Ignore red cross? ‘Intervening in the control of cars’

Despite repeated media attention and a special campaign, there are still motorists who do not understand that you are not allowed to drive in a lane with a red cross above it. If you do, the consequences are sometimes barely foreseeable. After all, such a lane is not ‘crossed off’ for nothing; There is often a broken down car further down the road, with or without a car recovery company and/or Rijkswaterstaat employees. Not surprisingly, the authorities involved (and many Dutch people) are fed up with people who ignore red crosses and now Heijmans Infra may have a solution.

In conversation with BNR Director Bart Smolders explains that, together with Swarco and V-Tron, they are working on a system that can take control of cars that ignore a red cross. Then lightning-fast communication takes place between, for example, a recovery vehicle and a car approaching in a crossed lane. Smolders: “Certain vehicles must receive authorization so that they can send a signal to cars that an intervention is justified. When a collision becomes unavoidable, an intervention is made in the car’s operating system.”

According to Smolders, in theory this technology can already be implemented fairly broadly. “It is already in most modern cars. All kinds of tests are already being done in Germany and Austria.” Smolder emphasizes that this is really an emergency measure and that an intervention only takes place if there is no other option. “It is not the case that cars will be placed along the road at any time.” According to the CEO of Heijmans Infra, it is desperately needed, because he believes the number of incidents on closed lanes is increasing.