face. For this reason a lot of pubs and clubs around where I live (Leicester) have now banned wearing them on the premises.

Also CCTV cameras don't always give an accurate portrayal of what happened. I know one case where someone was walking home from the pub when 3 guys attacked him. He defended himself and then the police arrived. When they played back the CCTV footage in court all it shows is him punching one of the guys, everything else happened off camera. Result, the 3 guys get off with cautions and the victim get 18 months for grevious bodily harm and loses his job as a pub landlord (he could no longer hold a license as he had a criminal record).

Re:monitoring

[ilcylic]

Yes, absolutely. The Bill of Rights enumerates those rights which predecess government. They are the natural rights of all people, not just citizens of the United States of America. Just as I hold that every human has the right to free expression, free practice of religion, and the right to peaceably assemble to petition for redress of greivance, so do I hold that they have the right to keep and bear arms.

We (the USA) are doing a thoroughly craptacular job of supporting these rights--in Iraq, everywhere abroad, and everywhere at home.

-Il Cylic