The Transportation Research Board (TRB) will sponsor the 6th International Visualization in Transportation Symposium from August 20 to 23, 2011, in Chicago. State-of-the-art methods of visualizing transportation information will be the focus of the symposium. The symposium will feature case studies and successful practices of visualization in transportation planning, operation, design, data management, maintenance, and more.

The Transportation Research Board (TRB) will sponsor the Managing and Operating Regional Arterial and Freeway Systems Conference from July 18 to 21, 2011, in Las Vegas, Nevada. The conference is the midyear meeting for the TRB Transportation Operations Committees and will cover a wide variety of topics on transportation operations, including strategies for managing and optimizing transportation systems, performance measures, integrated corridor management, advancing regional transportation operations, and more.

A new report, released by the National Cooperative Freight Research Program (NCFRP), developed a set of measures to assess the performance of the U.S. freight transportation system in an easy-to-read freight system report card. The report examined performance measures that capture the efficiency, capacity, safety, security, infrastructure condition, congestion, energy, and environmental effects of the freight transportation system. The performance measures support investment, operations, and policy decisions involving freight transportation at the local, regional, national, and global levels.

The U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) is conducting a National Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) Architecture user survey to get feedback on possible new or enhanced features for the update of the National ITS Architecture. The survey will take 10-15 minutes to complete and will influence the future direction of the National ITS Architecture. This update will also impact regional ITS architectures and the Turbo Architecture Software. The survey deadline is Friday, June 3, 2011.

The Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) released a report that examines new methods developed to estimate freeway performance measures using data collected through intelligent transportation systems (ITS). The performance measures are being developed as part of a decision support tool to support traffic management operations. The performance measures include travel time estimation, traffic diversion caused by incidents, secondary crashes, mobility impacts caused by incidents, and incident classification.

A report released by the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) explores the development of a new method for quantifying incident-induced travel delays using only volume data collected by traffic sensors in the Puget Sound region. Nearly 50 percent of freeway congestion in metropolitan areas in the U.S. can be attributed to traffic incidents. The ability to accurately quantify the incident-induced delay will allow policy makers and transportation professionals to better understand the real cost associated with traffic incidents, help develop more efficient incident management operation strategies, and develop effective active traffic management systems.

The U.S. Federal Highway Administration’s (FHWA) Office of Operations and Innovative Program Delivery will host a series of webinars that cover the challenges of implementing congestion pricing. These webinars are designed to assist transportation professionals, decision-makers, and political leaders to better understand the process of planning, implementing, and managing congestion pricing strategies. The webinars will last 90 minutes and are free to anyone interested in participating.

The schedule for upcoming webinars:
Webinar Schedule – April 2011
April 19, 2011 2:00 to 3:30 p.m. ET - Institutional Issues in Congestion Pricing

Webinar Schedule – May through December 2011 (dates are tentative and subject to change)
May 26 - Congestion Pricing Equity Impacts
June 23 - Technology to Enable and Complement Congestion Pricing
July 28 - Integrating Transit with Congestion Pricing and Increasing Congestion Pricing Acceptance
August 25 - Economics of Congestion Pricing and Impacts on Business
September 22 - Best Practices in Parking Pricing
October 27 - Dynamic Ridesharing and Congestion Pricing
November 17 - Pay-as-You-Drive Insurance
December 15 - Results of the Urban Partnership and Congestion Reduction Demonstration Programs
 

This guide, recently released by the U.S. Federal Highway Administration’s (FHWA) Office of Operations, is designed to assist state and local transportation professionals in developing a local congestion mitigation program that employs localized and low-cost bottleneck improvements. A local congestion mitigation program helps identify and alleviate congestion at specific locations that experience recurring congestion or locations that are congested on a regular basis. The guide reviews several templates, many already in use by other transportation agencies, for developing a successful local congestion mitigation program.

This report, released by the University of Minnesota’s Center for Transportation Studies, explores using a ramp metering algorithm based on density measurements, rather than flows, on Minnesota’s freeways. This algorithm is based on recent research that indicates “the critical value of density at which capacity observed is less sensitive and more stable than the value of capacity.” This next generation ramp metering algorithm is currently being tested on a microscopic simulation of a real 12-mile freeway section with 17 ramps.

The U.S. Federal Highway Administration’s Office of Operations released a guidebook on successful work zone operations strategies currently practiced by transportation agencies around the country. The guidebook provides examples of best practices and the contact information for the agencies that have implemented these practices. The guidebook is not intended to provide operators with a single solution, but will allow them to see what has worked in other regions and tailor the best solution to their needs.

The 2009 National Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD), issued by the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), along with the Illinois Supplement to the MUTCD, has been adopted by the Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT). The 2009 MUTCD and the Illinois Supplement is the official manual for traffic control devices for use on all roads open to public travel in the state. A summary of the significant additions and revisions to the 2009 Illinois supplement is also available.

The Federal Highway Administration’s (FHWA) Office of Operations recently released the report Synthesis of Congestion Pricing-Related Environmental Impact, which summarizes the state of the practice and provides a framework for evaluating the environmental impacts of congestion pricing projects. Examples of congestion pricing include high-occupancy toll (HOT) lanes and cordon or area pricing schemes. The environmental impact focuses include air quality, noise, and environmental justice. The report also discusses the evaluation of travel impacts caused by congestion pricing, which include traffic, transit, and travel behavior.

This webinar will provide an introduction to the soon-to-be-released updated Congestion Management Process (CMP) guidebook produced by the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) and Federal Transit Administration (FTA). The CMP is a method for urban regions to manage congestion that provide information on the performance of the transportation system and alternative strategies for alleviating congestion. The updated guidebook was designed to assist practitioners in understanding the elements of a CMP and lessons learned from Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs) successfully implementing a CMP.
 

This webinar will take place on Wednesday, March 23, 2011, from noon to 1:30 p.m. CST.
 

The Institute of Transportation Engineers (ITE) will host a web briefing, “Advanced Access Management for the Transportation Planner.” This webinar will cover the principles that define the practice of access management, typical public concerns and how to convey the benefits of access management to the public, the relationship of access management to sustainability, and how to develop an access management plan or program. The role the state DOT, MPO, and local government have in access management will also be discussed.

There is a $50.00 fee per website to participate in the web briefing, which will be held on Thursday, February 24, 2011, from 11:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. CST.

The Research and Innovative Technology Administration (RITA) will sponsor a free webinar titled Applications for the Environment: Real-Time Information Synthesis (AERIS) State of the Practice Assessments. The webinar will summarize identified applications that have demonstrated environmental benefits through the use of Intelligent Transportation System (ITS) technologies. The webinar will also review strategies that could be used to assess the environmental impacts of ITS projects.

The free webinar will take place Wednesday, February 9, 2011, from noon to 1:30 p.m. CST.

An upcoming Envista webinar, “The City of Baltimore – A Case Study Highlighting Traffic Management in an Incident Command System,” will feature Pat Nowlan of the Baltimore Mayor’s Office of Emergency Management. He will discuss how Baltimore deployed a web-based, map-driven, real-time Incident Command System. Challenges, solutions, and lessons learned throughout the project development process will be reviewed. Mr. Nowlan will also share information on how to apply for a Federal Emergency Preparedness Grant.

This free webinar will take place on Tuesday, February 1, 2011 from 1:00 to 2:00 p.m. CST.

Source: Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 2008. "The Netherlands: A Broader Horizon".

To follow up on a previous blog post, “Seattle-area Drivers Experience Smarter Highways,” Seattle-area drivers along the I-5 corridor are experiencing active traffic management (ATM) through high-tech gantries that display real-time traffic information such as speed limits that adjust to roadway conditions and lane status alerts. This article and video by govtech.com provides an excellent overview of the ATM project on Interstate 5 in Washington.

The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) recently released the report Efficient Use of Highway Capacity Summary, which summarizes the implementation of safety shoulders as travel lanes as a method to increase highway capacity. The report provides an overview of efforts to use left or right shoulder lanes as temporary or interim travel lanes and reviews the safety and operational impacts of shoulder lanes.

McHenry County Division of Transportation Maintenance Superintendent Mark DeVries was recognized as one of the top public works officials in the U.S. and is on the cutting edge and internationally known for ice and snow removal from roads. He is best known locally as pioneering an anti-icing solution made up of salt water, organic material, and calcium chloride. Under his expertise, McHenry County was one of the first counties to blend the anti-icing solution on-site. DeVries provides advice to other municipalities in the Chicagoland region and is also the chairman for the American Public Works Association’s winter maintenance subcommittee.

The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) unveiled the new Every Day Counts (EDC) website. The EDC initiative’s objectives are to employ demonstrated innovative technologies to expedite project delivery, make the roadways safer, and protect the environment. The EDC website currently has tools available to assist highway agencies and contractors to shorten project delivery time. A flyer describing EDC is also available.