Safety

A 75 mile rural segment of I-75 in South Florida, known as Alligator Alley, connects the metropolitan Miami/Ft. Lauderdale urban area to the tourist and beach communities in the Naples/Ft. Myers area of the Florida Gulf Coast. This four lane Interstate Highway segment, with average daily traffic approaching 25,000 vehicles, has experienced a sustained and perplexing crash history that includes 87 fatal crashes between the years of 2001 and 2006. The majority of these crashes involved a single vehicle and occurred in daylight hours under good weather conditions. To further the development of a crash mitigation strategy, the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) conducted a study to evaluate the potential impact on crash reduction through the implementation of ITS devices (1). The findings of the study indicated that an ITS Safety System, consisting of speed monitoring, weather sensing and lane control messaging, would yield cost beneficial mitigation of the severe I-75/Alligator Alley crash history. This technical paper presents a summary of the referenced study findings.

VANUS, Inc.

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

An automated warning system has been installed on Interstate Highway 75 in south Georgia at a site that is known for fog problems. The warning system, which was jointly developed by Georgia Tech and the Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT), continuously monitors visibility and is designed to automatically provide warnings to motorists whenever fog occurs. Visibility is monitored with 19 fog sensors, while speed and headway are monitored with five sets of traffic loops for each direction of traffic. The sensor data will automatically post warnings and speed advisories on two upstream Changeable Message Signs (CMSs), and will automatically notify the GDOT Transportation Management Center (TMC) whenever a hazardous situation occurs. Telephone access for remote monitoring by other transportation officials is also provided. Beta testing has been conducted and has shown the system to perform as designed. A comprehensive evaluation of the system and its effects on driver behavior has not been performed.

Georgia Institute of Technology

Scientific Atlanta

Presented at the ITS America Annual Conference and Exposition, May 19-22, 2003 Minneapolis, Minnesota

When emergencies associated with severe weather, traffic incidents, construction, planned
special events, and threats to security occur in the state, the Wisconsin Department of
Transportation will be one of possibly many agencies that will be called upon to respond to
the situation. This paper presents an overview of the Department’s proactive response as
guided by their Emergency Transportation Operations (ETO) Plan. The ETO Plan is
National Incident Management System (NIMS) compliant and describes how the Incident
Command System (ICS) is utilized as a structure for response. In addition to response
guidelines, the Plan also contains information on the Department’s ongoing ETO Program,
including organizational roles, performance-based accountability and reporting, threat and
risk assessment, and training.

HNTB Corporation

Wisconsin Department of Transportation

Paper submitted for publication and presentation at the ITS America’s 2009 Annual Meeting and Exposition

According to the successful experiences of highway design in developed countries, elementary
truck escape ramp design schemes are given for China mountainous area’s highway,
based on different kinds of geological conditions, and considering highway factors. Constructive
advices in the design are given too. The study collected data for China Criterion of truck
escape ramp design, and will enhance the safety of mountainous area’s highway.

Transportation Research Center Beijing University of Technology, Beijing China

Presented at the 12th World Congress on Intelligent Transport Systems, November 6-10, 2005, San Francisco, California

With the massive introduction of active safety systems in modern vehicles, it becomes more
and more difficult for the customer to understand the effectiveness of those systems.
Objective testing and evaluation methods are necessary to support this and are being
developed within the recently started European research project eVALUE. They will also
foster the development of new and advanced safety systems for future applications. This
paper gives an overview of the systems which will be regarded and a scientific approach for
the development of assessment procedures for those systems.

RWTH Aachen University

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