Ford has recently been granted a patent that will allow them to use cryptocurrencies to help facilitate vehicle-to-vehicle cooperation, and reduce overall traffic congestion. Yes, that’s right. They want to use crypto to help reduce or eliminate traffic jams.
The system will use what they are calling ‘Cooperatively Managed Merge and Pass’ or CMMP. The details of exactly how it would work aren’t yet known, but in general, they will set it up so vehicles can communicate between each other, and decide which one remains in a fast lane, and which one voluntarily remains in the slower lane.
Those that are in a hurry would set their vehicle to be a ‘consumer vehicle’ so that it would have less congestion, and could arrive at its destination more quickly. People who aren’t in as much of a hurry would set their vehicle to ‘merchant vehicle’ and would either remain in slower lanes, or at least move over to slower lanes when a consumer vehicle approaches.
Presumably, the consumer vehicles would then compensate the merchant vehicles with whichever coin or token is being used. These coins or tokens could then, it can be assumed, be sold on the open market.
The patent suggests that this system would use more than just fast lanes and slow lanes in the process. It would allow easier merging, letting people change lanes, and much more. It is even easy to see how a system like this could compensate a drive for getting off a congested road and taking a longer route to their destination, which would then free up the congested road to move more quickly.
The current system in place gives no incentives for people who aren’t in a big hurry to allow others to pass, which causes everyone to slow down. With this new system (once it is fully adopted) would not only incentivize people to share the road better, but it could even help with upset drivers. Someone who is getting paid to sit in a slower lane of traffic isn’t going to be nearly as irritable as someone who is just stuck there.
There is no information on if or when Ford will begin actively pushing this system into their vehicles, but it certainly sounds like a great use-case for crypto, and a great example of how blockchain and crypto are working to change the world in many great ways.
