THE HEARTBEAT OF OUR CAPITAL - OR CLOGGING UP OUR ARTERIES...!!!!

They say every city has a beating heart. If the examination of London's major road arteries by designer Pedro Miguel Cruz is anything to go by, the UK capital is heading for cardiac arrest.

 This July, Cruz -- based at the University of Coimbra in Portugal -- took GPS tagging data from 140 vehicles belonging to delivery company eCourier. He then mapped the speed and position of each of them over a 24-hour period to show traffic movement. Shown ABOVE is the snapshot of data monitored at 10am.


In the visualisation, each vehicle leaves a colour trail corresponding to its speed. "Green means 50kph, but most are a yellowish colour meaning the speed is less than 25kph," says Cruz. " The red areas mean the vehicles are at a standstill." The amber glow illustrates that the majority of the city centre is filled with cars travelling at little more than walking speed.

Could it help rethink traffic management? "Yes, it's a good tool to spot problematic areas," says Cruz. "But it's nothing traffic-control companies don't know already"