William Stopford Alfa Romeo's cheapest model in Australia just got cheaper 3 Hours Ago Cars could soon be electronically slowed or limited, with geofencing technology making speeding impossible in urban areas, a professor claims. Journalist The days of driving as fast as you like through urban streets could eventually come to an end, according to a leading transport academic, who believes technology already exists to stop motorists from exceeding speed limits. Marco te Brömmelstroet, a social scientist and professor at the University of Amsterdam, told Q&A geofencing could fundamentally change how cars operate in cities over the next two decades, automatically preventing drivers from exceeding speed limits in designated areas. "My dream is that in 20 years, we will look back and find it unbelievable that we allowed humans to drive 2000 kilo vehicles as fast as they wanted in our cities," Mr te Brömmelstroet said. "We have the technology now – like geofencing – to prevent that." While geofenced speed limiting remains rare in privately owned passenger vehicles, the underlying technology is already available in many modern cars. Geofencing can use a vehicle's GPS location, digital maps, cameras, and onboard software to create virtual boundaries that can alter how a vehicle behaves in specific locations. Rather than relying solely on roadside speed cameras or police enforcement, a geofenced vehicle can identify its location and automatically limit acceleration or cap its maximum speed within predefined zones. For example, a vehicle could be restricted to 30km/h outside a school during pick-up and drop-off times, limited to 20km/h in pedestrian precincts, or prevented from exceeding residential speed limits before returning to normal operation on open roads. In most cases, the system wouldn't necessarily apply the brakes. Instead, it would simply prevent the vehicle from accelerating beyond the applicable speed limit. Mr te