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ITS America Announces Winners for 2013 Best of ITS Awards

ITS State Chapters, Hall of Fame inductees and the Student Essay Competition winners honored during the ITS America Annual Meeting

Nashville, Tenn. (April  24, 2013) – The Intelligent Transportation Society of America (ITS America) today announced the winners for the 2013 Best of ITS Awards, a highly competitive program which recognizes the most innovative projects and influential achievements in the Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) industry.

“ITS America’s Best of ITS awards is the top honor one can receive in the U.S. recognizing the development and deployment of intelligent transportation systems (ITS) to address the nation’s transportation challenges. Each of the 2013 winners has demonstrated that they are not only on the cutting edge of transportation innovation, but that they are leading the industry forward,” said Scott Belcher, President and CEO of ITS America. “With more applicants than ever before, each of the winners exemplifies how technology can be used to create a safer, more efficient and sustainable transportation system.” 

Winners were recognized and announced during the Opening Plenary session of the 23^rd ITS America Annual Meeting and Exposition on Monday, April 22 at the Gaylord Opryland Hotel and Convention Center in Nashville, Tennessee.

The Best of ITS Awards recognizes organizations whose projects have demonstrated specific and measurable outcomes and exemplified innovation by establishing a “new dimension” of performance. 

The 2013 winners for Best Innovative Product and Best Innovative Practice are:

Best Innovative Product

• Intelligent Transportation System Facility Management, Florida Department of Transportation
• 495 Express Lanes, Virginia Department of Transportation
• Operations Task Manager Software, Florida Department of Transportation - District 6

Best Innovative Practice

• San Diego Interstate 15 (I-15) Integrated Corridor Management Project, SANDAG
• Virginia ITS Communication Network: A Public-Private Partnership Success, Virginia Department of Transportation
• Multijurisdictional Wireless Communication System Deployment, LA County Public Works

ITS America also honored its newest members of the Hall of Fame during the ITS America Business Meeting on Tuesday, April 23.

“Each recipient of the ITS America Hall of Fame award has served as a life-long champion of technology’s vital role in transportation, and recipients personify achievement in the ultimate standards for a leader in the ITS field,” said Belcher.

Hall of Fame inductees included, Mortimer Downey who currently serves as a Senior Advisor to Parsons Brinckerhoff, Michael Doyle, Chief Executive Officer of the Econolite Group, Randell Iwasaki, former Director of the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans), and who currently serves as Executive Director of the Contra Costa Transportation Authority (CCTA), and Edwin Rowe who currently serves as the Senior Vice President at Iteris, Inc.

In addition to the Best of ITS Awards, ITS America also presented awards to five state chapters. ITS America has 27 state and regional chapters representing 40 states in total across the country and a range of ITS stakeholders in various jurisdictions and the Outstanding State Chapter Award recognizes chapter achievements in 2012. The award is divided into two categories based on size and ITS California was the Outstanding State Chapter in Division 1 with ITS Florida honored as a runner-up; ITS Maryland took home the award in Division 2 with ITS Arizona and ITS Pennsylvania tying for runner-up.     

The State Chapter Membership Growth Award was presented to reward state chapters that have excelled at attracting and retaining members. The division one winner was ITS California. The division two runner-up, ITS Connecticut, had been recognized each of the last two years at the state chapter awards ceremony and the chapter’s sustained commitment to excellence is just as evident now as ever.  The winner of the division two Membership Growth award took deliberate steps to rebuild after 2011, a year in which it lost nearly 30% of its membership. In the words of one of the judges, this chapter “Gave themselves a facelift and really dove into what is important to the members, what makes them join and stay engaged.” The reinvigorated winner of the 2013 Membership Growth Award for Division 2 was ITS Maryland.

For many years, ITS America has held a student essay competition with appreciation to the Southwest Research Institute who sponsors this award.

The 2013 Student Essay third place winner was Edward Offei for the essay “ITS Technology to Reduce Truck Overturn Crashes Due to High Winds at Bordeaux, Wyoming” and second place was Sayanan Sivaraman for the essay “Cooperative Intelligent Vehicles: Are we there yet?”  Daniel. J. Fagnant’s essay “Environmental Implications for Autonomous Shared Vehicles Using Agent-based Model Simulation” took first place.

The Intelligent Transportation Society of America (ITS America) is the nation’s largest organization dedicated to advancing the research, development and deployment of Intelligent Transportation System (ITS) to improve the nation’s surface transportation system. To learn more about ITS America visit www.itsa.org or www.twitter.com/ITS_AMERICA.

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