If you are driving westbound on Highway 520 in Seattle during rush hour, you might as well get out and ride a bike, according to the Inrix National Traffic Scorecard released in June, because traffic moves at an average of a paltry 9 mph. Highway 520 in Seattle is only one of many bottlenecks identified by Inrix Inc., whose headquarters happens to be located very near the Highway 520 bottleneck in Seattle.
The National Traffic Scorecard is a countrywide, city-by-city analysis of traffic congestion, which increased nearly 2% in the U.S. in 2007 over 2006. Higher fuel prices and the economy are slowing the rate of growth in congestion, according to Inrix, but congestion continues to increase, averaging 60 hours a week across the nation’s 100 worst bottlenecks.
The National Traffic Scorecard was created through extensive analysis of nearly 50,000 miles of primary roadways using Inrix’s most recent and accurate traffic data. The network collects data from nearly 1 million anonymous, GPS-equipped commercial vehicles that report their speed and location continually to Inrix. The GPS information is then combined with traffic data from conventional road sensors, toll tags and other sources.
The top 10 most-congested metropolitan areas in the U.S. are not really surprising: (1) Los Angeles; (2) New York; (3) Chicago; (4) Washington, D.C.; (5) Dallas-Fort Worth; (6) San Francisco; (7) Houston; (8) Boston; (9) Seattle; and (10) Atlanta.
The National Traffic Scorecard also identified patterns in U.S. traffic congestion:
- Worst traffic day: Friday;
- Worst week-day commute: Friday p.m.;
- Worst commuting hour: Friday 5-6 p.m.;
- Worst morning commute: Wednesday a.m.;
- Best week day for traffic: Monday;
- Best week day commute: Friday a.m.;
- Best week day commuting hour: Friday 6-7 a.m.; and
- Best week day afternoon: Monday p.m.
Further information is available at Inrix’s website (http://scorecard.inrix .com).
A citation too far
A judge in Florida has blocked the state from collecting fees from 9,000 SunPass toll citations, WOFL Fox 35 TV in Orlando reported.
Judge John Galuzzo denied the Florida Department of Transportation’s (FDOT) motion to proceed with collecting the fees. He said the state had gone too far collecting fines and suspending driver’s licenses from people who should not have to pay.
Christopher Baird, a party in the case, had his license suspended even though he was not a SunPass account holder. His wife was the SunPass user, but he was the registered owner of the car, so the citations were sent to him. The problem was that the couple had moved, and the citations could not be forwarded.
The case now heads to the 5th District Court of Appeals.
Not in my backyard
The mayor of Cincinnati has vowed that he will never allow red-light cameras in the city, the Cincinnati Enquirer reported.
“I’m not convinced that they achieve their stated goal” of improved safety, said Mayor Mark Mallory, who said he would veto any ordinance permitting the cameras.
The city council’s law and public safety committee plans to discuss the merits of such cameras after its summer recess.
Generating 9-1-1 calls
Three testing laboratories and five Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs) will begin transmitting data starting June 16, as the proof-of-concept portion of the U.S. DOT’s Next-Generation 9?1?1 (NG9-1-1) Initiative gets under way.
The objective of the proof of concept is to test selected requirements, including:
- The ability of PSAPs to receive voice, video, text and data;
- Improving 9-1-1 access for the deaf or hearing-impaired;
- Transmission of telematics data, such as crash location, speed, vehicular rollover and crash velocity, directly to the PSAP;
- 9-1-1 call routing and call transfer based on the caller’s location; and
- Internet protocol networking and security.
Following completion of the demonstration, data gathered will be analyzed and used to revise and complete the project’s preliminary system architecture and transition plan.
The three participating laboratories are housed at Booz Allen Hamilton, Texas A&M University and Columbia University.
The PSAPs were selected from over 50 applicants, using objective criteria developed by the NG9-1-1 team.
More information is available at the NG9-1-1 Initiative’s website (www.its .dot.gov/NG911).
Mass. gov. acts to clear congestion
Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick has taken a variety of steps to help consumers offset the added burden of rising fuel costs. Among the measures is a new Quick Clearance Policy aimed at reducing congestion caused by traffic incidents.
Massachusetts motorists drive 40 million miles each weekday on the state’s highway system, and traffic congestion adds 62 million gal of wasted fuel every year. With gas prices reaching $4 per gal, that takes tens of millions of dollars out of the pockets of Massachusetts citizens each year.
To help relieve congestion, the Massachusetts Highway Authority is working with other agencies, including the Massachusetts State Police and emergency responders, to improve the coordination among agencies following crash-related road closures. Part of this effort includes developing new techniques to re-open the roads more quickly following major incidents.
Navteq to tap cell data
Navteq Corp. plans to add to its network of map information-gathering resources by tapping into the position information of users of Nokia cell phones, the Chicago Tribune reported.
Nokia Corp. announced its acquisition of Navteq last October, and the European Commission is likely to approve the deal by this August.
“We’re excited about tapping into the Nokia community of consumers—of which there are close to a billion around the world—who can give us input as to what they find when they’re traveling,” Judson Green, chief executive of Chicago-based Navteq, told the Chicago Tribune.
With access to Nokia’s 40% of the global market for cell phones, Navteq will be able to gather a wealth of information about where travelers go and how long it takes them to get there.
Art of fare dealing
Transit agencies implementing smart-card-based automatic fare collection systems face challenges serving those who do not have credit or debit cards or checking or savings accounts, because these riders are limited to cash when obtaining, loading and reloading transit smart cards. A new white paper from the Smart Card Alliance Transportation Council examines how transit agencies can serve these “unbanked” or “underbanked” individuals, including both the traditional approach of establishing retail sales outlets for fare media and a potential new approach of using network-branded prepaid cards.
“Unbanked and underbanked households make up more than 20% of the U.S. population,” said Randy Vanderhoof, executive director of the Smart Card Alliance, Princeton Junction, N.J., “so this is an important report for financial institutions and transit agencies to gain a better understanding of the various methods available for providing and reloading fare media to this significant market segment.”
The white paper includes case study data from the San Francisco Bay Area TransLink and the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority SmarTrip programs and details of the business structure and economics of prepaid card programs.
The white paper, “Serving Unbanked Consumers in the Transit Industry with Prepaid Cards,” is available at (www .smartcardalliance.org/pages/activities-councils-transportation).
