UPDATE Volume 3, Number 2 - Spring Quarter 1999

Safety Benefits of ITS Technologies

By Howard Preston, BRW

The deployment of advanced technologies has resulted in improved safety on urban freeway systems in the Twin Cities Metro area. Potential for extending these safety benefits to rural, conventional roadway systems are certainly present.

The Minnesota Department of Transportation (Mn/DOT) has been a national leader in urban freeway traffic management since the early 1970's. At that time Mn/DOT began their extensive traffic management system by installing vehicle detectors, closed circuit TV cameras and ramp meters along the I-35 corridor in South Minneapolis.

Because of the documented success of that first system, Mn/DOT has extended the coverage to include most of the metropolitan area. Follow up studies of the effected freeways has demonstrated an improvement in both traffic operations and safety. Operations capacity and operating speeds on the freeways increased and delays were reduced. Crash frequencies, crash rates and crash severity were all reduced.

The deployment of advanced technologies resulted in an improvement in the quality of traffic operations, fewer and less severe crashes and an extension of the functional life of the segment. All of this was accomplished at a fraction of the cost of freeway reconstruction.

It appears however, to continue achieving these impressive results, a shift in focus of the program will be required. A review of statewide crash statistics suggests that in the future the focus should shift from urban freeway management to a variety of new technologies. These new technologies should be designed to address critical safety deficiencies on rural and conventional roads.

A review of statewide crash data revealed the following facts:

  • Minnesota’s freeways are the safest type of roadway facility, with crash rates ranging from 40% to 75% less than comparable rural, conventional roadways.
  • The total number of crashes on Minnesota freeways accounts for only about 10% of the total number of crashes statewide.

As a result, it was concluded that in order to achieve the maximum safety potential of intelligent transportation initiatives, the technologies should be expanded to rural, conventional state, county and local road systems. Further review of the statewide crash data documented two areas of particular concern, the geographic distribution of fatal crashes and the frequency of snow and ice related crashes in particular parts of the state.

The severity of crashes is always a concern and the statistics revealed a disturbing pattern. Crash frequency is almost always a function of exposure by way of vehicle miles of travel (VMT). However, 70% of the VMT in Minnesota occur in the metropolitan area but 70% of the fatal crashes are in rural Minnesota. It may be a coincidence, but a review of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's Fatal Accident Reporting System found that in Minnesota's fatal crashes emergency response times were, on average, 60% longer in rural areas.

The statewide crash data also found that, on average, approximately 20% of all crashes involve snow and icy pavement conditions. However, in the northeast and south-western parts of the state the actual experience is closer to 50% of all crashes occur when pavement conditions were recorded as being snow or ice covered. This is particularly troublesome given that exposure (VMT) is below average in these parts of the state during winter months.

In response to these safety concerns, Mn/DOT and a number of private partners have begun a series of operational experiments designed to mitigate these safety deficiencies. The first is Mayday Plus and it has been under way for over a year in the Rochester area. The project objective is to develop and test a system that includes instrumented vehicles (hands free cellular phones, GPS, accelerometer, etc.) and a communication network that will connect a vehicle in need of assistance with the appropriate emergency service provider within 60 seconds. In the event of a crash the State Patrol and appropriate service providers (tow truck, ambulance, etc.) would be automatically notified of the vehicles location, the severity of the crash, the number of occupants and whether the air bags were deployed.

The second project is part of the Northeast Minnesota ITS Deployment, which began in March 1999. This project involves the deployment of a system of sensors to detect the onset of icing conditions at several critical locations and a communications network design to share this information with a variety of users, including Mn/DOT, the Minnesota State Patrol (MSP) and motorists. Road/weather information systems (R/WIS) have been previously tested in the Duluth area, but the unique feature of the proposed system is the communications network that will automatically notify maintenance and enforcement agencies when icing is detected. The network will also include a link to variable message signs in advance of the sensors that will bring on a pavement condition and advisory speed message for approaching motorists.

It is expected that the successful completion of these operational experiments would eventually result in statewide deployment of both emergency response and R/WIS systems. These systems present the potential to positively impact safety concerns on not only conventional state highways but also rural county and local roads that make up the bulk of the State's road system.

AUSCI - Another ITS Partnership Success

On April 6th the City of Minneapolis, Mn/DOT, Fortran Traffic Systems, FHWA, and Image Sensing Systems proudly announced the operation of the Adaptive Urban Signal Control Integration in the Minneapolis Central Business District. Keynote speakers at the ceremony were the honorable Sharon Sales-Belton, Mayor of Minneapolis, and the honorable Martin Sabo, U.S. Congressman. ITS Minnesota also congratulates the team on their efforts on this ORION Model Deployment Initiative project.

ITS America Annual Meeting

Listener envy was obvious in session 67 as a panel of Minnesota ‘partners’ described decades of successful ITS projects under the theme of "The Dress Rehearsal is Over in Minnesota". ITS Mn board members on the panel were: Bob Sands and Gordon Melby. They were joined by Dick Maddern, ARTIC operational test manager.

ITS Minnesota Board Information

Newly elected 2 year term ITS Minnesota board members:

  • Gordon Melby, Vice President at ADDCO, Inc.
  • Durga Panda, Vice President at Image Sensing Systems, Inc.
  • Mike Roman, Manager at 3M

Other new board members are:

  • Todd Foster, NCITE President as ex-officio member
  • Brian Scott @ SRF, Chair of the Membership Committee, send a note to bscott@srfconsulting.com to support this committee.

The FHWA announced the ITS Electronic Document Library (EDL). This is accessible via web site, www.fhwa.dot.gov to read from ITS field operational tests documentation.

Lowell Benson resigned as Communications Committee Chair in pursuit of his retirement phase in process.

Mike Sobolewski, current ITS Mn board member, accepted responsibility for chairing the Programs Committee. Contact him at mike.sobolewski@dot.state.mn.us to join and work with this committee.

Thanks to Durga Panda for planning leadership and to Doug Differt for coordinating sponsorships for the Annual Meeting. The results, 170 attendees, a positive bank balance, and the lead article in the CTS monthly newsletter that is distributed to over 7,000 people. From the evaluation forms, Dr. Peter Hancock was the most enjoyable speaker.