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US Dept of Transportation
Washington DC
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| The Montana Department of Transportation
is adding 800 miles of additional routes so that the database will
include over 8,000 miles of major state-maintained roads. The department
has changed the service's milepost references to land-based references.
This means, for example, that the system will say that Interstate
15 is snow packed and icy from Jefferson City to Helena instead of
saying that Interstate 15 is snow packed and icy from milepost a to
b. And, in an effort to facilitate interstate travel, MDT has added
road and weather information for North Dakota and South Dakota to
the 511 system. |
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| SAN JOSE, CA, June
8, 2003 - An article in the San Jose Mercury News profiles a new system
to track the speed and movement of Bay Area drivers and make it available
to drivers who call the 511 travel information line. Using small electronic
antennas under overpasses and on signs, the system will calculate
freeway speeds by tracking drivers' FasTrak units - devices that pay
bridge tolls electronically. As a FasTrak device passes by one of
150 roadside sensors, an electronic signature will be entered into
a government database and then scanned repeatedly as the vehicle passes
other sensors. With 250,000 of the toll tags in use, the database
will collect enough information to track and update travel times for
specific routes. Although commuters say that any new system that promises
to ease rush-hour jams will be a boon, FasTrak users and privacy groups
are troubled by the potential for government agencies to track individuals
or use the information to issue speeding tickets. They worry the system
is the latest encroachment on privacy, especially in an atmosphere
of heightened security. |
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| RICHMOND, VA, June 10, 2003 - (PRNewswire)
Northern Virginia commuters can fight - or at least avoid - traffic,
armed only with their cell phones or other wireless devices. Trichord,
Inc. of Leesburg and New York-based TouchToneTours announced today
at the Intelligent Transportation Society of Virginia' s Annual Conference
that they have entered into an agreement to make personalized, real-time
traffic information available to commuters on I-95, I-495, I-395 and
I-66 in Northern Virginia. Beginning in September, TouchToneTours
will retail Trichord's real-time traffic data, gleaned from a network
of 143 traffic sensor stations located throughout Northern Virginia's
interstate highway system. The sensor network, which includes both
passive-acoustic and embedded loop detectors, gathers lane-by-lane
data on travel speeds, lane occupancy, and vehicle counts. Trichord's
traffic monitoring software archives the data, allowing current estimated
travel times to be compared against historical average travel times.
Information is updated every minute. "Commuters who travel freeways
in Northern Virginia every day will be able to use TouchToneTours'
Travel Guide System to determine the congestion they face and the
travel time required to get to their destination," explained Craig
Franklin, Trichord's President. "Trichord's real-time traffic information
will be available on a personalized, real-time basis. Trichord is
pleased to be working with TouchToneTours as one of our distributors
for real-time traffic information." |
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| LITTLE ROCK, AR, May
27, 2003 - Channel 4, KARK-TV, the local NBC Affiliate, reports that
a network of cameras that monitor Little Rock highways can save drivers
time before they walk out the door. The network of cameras and sensors
allow highway officials to monitor areas of Interstates 30 and 40
for accidents or congestion. They are linked to new highway signs
that will alert drivers further down the road. Commuters can also
see the updated pictures on the department's website. Still cameras
take new pictures of traffic every 15 seconds, sensors read traffic
loads and color-code the areas on a map. Green is for good, yellow
is for slow and red is for stopped. |
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