Researchers
for the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) and the University of Virginia
(UVA) have been awarded a $1 million Federal Highway Administration grant to make
vast amounts of available traffic data more useful to transportation planners
and traffic engineers. That data is collected continuously by intelligent traffic
technologies on many of Virginia's heavily traveled highways through VDOT's "Smart
Travel Program." The data includes traffic volumes, speeds, and patterns-information
used daily by traffic controllers to manage traffic congestion.
"Until
recently that data was discarded after its initial use," explains Dr. Gary
Allen, director of VDOT's Transportation Research Council. "Now, however,
researchers intend to develop new systems to assess that data and use it for more
scientific transportation planning. The grant will enable development of these
systems by VDOT and UVA."
Working in the Smart Travel Lab on the UVA
grounds, staff members of the University's Center for Transportation Studies and
VDOT's Transportation Research Council receive traffic data from three "smart
traffic centers." Those centers-in Northern Virginia, Hampton Roads, and
Richmond- transmit real-time data and video of traffic to the Smart Travel Lab,
where it is archived. With funding from the grant, the effectiveness of the lab's
archiving methods and its prototype analyzing systems will be tested.
"Employed
in this effort is sophisticated, cutting-edge technology not used by other departments
of transportation," notes Dr. Allen. "Once data from the smart traffic
centers becomes analyzed, it can be used to make better transportation planning
decisions to improve mobility in the Commonwealth." The analyzed data not
only will be used to better understand the dynamics of traffic for highway planning,
it also will be valuable for determining new strategies to reduce traffic-generated
pollution. In addition, the new systems will make the archived data accessible
through the Internet to engineers, metropolitan planning organizations, businesses,
and citizens.
VDOT received the grant, the only one awarded to a department
of transportation, after national competition for it. VDOT will match the grant
with approximately $300,000. Also supporting the research is Open Roads Consulting
in Chesapeake, which will develop software for the new systems, and George Mason
University, which will assist in data analysis.
