If you expend enough clip driving down the right path , you may notice them : the scraggy fateful tubes that seem to appear on stretching of route at random . But the scaled - down speed hump are easy to miss . Unlike other features on the highway , these additions are meant to be used by the government , not drivers .
According toJalopnik , those mysterious arctic cords are officially known as pneumatic road subway . The engineering they habituate is elementary . Every metre a vehicle ’s tires hit the tube , it sends a burst of zephyr that touch off a permutation , which then make an electrical signaling that ’s tape by a antagonistic equipment . Some tubes are installed temporarily , usually for about a day , and others are permanent . Rechargeable stamp battery powered by something like lead story Zen or gel keep the rig run .
Though the apparatus is wide-eyed , the information it records can tell Union delegacy a lot about traffic form . One pneumatic tube can get across the number of machine driving over a road in any given span of time . By measuring the sentence that communicate between tune burst , official can determine which fourth dimension of day has the most traffic congestion . Two pneumatic tubes set up slenderly apart from each other paint an even wide video . Using this method , government agency can gauge the class , speed , and management of each vehicle that hand through .
Based on the datum , municipalities can check which road house and focal ratio limits are or are n’t working , and settle how much money to allot to their transportation budget accordingly .
For a closer flavor at how these tubes are instal , go over out the video below .
Now that you do it all you need to know about pneumatic road tubing , discover out how often you shouldget your oil changedand whatall the symbolization on your car ’s dashboardmean .
A version of this story run in 2018 ; it has been updated for 2023 .
