Advanced Traffic Analysis Center Offers Technology Support
We believe small-medium cities and urban areas are special! Not only are they home to about 25 percent of the U.S. population (or roughly over 50 million residents), but these areas provide critical economic, social, health and cultural opportunities for vast surrounding rural areas. According to census estimates, these areas experienced the largest growth among urban and metropolitan areas in the US. As a result, these areas also experienced the highest growth in traffic levels and traffic congestion. At the same time, small-to-medium size cities generally have modest resources to meet the increasing transportation challenges. Customer demands, limited budgets, resistence to additional taxes, heightened environmental standards, and advances in information technology all influence transportation decisions and contribute to their complexities. The ATAC program was developed with those challenges in mind, with extensive input from local, state, federal, and private sector partners. The goal of ATAC is to focus on enhancing transportation systems in small-to-medium size cities through the use of advanced traffic analysis and ITS solutions to safety and mobility problems. We believe that the analysis capabilities we have developed are valuable for supporting various transportation decisions, ranging from evaluating proposed roadway designs to enhancing traffic operations. We are working on building a knowledge base on ITS planning, evaluation, and deployment which targets rural and small-medium size urban areas. Our main resources in providing this support are qualified individuals who have the right background to relate to today's transportation challenges and are capable of running sophisticated analysis software. Our traffic laboratory houses the computer software and hardware used in the analysis. It also serves as the ATAC training facility which provides hands-on opportunities for exploring various traffic control strategies using traffic signal controllers and traffic simulation. Over the past year our partnership with the North Dakota Department of Transportation has been further expanded to increase ATAC's involvement in and support for various operations and ITS functions within the NDDOT. Working with local partners, the ATAC is developing a new focus area which will support travel demand modeling development and enhancements for North Dakota MPOs and the NDDOT. We will also be working with the Minnesota DOT to evaluate the Moorhead Area Integrated Train Detection and Traffic Control System. We plan on extending these partnerships to other states in the coming year. ATAC's staff is growing tremendously with an increase in graduate and undergraduate student involvement. Through partnerships with the computer science and civil engineering departments at NDSU, ATAC staff have access to a wide range of expertise in both students and faculty, which allows us to expand our research focus and better serve our customers needs. We hope that you find ATAC as a valuable resource which will allow us to further expand our partnerships. I encourage you to become more familiar with our program by visiting our web site (www.atacenter.org) which contains information on our projects as well as links to various transportation resources. |
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Welcome to the first issue of The Signal, a newsletter dedicated to reporting information about the Advanced Traffic Analysis Center (ATAC) and its activities. The ATAC was established at North Dakota State University in 1998 as a Technology Support Center to address transportation needs and issues of small-to-medium size cities.