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››› Browse Resources ››› Australian Traffic Agency Links Main Roads Queensland The Queensland Department of Main Roads has a manual incident management
system, relying mainly on telephone calls from the public, which are verified
through CCTV, but also has a semi-automatic incident detection capability
using in-road loop detectors. Brisbane City Council (Queensland) Brisbane City, the largest local government in Australia, is responsible
for the major urban roads other than freeways, have recently established
Traffic Response Units primarily to clear blockages during the peak periods. Roads & Traffic Authority of New South Wales Sydney’s metropolitan road network is monitored by over 320 CCTVs and
detector loops are being progressively installed at 500 metres intervals
across the freeway network. These inputs together with information from
the Sydney Coordinated Adaptive Traffic System (SCATS), which controls
the traffic signals, and information phoned in by road users to the call
centre, enables incidents to be rapidly detected and verified. Considerable
effort is currently being focussed on progressively developing preset
automated incident response plans. VicRoads (Victoria) The State government traffic authority, VicRoads, operates a Traffic
Control and Communication Centre which manages the 3,400 traffic signals
across the state and over 140 CCTVs in Melbourne (other than on the City
Link Tollway) and handles 250,000 telephone calls each year. VicRoads’
automatic incident detection system, utilising loop detectors on the major
freeways, is also being used in Adelaide. Melbourne CityLink (Victoria) The Melbourne City Link comprising 22 km of upgraded and new freeways,
opened in 2000, dramatically reducing traffic congestion. It is a single
operator controlled tollway using a Central Control Computer System (CCCS)
developed by MI Transport Systems. The CCCS solution integrates traffic
management and tunnel plant control systems into a single operator interface
and includes a state-of-the-art incident management system, with automatic
incident detection by real time digital image processing, automated response
plans and decision support systems for response management by the operator.
Transport South Australia The primary incident management system in place in South Australia is
on the reversible Southern Expressway in Adelaide (traffic flow is in
one direction in the morning peak and reverses for the afternoon). The
incident management system is based on the VicRoads system used in Melbourne,
using loop detectors and automatic incident detection. Main Roads Western Australia (MRWA) MRWA has recently introduced HEROs (Highway Emergency Response Officers),
based on the US Georgia DOT program, which operate primarily on the 60
km freeway network in the Perth Metropolitan area. Highways Agency (UK) Traffic Control Centre (TCC) Project web page – where you can find out
about the Highways Agency's flagship project for the new millennium, a
significant step in developing the Highways Agency's role as a network
operator, as TCC's will make a major contribution to improving the efficiency
of the motorway and trunk road network. This two year project was looking primarily at the impact of Dynamic
Route Guidance systems (ie identify the optimum route and update it in
real time during the journey). Travel Information Highway - Real time road traffic and travel information
from the Highways Agency Traffic Message Channel Personal traffic information on your route, in your language, across
the UK and Europe Motorway Control System (MCS) (Stockholm, Sweden) The Stockholm Region of the Swedish National Road Administration (SNRA)
has implemented its first warning and information system, the MCS along
a part of the European Highway E4. The Midlands Driver Information System (MDIS) (UK) The MDIS displays driver information on Variable Message Signs (VMS)
at key route choice junctions. Two signs are located prior to each junction.
The road network covered by this system is limited to motorways and those
trunk roads that are likely to carry diverted traffic most of the day.
The messages detail the problem, the destination to which the message
refers and, where appropriate, a recommended diversion route. The system
allows police forces to report incidents and give information on their
location, severity and anticipated duration via computer terminals. The
network management centre stand-alone computer analyses this information
and generates one or more proposals to divert the traffic away from the
source of delay. Companion: A Collective Warning System to Supplement Traffic Management (Germany) In case of an accident on a motorway, much danger is caused by the vehicles
that block the road (cars involved in the accident, emergency services,
a tailback of cars that cannot pass the location). Secondary accidents,
that are often more serious than the original, can be avoided if the incident
is detected immediately and the scene of the accident is cordoned off
right away. Inter-Urban Traffic Management (Salzburg, Austria) The high traffic volume on the A8/A99 and the danger of traffic jams
on the infamous Irschenberg are the main reasons for designing an intelligent
traffic management system for the Salzburg motorway, which is affected
by the all-German tourist traffic particularly in holiday seasons. The
traffic management system uses radar sensors and induction loop detectors
to acquire traffic data and it detects stationary traffic and measures
road conditions, environmental parameters and visibility. A 55-kilometre
long section of the Munich-Salzburg highway has been equipped with a Bosch
traffic management system. US Federal Highways Agency (FHWA) The Operations Core Business Unit of FHWA has information on incident
management and travel management. For more information: US Department of Transportation (US DOT) The US DOT established the ITS Joint Program Office (JPO) in 1994 to
provide strategic leadership for ITS research, development, testing, and
deployment and policy coordination. Also home of the EDL (see below) National Associations Working Group for ITS (NAWGITS) NAWGITS, in partnership with USDOT, is composed of national associations
of both state and local officials and transportation service providers
with a common interest in understanding the concepts, practices and applications
of ITS. The Working Group provides the materials needed to enable a broad
range of constituents to make informed, educated decisions about ITS.
The ITS Cooperative Deployment Network (ICDN) is a shared Internet resource
containing up-to-date news, insight, and resources for transportation
professionals and agencies. For more information: The ITS Deployment Resources page includes an extensive collection of
on-line ITS backgrounders, technical papers, discussion groups, tutorials,
and real-world ITS deployment examples Traffic Incident Management (TIM) Committee (ITE) The TIM Committee, sponsored by Institute of Transportation Engineers
(ITE) is a diverse network of professionals dedicated to improving traffic
incident management on US roadways. Site includes information on meetings
and upcoming events, papers and surveys, membership roster (~100 US members),
a TIM Discussion Group and links Traffic Incident Management (TIM) Discussion Group. Messages Sorted by
Thread National Incident Management Coalition (NIMC) The NIMC was created in 1991 to serve as an institutional forum for the promotion of incident management activities. It is an ad hoc group of private and public organisations dedicated to alleviating incident-related traffic congestion. ALERT® (Advanced Law Enforcement & Response Technology) With support from the US DOT, the National Institute of Justice and the
International Association of Chiefs of Police, the Texas Transportation
Institute is developing the Advanced Law Enforcement & Response Technology
(ALERT®). The System enhances the safety and efficiency of
all first responders by streamlining data collection and sharing, and
improving communication between law enforcement and the entire first response
community. The system enables source data entry by first responders and
provides wireless access to local, state, and federal databases. In addition,
the architecture provides a single graphical user interface to control
all vehicle peripherals and communications capabilities. CapWIN (East US) The Capital Area Wireless Integrated Network (CapWIN) project is a partnership
between Maryland, Virginia and District of Columbia to develop an integrated
transportation and criminal justice information wireless network. For
more information: CHART Program (Maryland) Maryland's CHART Program is a multi-jurisdictional and multi-disciplinary
statewide program directed by a Board, consisting of senior technical
and operational personnel from the State Highway Authority, Maryland Transportation
Authority, Maryland State Police, FHWA, University of Maryland Advanced
Transportation Technology Center and various local governments. This comprehensive,
advanced traffic management system includes a state-of-the-art command
and control center called the Statewide Operations Center (SOC), functioning
24 hours a day, seven days a week with satellite Traffic Operations Centers
(TOCs) spread across the state to handle peak-period traffic: COMPASS (Ontario Canada) COMPASS Freeway Traffic Management System developed to respond to traffic
congestion problems on urban freeways and increase safety by allowing
for the prompt detection and removal of freeway incidents and vehicle
breakdowns; providing accurate and timely freeway incident and delay information
to motorists; and, effectively managing peak rush hour traffic flow through
innovative traffic control devices. The initial 16 km leg of the Highway
401 COMPASS System was put into operation in January 1991. Over the years,
the System has been upgraded with more advanced equipment and software
programs and expanded both easterly and westerly to cover the entire section
of Highway 401 within the Metropolitan Toronto region. New initiatives
are being designed for the Greater Toronto Area Freeway Network and for
Highway 417 in Ottawa. For more information: Houston TranStar (Texas) A cooperative effort between the City of Houston, Harris County, the Metropolitan Transit Authority (METRO), and TxDOT responsible for the management of a variety of freeway and arterial street systems including ITS programs, Emergency Management Systems and Enforcement efforts within the Greater Houston area. TranStar is located in Transportation Management Center (TMC) housing transportation and emergency management personnel. The service area encompasses 5,436 square miles with a population of 4.0 million. Field components include: a 160-mile freeway system (out of a projected 300 miles); freeways and arterial Street incident management; flow signals at 53 ramps; closed circuit television surveillance (CCTV); dynamic message signs; a 63-mile HOV lane systems (out of a projected 105 miles); regional traffic signal system (2,800 signals); ITS programs; and emergency management operations for evacuation and disasters. For more information: I-95 Corridor Coalition (East US) A regional partnership of transportation agencies from 12 States from
Maine to Virginia, bringing its members together to address ITS solutions
to shared transportation problems and challenges. The I-95 Corridor Coalition
was established in 1993 to ensure mobility, safety and efficiency across
all modes and transportation facilities that serve the region. For more
information: NFSIMC Model Procedures The National Fire Service Incident Management System Consortium (NFSIMC)
has agreed to produce a model procedures guide for traffic incidents.
For the fire community “Incident Management” is very site specific and
is a process for assuring the safety of personnel and effective deployment
and use of equipment at an incident. At a traffic incident, organisations
typically responding include law enforcement, fire and rescue, emergency
medical services, transportation (both traffic management and highway
maintenance) and towing recovery. For more information: TIME (Wisconsin) The Traffic Incident Management Enhancement (TIME) program is a multi-agency
effort to effectively handle, respond to and clear incidents on the freeway
system in south eastern Wisconsin (Milwaukee area) For more information: TRANSCOM (Transportation Operations Coordinating Committee) (East US) A consortium of 16 transportation and public safety agencies in the New
York, New Jersey, and Connecticut area whose goal is to provide a cooperative,
coordinated approach to regional traffic management. It has an Operations
Information Center (OIC), open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, that
shares incident information by alphanumeric pager, phone, and fax to more
than 200 highway and transit facilities, police agencies and a number
of radio traffic services. It also serves as a forum for incident and
special event management planning, construction coordination, and the
shared testing and implementation of regional traffic and transportation
management technologies. For more information: TransGuide System (Texas) The Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) traffic management center
called the TransGuide system, which began operations in July 1996,focuses
on incident management rather than congestion management. The TransGuide
control room monitors traffic conditions, controls traffic signals, and
allows rapid response to accidents and emergencies using data from roadway
sensors. The project is currently in the first phase of development in
which 26 miles of highway are equipped with roadway sensors, 52 CCTV cameras,
and 359 lane control signals. Final development is planned to include
191 miles. For more information: Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) The Northwest Region (includes Seattle) Traffic Management Center has
archived a year of traffic congestion maps. They've captured a map every
10 minutes and archived them. The map shots are stored on the web servers
and are accessed via a web page. Users can pick a date and time and the
map pops up. There are buttons that allow the user to scroll to the next
map, previous map, day or week. For more information: US DOT ITS Public Safety Program Interoperable procedures and technologies form public safety and transportation
operations will enable integrated information for safer communities. The
public benefits include: Land Transport Authority, Singapore Real time traffic information by satellite provides you with average
speed information on roads that are frequently travelled by taxis. traffic.smart provides one-stop, comprehensive real-time traffic information
for travellers to make well-informed travel decisions. It is linked to
various intelligent transport systems viz. ERP, EMAS, GLIDE, RIMS and
TrafficScan. Hong Kong Transport Department The HK Transport Department signed a contract in June 2000 with Hyder-Advantec
Joint Venture to conduct a preliminary feasibility study on the Traffic
Management and Information Centre (TMIC) for the Strategic Road Network
(SRN). The objective of the study is to find out the feasibility for establishing
such a Centre, which will put traffic surveillance and management, incident
management of the SRN and the dissemination of traveller information to
the public under one umbrella. Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport(MLIT) (Japan) http://www.mlit.go.jp/english/index.html ››› Incident Management Systems & Technologies Mi Transport Systems (Australia) Mi Consulting Group (Mi Transport Systems) is the Australian arm of Mi
Services Group has developed a Central Control Computer System (CCCS),
which provides an Incident Response Plan facility as a decision support
system assisting the operator’s response to an incident, and reducing
the chance of operator error. The Plans are pre-programmed and tested,
but can be changed in real-time, allows a single operator to respond to
multiple simultaneous events, in order of priority, with the lowest possible
effort. Aldridge Electrical Industries Pty Ltd Design, manufacture and install Intelligent Transportation Systems products,
including incident management detector Excel Technology Excel Technology Group designs, develops and manufactures a range of
traffic management and public transport management technology, including
incident management systems. Cetrac (Singapore) Intelligent transport management system by CET Technologies Pte Ltd (CET),
Singapore ADDCO Inc (US) ADDCO used internet conventions to develop software which allows Mn/DOT
to run traffic operations from a laptop anywhere, rather than being confined
to a specific facility – "virtual transportation operations centers"
- or VTOC (vee-talk). These organise information received from travel
information networks, CCTV, portable traffic systems and provide travel
information to motorists through the internet and kiosks: Autoscope Autoscope products combine real-time image processing and computerized
pattern recognition within a flexible software platform. The technology
provides traffic managers the means to reduce roadway congestion and improve
roadway planning and provide real-time detection information to improve
intersection control and provide highway speed data for traffic control
centers and Internet information systems. Autoscopes are used to automatically
detect incidents in tunnels and on freeways, thus providing the information
to improve emergency response times of local authorities. Legion Interactive (Australia) Mobile information—traveller & driver information systems Siemens (Germany) Siemens Traffic Control Systems is part of the Siemens Industrial Projects
and Technical Services Group and offers hardware, software, system engineering,
turnkey projects, as well as project management, maintenance, customer
training and other services. Siemens Traffic Control Systems participates
in many ITS projects world-wide. Siemens Traffic Control Systems is specialised
in ITS such as Urban Traffic Control Systems, Expressway Control Systems,
Traffic Information Systems, Parking Guidance Systems, Tunnel Operation
Systems, Traffic Management using Expert Traffic Control Strategies, Real-time
Traffic Collection and Processing, Automatic Incident Detection and other
advanced technologies. TNO (The Netherlands) TNO supports and assists trade, industry and government in technological
innovations and in solving problems. TNO covers a large number of disciplines
and aspects in the field of ITS, including policy, behaviour and technological
elements. Current researches focuses on development of long-term dynamic
traffic management strategies; various projects on systems architecture;
development of short term traffic prediction models; evaluation of route-guidance
systems and incident management. University of Queensland (UQ) (Australia) Neural network incident detection models, developed by leading Australian
ITS researcher Dr Hussein Dia at the University of Queensland, have been
shown to outperform existing automated incident detection models in terms
of providing higher detection rates, lower false alarms and faster times
of detection. These sophisticated models, using real-time data from loop
detectors are running on a number of freeways in Brisbane, Melbourne and
Adelaide. Dr Dia is currently developing a new generation of artificial
neural network incident detection models based on recent advances in the
theory of neural computation. Contact: h.dia@uq.edu.au Consortium of ITS Training and Education (CITE) (US) CITE provides online ITS courses and textbooks (University of Queensland
is a member of CITE). A module, which can be taken online, of the current
ITS course is on Incident Management and Emergency Management. For more
information: NHI Incident Management Workshop (US) The National Highway Institute (NHI) of the US FHWA provides a very popular
two day Incident Management workshop across the US providing state-of-the-practice
in effective management of traffic incidents. The primary facilitators
include John O’Laughlin (formerly Washington State Patrol) and Ted Smith
(formerly Illinoise DOT) both from PB Farradyne, Inc. For more information: Module 14 Major Incident Management One of 17 Modules which comprise the Incident Command System (ICS) National
Training Curriculum, sponsored by the US National Wildfire Coordinating
Group. ICS is now widely used throughout the United States by fire agencies,
and is increasingly used for law enforcement, other public-safety applications,
and for emergency and event management. This module describes how major
or complex incidents can create special problems related to incident organisation. Incident Management Program Presentation to XXI World Road Congress, Malaysia, October 1999 by James
Wright Electronic Document Library Documents with “EDL#” are available for downloading (pdf document) in
the Electronic Document Library (“search” using the EDL#): – Traffic Incident Management Handbook (revision of the 1991 Freeway
Incident Management Handbook; consists of 3 parts – introduction; organising,
planning and designing; and operational and technical approaches), November
2000 [166pp 1.85MB] – Incident Management: Successful Practices; A Cross-Cutting Study, April 2000, EDL#11484 [32pp, 1.11MB] – Incident Management: Detection, Verification & Traffic Management (ITS Field Operational Test Cross-Cutting Study), September 1998, EDL#6328 [26pp 0.22MB] – Deploying and Operating Incident Management Systems, EDL#6869 – Incident Management Systems, EDL#6868 – HAZMAT Incident Response, EDL#6327 – Safety Service Patrols, EDL#6872 TRIS Online (US) The Transportation Research Information Services (TRIS) Database is the
world’s largest and most comprehensive bibliographic resource on transportation
information. TRIS is produced and maintained by the Transportation Research
Board (TRB). TRIS contains almost a half million records of published
and ongoing research on all modes and disciplines in the field of transportation.
In 1999-2000, over 30,000 new records were added to TRIS. TRIS is now
available as TRIS Online through the National Transportation Library ’s
Website California PATH Bibliographic Database The California Partners for Advanced Transit and Highways (PATH) Database,
the world ’s largest bibliographic database pertaining to ITS is available
online. The Database reflects a wide coverage of ITS information including
monographs, journal articles, conference papers, technical reports, theses,
and selected media coverage. It currently contains close to 13,000 records
with abstracts. Where documents are available in electronic forms, URLs
are provided. ARRB Transport Research Research Report ARR 327 (1999) - Incident detection
and management on freeways by E. Chung & N. Rosalion. Available from ARRB
Transport Research [ISBN 0 86910 779 8 $49.50] |
www.transportroundtable.com.au
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