Iraqi Journal for Computers and Informatics Vol.

[44], Issue [2], Year (2018)

DESIGN AND IMPLEMENTATION SMART TRAFFIC LIGHT

USING GSM AND IR
Thaar A.Kareem 1 Mays Kareem Jabbar 2
1 2
College of Engineering College of Engineering
University of Misan, University of Misan,
Misan, Iraq. Misan, Iraq.
Thaar_kareem@ uomisan.edu.iq [email protected]

Abstract: The increasing in the number of vehicles on streets

at Woodward and Michigan Venus in Detroit. A year later,
has led to traffic congestion. In order to reduce the waiting time the success of the experiment in the organization of vehicle
in cases of emergency, the idea of this work is suggested. This
work is divided into two parts, the particular part and software traffic Fifteen lamps were installed in Detroit and all were
part. The first circular particular part is a model which consists
automatic. At the same time, Morgan, a talented American
of four lanes junction of a traffic light, it also has GSM system (
Global System for Mobile Communications). The GSM and inventor, realized the need to control traffic in Cleveland,
lamps of the traffic light are connected to Arduino UNO. The
Arduino controls every signal which is coming from the inputs Ohio, the inventor of electric light. Although at first they
(GSM) to software and display to the outputs (lamps) The were similar to existing train stations [1].
second circular particular part is a model which consist same
components the first circuit except replace the GSM with The numbers of vehicles are increased because of the
IR(infrared Remote).The goal from this work is to help us in the
emergence cases, the opening and closing of the traffic light are increasing in population numbers. This led to full
controlled by using GSM system and IR, the time of each lane, congestions in streets and intersections. In some countries,
is controlled that means reduce the crowding.
for example Iraq, the streets inside the cities are narrow and
KEYWORDS: TRAFFIC LIGHT, ARDUINO UNO , GSM, IR there are no highways that led to increasing in traffic
congestion which may reach up to 15 minutes at the
I. INTRODUCTION
intersection. And thus leading to delay in emergency like
During the time when pedestrians, buggies, and wagons
ambulances and fire trucks ...ect.
were roaming the roads, the world’s first traffic lights was
In [2] the authors made the time of traffic light unfixed
installed in London in the 1868, long before the automobile
according to the size of traffic jam, when there is a traffic
was invented., It was consisted of a lantern, illuminated by
jam in any road the green light which means permeation
gas and, with two signals of red and green which
gives full time to the user of the road. If there is no traffic
represented stop and caution, respectively. On January 2,
jam, the green light does not give full time. In [3] the
1869, this crude traffic light exploded, injuring the
authors used method to help reduce congestion on roads and
policeman who was operating it. Despite the primitively and
to help in coping with accidents as the heavy vehicles and
the number of accidents, especially those such as the
light vehicles will be in different lanes, this proposed system
explosion of the traffic light on January 2nd, 1869, the
made roads a safer place to travel. In [4] the author solved
situation was not as worse as the time when the automobiles
the traffic congestion issue by developing a new traffic light
era has begun. One of the earliest solution was to adapt
control system controlled using programmable logic and
railroad signals to be used in streets, that was first thought
then implements the system on a model of a traffic light
by a police officer from Detroit, Michigan (officer William
controller (PLC).
L. Potts). However, major challenge has come out as the
in (11) traffic jams have been reduced using sensor
railroads run along parallel lines, while streets travel at
technology, where the time of the signal is changed based on
right angles. The world’s first 4-ways three color traffic
the number of vehicles on the road. The system calculates
light (red, amber, and green) connected throughout wires
congestion in the road if the number of cars is many times
and electrical controls. In 1920 it was installed in a corner

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Iraqi Journal for Computers and Informatics Vol. [44], Issue [2], Year (2018)

the time of the green signal and gives it extra time until the  6 analog inputs
congestion is eliminated, However, if the number of cars is  A 16 MHz of ceramic resonator
small, it gives the system time  a USB connection
 a power socket
The goal of this work is to help us in the emergence cases  an ICSP header
and to reduce the crowding, where we can control in the  button to reset
opening and closing of the traffic light by using GSM It has complete functionality that is needed for the
system and IR, and also we can control the time of each microcontroller. To get started, all that’s needed to be done
lane. is to power it with an AC-to-DC adapter/ battery or
The remainder of this paper is organized as follows: Section alternatively it can also be connected to a computer through
2 presents the first circuit design using GSM, Section 3 USB port. The latest Smart UNO development board version
presents the second circuit design using IR. The proposed is Revision 3.
system is presented in Section 4, Section 5 is a comparison
between the two circuits, and the conclusion of this work is 2. GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications,
presented in Section 6. initially known as Group Spécial Mobile) is a standard
developed by the European Telecommunications Standards
II. THE FIRST CIRCUIT DESIGN USING GSM
Institute (ETSI). It is actually a set of protocols of mobile
Main aim of this work is to design a traffic light controller. devices for 2G (second-generation) digital cellular networks
For that purpose, a circuit was implemented which had 12 which have widely replaced the 1G standard [6]. It
LEDs in a 4- way intersection. In each intersection there originated in the December of 1991 in Finland[5].
three LEDs each of yellow, green and red colors. Since 2014 it has been the global standard communication
Each intersection further has 4 lanes. Current limiting protocol for mobile networks. It is currently deployed in
resistors of 1 kΩ connect each LED to Arduino UNO’s over 219 countries and enjoys 90% market share. GSM is
digital I/O pin according to the circuit diagram. digitally optimized to give full duplex voice telephony that
now includes data communication that was initially done by
circuit switched transport and then by utilizing EDGE and
GPRS (General Packet Radio Services) in packet data
transport.
Subsequently, the 3GPP developed third-generation (3G)
UMTS standards, followed by fourth-generation (4G) LTE
Advanced standards, which do not form part of the ETSI
GSM standard [6,7]
3. USB cable.
4.1 KΩ Resistor X 4.

Fig 1: The circuit design. 5.470 Ω Resistor X 4.

1.Circuit Components (particular part components) 6.Red LEDs X 4.

The components of the design circuit are: 7.Yellow LEDs X 4.
1. Arduino UNO it is a microcontroller board built on 8.Green LEDs X 4.
ATmega328. It has a total of 9.Connecting wires.
 14 digital input/output pins. 6 of those can be 10.Prototyping board.
used as PWM outputs. 11.Power adapter.
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Iraqi Journal for Computers and Informatics Vol. [44], Issue [2], Year (2018)

2. The Second Circuit Design Using infrared timing system. Figure 3 below is the block diagram of the
Remote Control (IR):
circuit design."
The second circuit design is by using IR control technology.
It is a component of an electronic device used to operate the
device wirelessly from a distance [9]. The receiver device is
connected with the Arduino and the transmitter device is
putted in ambulances or emergency vehicles. As shown in
the form and when the driver of ambulances or emergency
vehicles arrives at the traffic light, he can open the traffic
signal by the remote which is located in the car. The IR
controller is used in this experiment. It requires a clear line
of distance to the receiver device for the signal, with a
maximum of 30 feet (9.14 m) [8].
3. Circuit Design:
This circuit consists of the same first circuit design
components but it replaces IR control instead of GSM. The
circuit design is as shown in Figure 2 below.

Figure 3: The Block Diagram of The Circuit Design.

Suppose the first the Lane 1 gets its Green light turned.
Hence, in all the other Lanes, their corresponding Red lights
are turned on. The emergency case is in the third lane, then
the vehicles driver (ambulance) can send message or signal
by using GSM or IR to the traffic contrail and the lane 1 is
turn off after the time is finished and red light turned, the
lane 3 get its green must be open and another lanes gets Red
lights turned, in this status the waiting time for emergence
case becomes less than the waiting time of the normal case,
Figure 2: The Second Circuit Design Using (IR).
As well we can reduce the traffic in the intersections by
using this proposed. For example, if lane 2 has a lot of
vehicles and lane 4 has few vehicles, in this case the waiting
time causes crowded in the lane 2. To solve this problem,
III. THE PROPOSED SYSTEM the time of lane 2 is increased and time of lane 4 is
In this study,"a simple traffic light system for a 4 lanes decreased. The working of the traffic light controller is as in
intersection is implemented using Arduino UNO. The aim Figure 4 below:
of the project is to implement a simple traffic light
controller, where the traffic is controlled in a pre-defined

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Iraqi Journal for Computers and Informatics Vol. [44], Issue [2], Year (2018)

2. Comparison between Our Circuits with

Circuit of [1]:
In [1], the smart traffic is designed to reduce the jam traffic
in the road that had a lot of vehicles by using sensors. The
sensors sense the vehicles number if there are many vehicles
the system gives full time to that road. That mean, they
reduced the jam traffic by changing the time.
In our work, we use GSM and IR for emergency case. Also,
IR can be used by traffic cop when there is jam traffic in one
of the road.

VI. CONCLUSION
In this work, Arduino UNO was used to design smart traffic.
Across road which consists of four lanes was designed. Each
lane contained a traffic signal which consists of three lamps
(red, yellow and green). The traffic light is controlled by
Arduino. This work was designed for emergency cases,
especially with ambulances by open the traffic signal in the
lane which has the ambulance by using GSM system or IR.
Where the ambulance send message or signal to the traffic
light and open the lane. Our proposed system decreased the
waiting time in the emergency cases. The GSM system was
used in the first circuit and the IR system was used in the

Figure 4: The Working of Traffic Light Controller second circuit. After comparisons between the properties of
these two circuits, we approved that the using of GSM is
V. COMPARISON better than the using of IR.

1. Comparison Between Our Two Circuits:

The second circuit uses Remote control which works with
infrared, the infrared works in 3 GHz to 400Hz [8], and the
distance to which the radiation reaches is a few meters.
While the first circuit (GSM), is not restricted by distance
because it is use satellite technologies.
The GSM technology is not affected by obstacles such as
walls and vehicles, whereas the remote control radiation is
affected by the walls and vehicles. The radiation must be
straight when attempting to open the traffic signal.
From the two experiments and the properties of each
technique, we can approve that the use of the first circuit
which it is use GSM is better than the second circuit which
it is use the IR.

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Figure 4: Smart Traffic Implementation

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