ECEN 248
Project 2: Traffic Light Control.
Instructor: Miss Randa AlQudah
Date: December 3rd, 2021
Introduction:
The objective of the following experiment is to apply engineering designing skills in order to
obtain solutions required to eventually come out with the required outcome of a specific control
system required. The desired control system in this experiment is a traffic light. Environmental
safety and economical factors were taken into consideration as well when working on the
experiment, to obtain the safest and most economical design of the traffic light system required
in the experiment.
Problem statement:
The traffic department considers a system of traffic lights where the sequence of signals in the
road crossing is given as follows:
There are six lights to operate: Red, Yellow, and Green lights in both the North-South and East-
West directions. When the digital signals are in the Logic-1 state they turn their respective lights
on, otherwise the lights are off. A digital clock signal will be supplied (with proper sequence of
timing intervals) and at each clock pulse, the lights should change according the sequence given
above.
Objective:
The objective of this experiment is to construct the most effective system of a two-traffic light
design that operates safely and healthy using finite state element (FSM), tables, and state
diagrams to form the finalized design of two-way traffic lights with the given sequence of
signals.
The first part of the project included the initiation of the traffic light design. This process was the
construction of the truth tables and state diagram of the traffic light, that consisted of 3 colors,
red, green, and blue. The data is therefore presented below:
State Light 1 Light 2 Time (s)
S0 Green Red 15
S1 Red Red 3
S2 Yellow Green 10
S3 Red Yellow 15
The second step was the construction of k-maps using the flip-flop truth tables to therefore
obtain the optimized and unoptimized equations of each flip-flop, using which to draw the
circuits. The K-maps are shown below:
Unoptimized k-maps: Optimized k-maps:
Unoptimized circuit: Optimized circuit:
As we can see from the circuits constructed above, the logic cost of the optimized circuit is 47,
while on the other hand, the unoptimized circuit cost is 62. This shows how much more efficient
and safer the optimized circuit is compared to the unoptimized, showing that it is the better
option to choose, in order to construct the system.
The final constructed design of the logic circuit is therefore the optimized circuit, which has
more efficiency compared to the unoptimized circuit. The safety measures taken into
consideration was the time in which the cars will stop, which is at max 15 seconds, in order to
reduce the emission of harmful exhaust gasses into the atmosphere. This shows that the system
contributes to reducing the greenhouse effect and the increasing of earth’s average temperature.
The traffic system constructed is therefore benefiting the environment. The time for which the
colors on the traffic light changes is longer than usual as well. this gives the cars more time to
react and stop in case of emergency. This as well is a benefit for the chosen system.
The traffic system does not include a button for people crossing the street. This means that the
system could be implemented on a road with no street crossing signs for people, to reduce the
risk of accidents or mistakes occurring within the system, or from drivers themselves.
