Personal Mobility

In April 2006 the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) completed its 511 strategic
plan, which encompasses both phone and web services. In this strategic plan, MTC highlights its
commitment to determining whether further investment is warranted in comparison to other
regional transportation commitments. A valuable input to this determination is having a
quantified estimate of the benefits to users of the 511 system, which is what this study provides.
Noblis and MTC worked jointly through the support of the Federal Highway Administration to
quantify the annual mobility benefits for routine users of the traveler information service through
the application of the HOWLATE (Heuristic On-line Web-Linked Arrival Time Estimator)
process.

Noblis, Inc.

511 Traffic Operations

Transportation agencies need effective ways to inform the traveling public about current road
conditions and to manage congestion. Travel time systems and variable toll pricing systems
are two proven ways to meet these goals. These two systems require similar data, perform
similar calculations to produce correct results and both need to distribute the final
information to motorists on the roadway. Combining the systems makes sense from
technological and operational perspectives. However such a system must be designed
carefully to manage complexity while maintaining data integrity, performance, and
reliability.

Wavetronix LLC

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

Kansas City Scout is Kansas City's bi-state traffic management system. The Kansas and Missouri
Departments of Transportation (KDOT, MoDOT) designed Scout to lessen traffic jams by
improving rush-hour speeds, to increase safety by decreasing the number of rush-hour accidents,
and to improve emergency response to traffic situations. Kansas City Scout first became
operational in January 2004. Kansas City Scout manages traffic on more than 100 miles of
continuous freeways in the greater Kansas City metropolitan area. Scout uses closed-circuit
television (CCTV) cameras to monitor the highways from its traffic management center in Lee's
Summit. The Scout system relies on sensors to gauge traffic flow, uses large electronic message
boards to send urgent traffic notices to drivers along the freeways, and activates a Highway
Advisory Radio system that motorists in Missouri can tune to in the event of a freeway incident.

Kansas City Scout Traffic Center

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

The Maryland State Highway Administration’s (SHA) Coordinated Highways Action Response Team (CHART) program has gained access to real-time travel-time information from a third party provider, contracted by I-95 Corridor Coalition. The CHART program conducted a study to develop a set of procedural guidelines for travel time implementation on dynamic message signs (DMSs). The focus of the study was to specifically respond to a set of procedural issues that were identified during the project initiation phase. The study approach involved interviewing CHART stakeholders (operations, traffic safety, police, development, integration), researching the best practices around the country and abroad, and applying traffic engineering principles to provide recommendations to resolve the identified issues. The details provided in this paper may help other agencies to derive solutions to similar problems.

Daniel Consultants, Inc.

Maryland State Highway Administration

Integrated Control Systems, Inc.

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

This paper examines the accuracy of traffic information generated by a commercial traffic
monitoring system using anonymous tracking of cellular phones to generate roadway speed
information. The calculated speeds from the cell phone floating car probe system were
compared to two alternate sources of speed measurements; inductive loops for speeds on
freeways, and GPS equipped test vehicles for speeds on surface streets. The Traffic
Measurement System (TMS) was tested in Toronto and generated speed data which was
closely correlated with speeds measured by inductive loop detectors and with speeds
calculated from travel times of GPS equipped test vehicles. For both freeways and surface
streets under congested and uncongested conditions, the system produce speeds with better
than 85% average absolute accuracy and better then 95% average accuracy in all categories.

Intellione Technologies

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