Google to give real-time traffic updates on mobile app
Google will soon launch an app to give traffic update featuring Google Maps.
Visakhapatnam: There is good news for those vexed by traffic jams in Vizag city. Google will soon launch an app to give traffic update featuring Google Maps. The Internet Company launched a new feature that highlights real-time traffic flow in the city on its online maps besides voice guided navigation system that will offer driving direction to smart phone users choosing the quickest possible route to their destination.
Sources said that the traffic feature, which is in use in 22 cities in India, will be available across Vizag, Kolkata, Lucknow, Surat, Coimbatore, Nagpur, Ludhiana, Thiruvananthapuram, Madurai, Kochi and Bhopal both on desktops and Android phones in a few weeks. All users who have traffic layer enabled on computers and mobile apps will be able to have traffic updates using different colours. The feature uses a colour scheme of red, green and yellow on Google city map to indicate traffic.
Red means traffic congestion; green indicates no traffic congestion and yellow means medium traffic. This will help commuters plan their travel time by avoiding paths with heavy traffic congestion. The volume of traffic in Vizag, the biggest city in Andhra Pradesh, has been growing by leaps and bounds and there are over 8 lakh vehicles of all categories on the roads and every year not less than 60,000 vehicles are being added.
This apart, vehicles from other districts and states are plying on the NH-16 stretch. Traffic congestion has been witnessed in almost all the major junctions every day. Vizag is ready to get smart city status and these kind of features would help motorists a lot in the coming days says I.V. Prasad, a techie in Vizag.
Speaking to this correspondent Assistant Commissioner of Police (Traffic) K. Prabhakar said that they were aware about the real-time traffic in Vizag to be on Google maps. But, police are yet to get any formal communication from Google.
The ACP said that once the installation of CCTV cameras at 94 major junctions is complete, city traffic cops will update traffic congestion through Facebook and SMSes to motorists, he added. The police said if anyone cares about time than distance, the real-time traffic updates on Google Maps will help them by selecting a route to their destination.
( Source : deccan chronicle )
Next Story
