Commercial Operations

This paper provides a overview of Michigan’s unique approach to moving ahead on the vision of
technical and relationship integration and on building a connected vehicle system that meets
shared public and private objectives.  The transformation of the automotive industry from
mechanical to electronic engineering is critical to the Michigan economy as the dramatic
reduction in automotive industry jobs has placed Michigan at the forefront of what appears to be
a recession of the U.S. economy.  The Michigan economy lost 75,000 jobs in 2007 and appears
to be headed in a similar direction in 2008.  Connected vehicle technology development offers
Michigan a growing high-tech industry where Michigan companies have a competitive
advantage.  Michigan is also home to the MDOT and other public-sector agencies that have
demonstrated national leadership in connected vehicles.  “Team Michigan” is pursuing a strategy
for testing and developing VII providing all the players necessary for further developing vehicle
communication systems that keep drivers connected, save lives, improve mobility, protect the
environment, and employ Michigan residents.

Center for Automotive Research

University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute

Presented at the 15th World Congress on Intelligent Transport Systems, November 16-20, 2008, New York, New York

The City of Tampere in central Finland, Europe, together with neighboring municipalities,
form a region of about 350.000 citizens, from which more than 200.000 citizens live in the
City of Tampere. The region has since the beginning of 1990’s actively developed through
public-private partnerships and co-operation some of the Europe’s leading ITS services for
citizens and private & public organizations. Examples of these advanced services are: GPSpositioning and priority system for buses and emergency vehicles, real-time public transport
information displays at bus stops and main public places, mobile and web based public
transport information for travelers, multi-purpose smart cards for public transport, libraries,
swimming arenas etc, public transport journey planner, journey planner for cyclists, voice
recognition and text message based timetable information, real-time parking place
information, warning system for trucks approaching low bridges, boat/ferry connection
information displays, taxi and demand responsive dispatching systems, real-time traffic
information portal that collects data from floating cars, fixed measurement points and traffic
lights and combines all the traffic data in the city and many more. In the spring 2007 the
different stakeholders; ITS service providers, hardware suppliers, software suppliers,
consultancies, universities and authorities decided to establish an open co-operation network
to promote and co-ordinate the existing and future development and implementation activities
in the City of Tampere and the surrounding region in a more organized and effective manner.
Thus all the development activities could benefit from and support each other and make
Tampere one of the main cities and test-beds in the world in the field of advanced ITS
systems.

WSP Finland Ltd.

Mobisoft Ltd.

Presented at the 15th World Congress on Intelligent Transport Systems, November 16-20, 2008, New York, New York

In this paper, we investigate traffic flow characteristics  in a traffic system consisting of a
mixture of adaptive cruise control (ACC) vehicles and manual-controlled (manual) vehicles,
by  using a hybrid modeling approach. In the hybrid approach, (i) manual vehicles are
described by a cellular automaton (CA) model,  which can reproduce different traffic states
(i.e., f ree flow,  synchronized flow, and jam) as well as probabilistic traffic  breakdown
phenomenon; (ii) ACC vehicles are simulated by using a car-following model, which removes
artificial velocity  fluctuations due to intrinsic randomization in CA model. We have studied
traffic breakdown probability from free flow to congested flow and transition probability from
synchronized flow  to jam  in the mixed traffic  system. The results are compared with that,
where both ACC  vehicles and manual vehicles are simulated by CA models. The qualitative
and quantitative differences are indicated.

University of Science and technology of China

Presented at the ITS America Annual Conference and Exposition, November 16-20, 2008, New York, New York

The  Texas  Department  of  Transportation  (TxDOT)  has  been  actively  involved  in  Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) at a statewide level since 1998.  Key to the TxDOT ITS Statewide Development  and  Integration  (SDI)  Program  has  been  the  concept  of  develop  once  and  reuse many  times.    Benefits  of  the  Texas  SDI  program  have  extended  to  the  25  districts  in  the  state which  include  both  metropolitan  and  rural  deployments  and  several  of  the  largest  cities  in  the United States.  ITS applications include traditional traffic management centers as well as border safety  inspection  facilities.    The  program  has  had  to  deal  both  with  new  development  and deployment as well as integration into existing deployments with legacy equipment and migration  issues.    Software  has  been  licensed  for  use  by  other  state  departments  of  transportation  and successfully built upon.  Through reciprocal licenses, TxDOT has been able to take advantage of additional  capability  developed.    An  overview  of  the  program  and  its  accomplishments  will  be given.

Texas Department of Transportation

Southwest Research Institute®

Presented at the 15th World Congress on Intelligent Transport Systems, November 16-20, 2008, New York, New York

Several states in the U.S. have supported the needs of public transport agencies that provide
demand-response transport (DRT) services by procuring scheduling and dispatching software
on their behalf.  The primary impetus for these states to undertake such procurements was
that many of their agencies do not have the resources and expertise that is required for
procuring and deploying such systems.  Further, the prospect of selling these systems across
an entire state was expected to increase the competition among the vendors of these products. 
The statewide procurements have resulted in agencies within a particular state being able to
purchase and deploy the selected software product.  While many benefits have been
experienced by the agencies that have deployed these products, there have been significant
challenges in the procurements, as well as the deployments.
This paper will describe and summarize the results of three statewide procurements of DRT
scheduling and dispatching systems – those in Iowa, Tennessee and Pennsylvania.  The
challenges associated with each procurement will be discussed, along with the ways that each
challenge was overcome.  Finally, the overall lessons learned from these procurements will
be summarized.

TranSystems Corporation

Presented at the 15th World Congress on Intelligent Transport Systems, November 16-20, 2008, New York, New York