Big Brother is out there as a new generation of road cameras, which can deduce how many people are in a car, is to be tested for the first time.
It will initially be used to monitor car-sharing lanes in Leeds but councils across Britain are said to be interested in using the technology. Four out of five cars driving into cities at rush hour only have one person in them.
The Government believes encouraging people to share journeys will help combat congestion. It wants councils to look at building more high occupancy vehicle lanes. Enforcing the lanes has previously been a problem. In the United States drivers often trick police and cameras with dummies and even large dogs to allow them use lanes reserved for more than one person. Only the yanks could come up with that one.
Sadly UK motorists will not get away with those antics as a new camera developed at Loughborough University can see how many people are in a car by detecting water and blood content. The inventor of the camera, Professor John Tyrer from Loughborough University believes the camera is key to reducing congestion. Car sharing lanes are already in operation in cities such as Birmingham and Leeds. No mention of how this is panning out in this press release!
This all very well if you get on with the person you are sharing but what if they say, smell, or have other in-car dirty habits. But more importantly, for some people, driving home is their wind down time. Do they want to be forced to share this precious quite time with AN Other?
Give us back our freedom please!