The Regional Municipality of York in Greater Toronto, Canada, is planning to use a new technology from Intelligent Mechatronic Systems to monitor and improve traffic congestion from January next year.

The new technology monitors traffic congestion by picking up cellphone signals from cars.

IMS Traffic Intelligence gathers the information and sends it to a communications tower every second during a phone call to create a life traffic report as well as a city-wide map of traffic flow.

The local authority will also use the information gathered to sync with planned road improvments and traffic lights to allow for more effective relief of congestion.

The city plans to offer a smartphone app to provide IMS’ Traffic Intelligence, real-time traffic information to drivers which will help drivers to chose the best route to commute.