As part of a wider project to replace the existing highway classification method in Australia, Lambda Functions is developing a decision-making system that uses technology to classify the quality of roads.
“The current way involves people looking at hundreds of thousands of photographs and categorizing 180,000KM of road by hand. These individuals spend hours analysing speeds, what is next to the roadside, the standard of curves in the roads - all sorts. Obviously, it’s a long and expensive process.”
The goal of the project is to achieve this by using a computer vision system attached to a rules engine, which makes the job much faster and cost-effective. Michael is writing the rules engine part.
“Ideally, our work will mean that the classification can be run more often, on a greater proportion of the highways, improving road safety across the state.”
Michael has an intriguing background, with his work in IT taking him all over the globe:
“I have always worked in various different IT jobs ever since I was a student; I studied a joint major in German and Computer Science. I’ve worked as a network engineer, systems administrator and a developer at different universities and even worked in Antarctica,” he tells us. “I would definitely say that I’m more of an IT generalist, rather than a specialist in any one technology. My strength is bringing together all the bits that makeup more complicated projects.”
To find out more about Michael’s exciting work down under, please visit the Lambda Functions website.
Mike will also be speaking about his tech at the Codepen event in March