U.S. Highway Official Outlines Intelligent Transportation Programs

An official of the U.S. Department of Transportation's Intelligent Transportation System (ITS) Joint Program Office spoke in September during a seminar hosted by ATAC. The seminar, part of the UGPTI distinguished speakers program which invites a prominent speaker to campus, was attended by NDSU faculty, students, and state and local transportation agency staff.

In its 20-year history, ITS has been deployed by both the public and private sector, notes Michael Freitas, Manager, Integrated Corridor Management Systems Initiative at the ITS Joint Program Office. More than 50 operations centers provide traffic management for urban areas across the country. About 25 percent of vehicles in city transit programs have automatic vehicle location technology. Technology is used in the clearance, credentialing and inspection of commercial vehicles and in toll collection, General Motors' OnStar system, traveler information websites, and state and metropolitan 511 travel information systems.

Freitas is a civil engineer with more than 30 years of experience at the Federal Highway Administration. He oversees the portions of the U.S. DOT ITS program dealing with advanced traffic management, traveler information and the Rural ITS Program. He is also currently serving as the day-to-day manager of the ITS Joint Program Office in support of the acting director.

Freitas says ITS activity under the current transportation bill focused on research, development and deployment. "We wrote the rule requiring regional architecture," he said. "We have hundreds of plans in place. Proof of success will be in the implementation." Funding for ITS deployment in the federal transportation bill from 1998 to 2003 was $679 million with another $603 million for ITS research and development.

He says the U.S. DOT has restructured its ITS program to include fewer, larger, short-term, high-payoff initiatives. "Our expectation is that these initiatives will be multi-modal in nature, engage the private sector, have a clear public sector role and be results oriented," he said. "Crosscutting efforts that support the overall goals of the ITS program will continue."

Major initiatives of the restructured program include:

• Integrated vehicle-based safety systems. The program will accelerate the introduction and commercialization of vehicle-based safety systems to assist drivers and reduce the number and severity of crashes.
• Cooperative intersection collision avoidance systems. "We need to get the systems in the cars and on the roadside at least talking to one another," Freitas says. The goal is to deploy systems at 15 percent of the most hazardous signalized intersections with in-vehicle support in 50 percent of vehicles by 2015.
• Next-Generation 911. New Internet-based technology is being investigated. Video is beingintegrated so that public safety departments know what kind of equipment to dispatch to incidents. Wireless 911 service is growing in urban areas, but not in rural areas.
• Mobility services for all Americans. Through research, technology use and coalition building, the department will increase mobility and accessibility while achieving more efficient use of federal transportation funding.
• Integrated corridor management systems. Freitas says a model system will be developed that uses ITS for better detection of traffic congestion and then integrated to divert traffic to alternate routes and adjust signals to cope with the added traffic. ITS on the highways also need to be better integrated with transit systems.
• Nationwide surface transportation weather observation system. Currently the system is geared to airports with weather observations at altitudes of 3 feet and up. "Highway departments have weather stations where they've historically had problems, but they're not statistically located and not integrated into forecasting models," he said.
• Emergency transportation operations. ITS applications will be implemented to improve emergency response to major incidents. The results should be shorter duration of incidents, reduced impact and more rapid restoration of normal travel conditions.
• Universal freight manifest. The transportation system will be made more efficient, productive and secure through use of a common electronic freight manifest that allows access to shipment information by all supply chain partners.
• Vehicle infrastructure integration. Nationwide deployment of an integrated communications infrastructure on roadways and vehicles.

"ITS is becoming increasingly visible to the profession and to the public," Freitas noted. "The U.S. ITS program is well-positioned for the next generation of issues and applications."

In this issue...

• U.S. Highway Official Outlines Intelligent Transportation Programs
• Traffic Operations Roundtable
• ATAC Updates
• VMS Composer
• Statewide ITS Plan
• MPO Directors Meeting
• ITS Architecture
• ATAC Develops Traffic Technology
• Busek Links DOT, ATAC with FHWA
• Keeping Up with Growth
• Traffic Detection Equipment
• Staff Notes
• ITE Student Chapter Trip