New 'drive through' toll collection system

Within a few months, Bangkok drivers will be able to use a new electronic toll collection service, allowing them to avoid the bottlenecks of slowing down on the city's expressway system to queue and pay tolls.

The Expressway Authority of Thailand (Exat) is introducing a new, fast electronic toll collection (ETC) service to give drivers the opportunity to "drive through" expressway toll gates without the need to pay with coins or banknotes.

The tolls will be deducted instantly from money "stored" electronically in smart cards embedded in ETC on-board units installed on vehicles' windshields.

The chief of Exat's Engineering Analysis Section, Sakda Panwi, said the new service was part of Exat's intelligent traffic system, which was designed to reduce travelling time and improve traffic flow at expressway toll gates.

To take advantage of the ETC service, expressway customers will first have to invest in and implement an ETC unit on their windshield. The unit will contain vehicle identification and electronic money. When they drive through an expressway toll gate, a fixed reader installed at the gate will detect the on-board unit with microwave technology and automatically deduct the toll.

"Microwave technology can perform vehicle-to-roadside communication at toll gates at a distance of up to 15 metres and at a speed up to 60 kilometres per hour. It will be able to handle about 1,200 vehicles per hour," Sakda said. "We plan to launch the ETC service in the next few months."

The beauty of ETC is that it will help to increase toll-lane capacity while reducing waiting time at toll gates. It will also be convenient for toll payers, he said.

Initially, the service will be available on the Chalerm Maha Nakhon, Chalong-Rach, Ram-Indra and Bang Phli-Suksawasdi expressways.

When it is up and running, users of the service will be able to top up the money recorded in their on-board units by paying in lots of Bt500 or Bt1,000 at toll gates, but Exat expects that in the future toll payers will be able to top up their windscreen-mounted units via mobile phones, websites and bank counters.

Within about six months, the next phase of the system will see trials of applications that will add-on to the ETC service. Exat plans to use its fixed expressway sensors, including closed circuit television cameras, along with up to 1 million mobile sensors located throughout the expressway system, to record vehicles as they move on to and out of an expressway and calculate the time it is taking to cover that route.

Then, computer analysis will enable the provision of real-time information, displayed on electronic boards mounted in front of toll gates, giving drivers a picture of traffic conditions on the expressway ahead, before they enter the expressway.

"Vehicle information captured by CCTV will be transformed by software from picture to speed data, and mobile sensors will also capture vehicles' speed. This data will be analysed and presented as traffic information for other drivers at the toll gates," Sakda said. "In the future, we can also feed this to other providers of traffic information, such as Jor Sor 100 MHz, Exat's website and the central traffic information centre, which is supposed to be established in the near future."