|
Welcome to the inaugural Every Day Counts Round 6 (EDC-6) Crowdsourcing for Advancing Operations innovation newsletter. As co-leads for this innovation, we welcome every State and local agency to explore the breadth of crowdsourced data and applications areas that address operations challenges facing your agency.
Our National experts, practitioners, and consultant support team are ready to help your agency formulate a plan and overcome technical and institutional hurdles to improve operations, increase safety and reliability, and save operating costs.
Through this bi-monthly newsletter, we will spotlight upcoming events, agencies that have benefitted from using crowdsourced data, and resources to accelerate your agency's use of crowdsourced data. Featured in this newsletter are:
- Adventures in Crowdsourcing Webinar Resource
- Success Story: Project Prioritization Using Free Crowdsourced Data
- Success Story: Georgia Safety Service Patrols Use Crowdsourced Data to Manage Incident Queues
- Crowdsourcing Cohort Opportunity
- Crowdsourcing at Your State or Regional Meeting
Please reach out to any of us if you have a specific question or a request for technical or programmatic support. To learn more about how crowdsourcing can help your agency improve transportation operations, visit the FHWA EDC-6 Crowdsourcing for Advancing Operations site. Also, do reach out to us to share your crowdsourcing success story.
Warmest Regards,
James Colyar, Ralph Volpe, and Greg Jones
FHWA EDC-6 Crowdsourcing for Advancing Operations Co-Leads
Vehicle Video Analytics and Connected Vehicle Data for Transportation Operations and Planning
 |
|
The Adventures in Crowdsourcing webinar series offers webinars that highlight varied applications of crowdsourcing as well as data readiness strategies. Moving forward, webinars will be held the second Tuesday of each month from 1:30 – 3:00 PM ET. |
Register for the July 13, 1:30 PM - 3:00 PM ET webinar to learn how the Regional Transportation Commission (RTC) of Southern Nevada uses vehicle video analytics in real-time to detect and manage work zones and lane closures. Participants will also learn about the Maricopa Association of Governments’ use of connected vehicle data to improve travel and congestion studies, performance measures, and planning models.
Visit the Adventures in Crowdsourcing webinar page to view past webinars, or click on one of the links below to directly view a specific webinar and download briefing materials:
The Federal Highway Administration is committed to providing equal access to Adventures in Crowdsourcing webinar for all participants. If you need alternative formats or services because of a disability, please contact James Colyar at (360) 753-9408 or via email (james.colyar@dot.gov) with your request by close of business July 6, 2021.
The Lake County Division of Transportation (LCDOT) in Illinois has been archiving travel time data every 2 minutes for 600 directional road segments from a free navigation app provider since year 2018. Beyond using this data in real-time for traveler information and incident management, LCDOT found this data valuable as a selection criterion in prioritizing their capital investment projects.
"For years, traffic congestion has been the top transportation issue we've heard from residents," said Justin Effinger1, Principal Engineer at LCDOT. "Crowdsourced data helps us prioritize much needed capital improvements by making data-driven decisions to improve safety and keep traffic flowing on our transportation system."
 |
|
The agency scores proposed projects based on four categories of factors:
1. Transportation impact,
2. Multimodal and community,
3. Safety, and
4. Congestion.
The free crowdsourced travel time data are aggregated monthly for road segments or corridors relevant to a proposed intersection or segment capital project proposal. Using this data, traffic engineers can better balance the congestion score, reflecting both intersection and route levels of service.
|
The agency has evaluated this new data source and found it tremendously helpful in differentiating and selecting the projects that best reflect agency priorities and deliver the best possible transportation system for LCDOT residents and local commerce.
1FHWA EDC-6 Program interview with Justin Effinger, Mar 5, 2021.
Georgia's Coordinated Highway Assistance & Maintenance Program (CHAMP) is a rural-focused safety service patrol program operating on the State's Interstates outside the metro-Atlanta area. Operating 7 days a week and 16 hours per day, CHAMP proactively patrols for debris, disabled motorists, and opportunities to assist incident responders with traffic control.
When it comes to incident management, CHAMP operators are an essential asset to other response agencies, particularly with advanced warning and back-of-queue management. The transition from free-flow to slowed or stop-and-go conditions are extremely hazardous on rural Interstates. First responders, like CHAMP, benefit from public views of real-time transportation agency traveler information with mapping. The familiar map with roadway symbology depicting green, yellow, and red segments is a powerful tool to identify where queues begin.
Operators safely access the 511ga.gov website and the Waze application from inside their CHAMP vehicle to identify the back of the queue. Armed with queue information, CHAMP focuses on placing resources where those queues begin, to warn approaching drivers.
 Consuming crowdsourced data helps responders manage queues, but CHAMP operators and other responders are also encouraged to use the Waze application to report their location to benefit other road users. By reporting this information, responders ensure that accurate location and situational information benefits more travelers in real-time.
The grassroots use of crowdsourced applications and data by Georgia's rural responders shows that sometimes a "low tech" approach can be as effective as sophisticated systems that mine, combine, and analyze data in real-time.
The FHWA EDC-6 Crowdsourcing for Advancing Operations Team is hosting informal, recurring conversations for State and local agencies across three themes:
- Vehicle Probe Data Uses
- Free Navigation App Uses
- Crowdsourced Data Analytics and Tools Uses
The informal conversations are facilitated by a National expert, and center on questions expressed among group members. The conversation may occasionally include a brief description of data use by a member. Please contact James Colyar for more information about joining one or more of the four cohorts.
Don't let travel restrictions keep you from improving your transportation systems management and operations (TSMO) programs and strategies. The Crowdsourcing Team is available to share a virtual 15-minute overview of crowdsourcing applications or bring experts to describe crowdsourcing applications from a practitioner's perspective at your State or region's next virtual conference or meeting. We can also customize a virtual workshop on crowdsourcing for operations. Please contact James Colyar for more information on scheduling a presentation or a virtual workshop on crowdsourcing to advance operations.
To be added or removed from this e-news:
CLICK HERE to update your subscription preference for the Crowdsourcing for Operations e-news or click on the button below.
Stay Connected |
|
 |
If you are not already a subscriber, the Center for Accelerating Innovation invites you to subscribe to EDC News and Innovator. These newsletters cover this topic and many additional innovative topics in which you may be interested.
|
