MEDIA: Autoroute Info in red mode this summer
Radio 107.7 on the motorway is mobilizing for an unprecedented summer in terms of traffic, with the launch of a smartphone application, information on social networks, calls for witnesses, messages in a foreign language, journalists called in for reinforcement. ..
“The 107.7 on the motorway is a reflex, it’s traffic information in real time, we are the only radio station that offers precise and present information on your journey” explains Philippe Sablé, Motorway Branch Director Info, and to continue proudly “We go beyond the GPS which guides you but does not make you make the right decisions about your route in the event of road disturbances. We explain to you whether or not you should exit the motorway. We analyze the situation, we advise you with the support of more than 500 cameras. What GPS algorithms do not do. Anyway, we know that a motorist automatically switches from GPS to 107.7 as soon as he encounters a difficulty in knowing what is really happening.
the “AT» for emergencies
Philippe Sable : “As soon as we have the information, which we have to broadcast in less than two minutes, according to rigorous specifications and which obliges us, an RDS function comes to cut your music or the standby of your car radio. This is the TA for Traffic Ads. As soon as there is an emergency situation such as an accident, a vehicle going the wrong way, a stray animal for example, the radio journalist activates this function on the motorway sector concerned and makes his announcement. The info is given and the follow-up is only broadcast on Autoroute-Info”
The smartphone app
“This is the novelty of this summer. It allows you to listen to our radio outside the motorway network, since our broadcasting area is channeled, for regulatory reasons, only on the motorway and around 10 km away. Our application is compatible with Android-Auto and Apple-Car-Play in recent vehicles. Concretely, I plug my phone into the USB socket, then the content of my mobile is displayed on the car screen in an ergonomic and safe way. I find my applications, so of course not games or social networks like Instagram, but of course Autoroute-Info. This allows me on the one hand to appreciate the radio in digital quality, and on the other hand to immediately listen to the traffic point on the sector that I am going to join. What you can’t do with radio frequency. Another possibility is to listen to the last traffic update before entering the motorway”.
The red mode for this summer
“It’s a system that will mobilize a maximum of journalists and presenters on the air. We will put it in place during major departures. We will be in mode, Antenna-Realized. Which means that we broadcast the same program on the entire APRR and AREA network. This will allow, for example, the motorist leaving Paris to reach Chambéry, to have global information as soon as he leaves, without having to be in Rhône-Alpes to find out the traffic situation when approaching the Savoy. We will be used from Friday noon to Sunday evening and sometimes until Monday, on the radio and on our social networks. To carry out this mission, we have trained, since the spring, five trainee and work-study journalists. At the height of the weekends we will be eight people to take turns on the 10 hours of antenna said in red mode ”
An unprecedented summer on the motorway
“Yes, we expect a traffic record on our highways. It has been two years since the French and Europeans have been restricted in their movement. And despite the high cost of fuel, there will be very high traffic. We are expecting weekends in Rouge et Noir with English, Belgian, German, Luxembourgish and French people. It won’t be a summer like any other. We risk experiencing new situations, but Autoroute-Info will be there to guide and advise holidaymakers.
Calls for witnesses
“This is another novelty for this summer. When there is a traffic jam, when we feel that the information is not precise enough, that obviously what we see in return from the camera does not correspond to what we have on the counting loops, in short when our tools have reached their limit, we ask motorists present at the place of the event to communicate the information to us via our social networks and in particular Twitter. After verification, we relay the information by quoting the motorist.
Foreign language messages
“We have a foreign public that we also want to capture. This year, we developed a small piece of software in-house on which an English speaker recorded blocks of sentences that we put together according to the messages. It’s not a synthesized voice, it’s a real human, SNCF voice. This allows you to have correct and above all well-pronounced English»
Traffic info on Twitter
“It’s still new. On Saturdays and Sundays this summer, we will be tweeting every 15 minutes. It will be on the short traffic jam and its evolution, the main journey times or even weather information. The information given will be really trendy style updated 4 times per hour»
Autoroute-Info will also be presented during activities set up by APPR, to meet holidaymakers to take stock of their journey and their destination. A circular traffic car will also be on the motorways to be closer to tourists and provide direct information via the service areas.
Norbert Banchet
Photos: N. Banchet