Ever since optical character recognition (OCR) started including the reading and recognition of vehicle license plates, a wide variety of intelligent transportation systems have seen the light of day. Many processes that once were painstakingly done via manual labor can now fully be automated thanks to automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) technology – also known as automatic license plate recognition (ALPR), which I’m going to continue using throughout this article.
In this article, we take a closer look at some of these application areas and provide examples of ALPR-based solutions offered by Adaptive Recognition.
Versatility at Its Best
Although the two major added values of a system relying on automatic license plate capturing technology are automation and security, there is one more thing that is expected from an ALPR-based system: versatility. Thankfully, ALPR can easily surpass that expectation by complying with the following criteria:
Being a Component
One major rule of any intelligent transport system is that ALPR is only a building block, not a separate solution. This guarantees that the final result will be something that incorporates all the benefits coming from using license plate recognition and perfectly adapts to the end user’s unique needs. Though an ALPR solution can be the core of a whole system, it usually is an equal component in a complex ecosystem.
Multiple Forms
Since automatic license plate recognition is merely a part of the bigger picture, developers and end users have plenty of options to choose from when creating their ALPR-based system. In that regard, ALPR software SDKs, such as Adaptive Recognition’s Carmen® FreeFlow, are the most sought-after because they are akin to assembling furniture from IKEA: you get all the building blocks, and the final result will be license plate recognition. However, the final assembly and the software’s purpose are entirely up to the end user.
Integrators who do not want to spend too much time with the integration process aren’t left in the dark either. Thanks to its versatility, ALPR software is available in various shapes and forms without compromising its overall functionalities. The best examples are turnkey solutions like Carmen® GO, cloud-based SaaS such as Carmen® ANPR Cloud, and, quite recently, mobile applications in the likes of Carmen® Mobile.
Examples of ALPR-based Systems Around the World
Since ALPR software is so versatile, it’s no wonder that it has been incorporated into many different intelligent transportation systems. To demonstrate what automatic number plate recognition can give to the world—and, in the process, give ideas to those thinking about similar projects—we provide some exemplary ALPR-based systems in which our company, Adaptive Recognition, participated via ALPR software or smart ALPR cameras.
Tolling via Pay-by-Plate
Long gone are the days of waiting for your turn in seemingly endless lines at tolling plazas. Nowadays, all it takes is an elaborate network of cameras placed at different sections of the highway—usually near the entry and exit points—to capture vehicles’ license plates and check whether the owner has paid their dues. It’s fast, automatic, reliable, convenient, and cost-effective.
In most of Europe, highway fees are prepaid, indicated by a windscreen sticker. However, highway users don’t need stickers at all in more advanced tolling systems such as at the Crown Prince Mary’s Bridge in Frederikssund, Denmark. They can register on a website, providing their credit/debit card details, and the system only deducts the necessary amount when their vehicles are captured on the highway.
An advantage of the pay-by-plate technology used by such tolling systems is that they can be adapted to other application areas. For instance, who hasn’t dreamed of stopping at a fuel station, refueling, and then leaving while the payment is automatically made? The fast fueling lanes at certain New Zealand fuel stations made that dream a reality.
Image courtesy of Z Energy.
Process Automation and Acceleration
Imagine that you don’t have to leave your car for your groceries; they are delivered to your car. You arrive at the ferry port and can board the ship immediately without waiting a single second.
How is it possible? Simple: the combination of ALPR technology and a pre-booking system that records license plate data and, optionally, credit/debit card details for immediate payment. There is no need for extensive staff to monitor and register vehicles one by one; the ALPR-based system does that automatically.
Monitoring and Analysis of Traffic
What’s a common denominator in any major city? Traffic jams. All big cities can put out the “full” sign at this point. This is where intelligent transportation systems using automatic license plate recognition can help: by monitoring traffic, city officials can determine peak hours and divert traffic to lesser-used roads to eliminate or, at least, ease traffic jams.
In addition to making cities more inhabitable, the acquired data can be used for additional purposes, such as creating statistics or even filtering out vehicles of interest, like in the case of our project in Cairo, Egypt, in cooperation with 6SS.
ALPR data can also be used for creating car-free zones for pedestrians to finally enjoy their cities.
Image courtesy of 6SS.
Weighing Systems
Weighting a vehicle, especially a huge truck, is never easy. However, there are multiple options to automatically weigh vehicles, whether they are stopped or on the move. When on-the-move weighing is needed, weigh-in-motion sensors are the key. If the vehicle has to stop—at a gate, for instance—weighbridges are used.
Either way, when ALPR is added to the mix, the complete weighing process can be partially or even fully automated like in the case of this stop-n-go pay-per-weight system at a New Zealand landfill site.
Advanced Parking and Access Control
As ticketless solutions become more common—especially in a post-COVID world—it’s not surprising that the application areas thriving the most from ALPR technology are parking and access control systems. By acquiring license plate data with appropriate tech, entering it into a designated system, and comparing the new data according to the system’s main purpose, complete procedures can be fully automated and made virtually touchless.
No more hiding from unpaid parking fees; all it takes is a surveillance car with a MicroCAM on-the-go ALPR camera or a mobile phone with the Carmen® Mobile Android ANPR app, which can be used inside a car, on a bike/scooter, or foot—circling the parking area to check if fees have been duly paid.
In the case of fixed access control systems, vehicles can be easily filtered out based on various criteria, such as whether they can enter special commercial areas or exhibitions. ALPR-based access control systems can go as far as being combined with under-vehicle scanning units to halt cars with bombs attached from entering governmental premises.
Theft Prevention
Although ALPR-based traffic monitoring, tolling, and access control systems can be a blessing, some question the overall safety of such systems. After all, how can theft be thwarted if nobody stands guard at parking lots or fuel stations?
Thankfully, ALPR can take care of that as well. All you need is the combination of good license plate recognition technology and a database that sends an alert when something is off, i.e., an unknown driver trying to steal the vehicle from the garage. Our partner in New Zealand, Focus Digital Security Solutions, created an effective system that virtually eliminated the phenomenon known as drive-off fuel theft by creating an alert system based on the database of a well-known retail crime intelligence platform.
Image courtesy of Auror.
Law Enforcement
Road security is a top priority in every country. Accidents caused by those committing a road offense—including but not limited to speeding, bus lane use, forbidden turns, and expired insurance—have to be stopped before they happen. However, police officers are unlikely to jot down an offender’s license plate while chasing them. It’s best to have a solution that is fast enough to capture license plates and, if needed, can be hidden to perform covert operations, such as speed measurement.
The versatility of ALPR technology allows law enforcers to quickly move around the country and perform license plate recognition and speed measurement with highly accurate mobile ALPR units. ALPR can be the base of super-complex systems comprising fixed speed detector cameras and portable speed cameras combined with license plate recognition, such as Adaptive Recognition’s crowning jewel, the VÉDA traffic monitoring and speed enforcement system of Hungary.
Endless Possibilities
The application areas and projects listed above give only a small taste of what an ALPR-based intelligent traffic monitoring system can do. However, since ALPR is such a versatile tool, it’s safe to say that no ALPR-based system is the same, even if core components have similar features. And that’s the beauty in it: no matter what your system is, ALPR can be shaped so that it seamlessly integrates into it.
For further use cases of our ALPR products, check our case study page.
Are you interested in another application area that we haven’t mentioned in this article?
