E-Z Pass is a system that is used for tool collection in the United States of America’s Northeastern region. The technology
can trace its roots to the early years of 1990s in the very busy highways of New Jersey Turnpike and New York Thruway. Since the early 1980s the need for an alternative tolling system was required and the most viable system that was thought of was an electronic toll station. Due to this need, the agencies that exist in Pennsylvania, New York and New Jersey came together to create a tolling system that could be used in all the states. And not up to the year 1991 that E-Z pass came into functioning.
About RFID and its integration with E-Z pass
The system uses a technology known as Radio Frequency
Identification or RFID, this technology makes it possible for a driver not to stop at any tollbooth to pay their toll charges but pass through and be charged automatically. The system works in a pre-paid mode where the driver pays access fee for a month and gets his or her vehicle fitted with a transponder that is placed inside their windscreen. In the event that the driver whose vehicle is fitted with E-Z Pass comes near a toll the part that has the E-Z Pass goes though a tailor made booth possessing a unique antenna.
The achievement of the service is witnessed by the transformation of the grid lock that mimicked long distance travelers in tollbooths to easy flow of traffic in the United States northeastern passageway.
Radio-Frequency Identification is the technology that made it possible for E-Z Pass to come to life. The term RFID is used to refer to small electronic devices that make up chips that are used to transmit data which range up to 2,000 bytes. Providing a distinctive classification, RFID works in a similar way that an ATM card does, single electronic identification. Just as the bar code functions, the RFID device needs to be inspected before the
information that spots out the owner retrieved. The feature that has made it possible for it to be used with E-Z Pass seamlessly has been the factor that it does not need to be positioned at a specific point for if to be scanned. RFID has the ability to work in a range of a few feet. This point of technological development has been reached at due to fifty years of research and development.
RFID has quiet a number of advantages which make it a pivotal technology in the electronic tolling. First and the most important is that the technology has the capability to carry information about an item, account and unique details of a person securely. Due to the fact that electronic billing is done on a vehicle that is on motion, there is need for a technology that will not require a specific positioning for it to transmit information. An RFID device does not require one to place the device in a certain direction or in a straight line, but can send information when placed in the required radii. In addition to that, the transponders that use RFID in the vehicles can be scanned at much larger distances as much as 300 feet (Melvin, 2006).. This feature makes it ideal as the vehicle owners can make their payments only by approaching the tolling booth. Speed is also a matter in highway electronic billing, this is due to the reason that vehicles usually are a high speeds while they are in the highways. Radio- Frequency Identification can be scanned much faster by Radio- Frequency identification readers thus aiding the reduction of traffic congestion in highway tolling booths.
This has reduced cases of delays due to grid locks and increased efficiency is service provision by the tolling agencies. A benefit that is closely attached to this is the reduction of harmful exhaust emissions in the environment. When vehicles take less time in the traffic they burn less fuel thus aiding in the reduction of release of green house gases to the environment. Adding to the above advantage is the reduced expense by motorists in fuel. Less time in toll payment traffic translates to less use of fuel by motorists. This savings are vital with the soaring fuel costs and a slowdown in the global economy. Before the integration of E-Z pass workers, commuters and delivery used to take longer in the lines to pay their tolls. But after the adoption of the technology the states of Pennsylvania, New York and New Jersey have been able to save a lot of man hours that could have rather been lost in gridlocks on their highways. Having the ability to monitor, extract and record information fro on coming vehicles the technology posses a very crucial advantage of reducing auto theft cases, E-Z pass can therefore be used as a tracking device. The gadget will be able to report real time location of a vehicle or the last point of location, a capability that will enable law enforcement officers the ability to locate people’s vehicles easily.