Costa Rica to roll out RFID tags for vehicle registration and contactless toll payments

Costa Rica vehicle registration sticker on car windscreen
DIGITAL LABELS: Costa Rica plans to replace the standard vehicle road tax stickers with RFID tags

The government of Costa Rica has launched a project to develop an RFID tag that can be fitted in cars and other vehicles as a replacement for the right of circulation stickers that drivers are obliged to fix to their vehicle’s windscreen to prove they have paid their annual road tax.

The tag developed by the Digital Marchamo project will also support functionalities including contactless in-car toll and parking payments. In addition, it will send information about individual vehicles to “a centralized computer system, in turn, this information can be read remotely by special teams of the Traffic Police” and “improve traffic systems, controllers and traffic lights”, the country’s Instituto Nacional de Seguros (INS) says.

The solution will also “be able to give quick and expeditious passage to ambulances, firefighters and the police and support shadow tolls, which means that you don’t have to stop at a tollbooth to pay, but you go at the legal speed that is demarcated without having to stop”.

“This adjustment will be possible thanks to RFID technology, radio frequency identification that allows objects (in this case cars) to be identified using radio waves in a unique way and being able to capture hundreds of objects at the same time,” the INS adds.

It plans to issue two public tenders inviting suppliers and developers to submit proposals for the provision of RFID technology and for a system integration platform later this month.

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