TRB A3A18 Meeting

Sheraton Newark Airport

Monmouth Room

 

Summer Meeting Minutes

 

 

July 16, 2001

 

 

1.      Welcome and Call to Order

·         Tom Urbanik called the meeting to order at 8:05 a.m.

·         All attendants introduced them selves.

2.      Approval of the January 2001 Minutes

·         Minutes from the committee meeting January 2001 were approved unanimously. The minutes are available at the committee web site:

·         URL:  http://signalsystems.tamu.edu

·         Name:         member

·         Password:   valid

·         Domain:      dtl-nt-webe

3.      Pam Crenshaw – FHWA Update

·         Showed a video they had developed for Mayors on “Traffic Signal Management”

·         Pam will post a document entitled “Information Needs for Traffic Management along the National Highway Systems” on the USDOT electronic web site http://www.its.dot.gov/welcome.htm

·         ACS Lite: Currently in contracts, field operational test planned for FY 2002.

·         NGSIM – no update.

 

4.      Larry Head – Paper Review Update

·         100% Electronic this year.

·         Strongly encouraged reviewers to provide substantive comments.

 

5.      Subcommittee Reports

·         Problems statements – Tom Urbanik reported “Dynamic Phasing” is being reworked

·         Strategic plan – Don Dey -  no report

·         January Workshop – Paul Olson distributed draft program for “Signal Control Priority for Transit Vehicles” Workshop on Sunday.  Committee provided several suggestions to Paul for refining the draft program.  Possibly require PowerPoint presentations by December 15th for posting on the A3A18 web site.

·         Traffic Control Systems Handbook – Darcy Bullock reported subcommittee was meeting later that day.  Pam Crenshaw indicated there is funding in FY 2002 for Traffic Control System Handbook.  FHWA need input by Jan 2002. 

·         Performance Measures – Ken Courage – no report.

 

6.      Related Committee Work

·         NTCIP: Signal Control and Prioritization Working Group – Tom Urbanik –  First priority is Transit priority.  Currently diagramming system operation using Unified Modeling Language. 

·         IEEE WG14is working on the Highway – Railroad interface definition.

 

7.      Summer 2000 Meeting

·         Peter Martin has proposed hosting 2002 summer meeting in Salt Lake City, Utah.

·         Tom Urbanik will proceed with the assumption that Salt Lake will be the site.

·         Possible Topics from January brainstorming exercise.

·         Sensors – Detection (Dolan)

·         Communications (Bullock)

·         Performance Measures (Courage)

·         Dolan’s sensor system proposal was discussed. 

·         Larry Head suggested a “technology” meeting discussing ATC, cabinet busses, communication..

·         Pitu suggested a “Lessons Learned in Salt Lake” topic.

·         A committee member suggested incorporating “Train Wayside Communication (TWC)”

·         Les Proposed 0.5 day on detection and 0.5 day on performance measures.

·         Les Kelman agreed to help Frank Dolan organize the mid year meeting.

·         Tom Urbanik suggested  “Lessons Learned” on detection be part it.

·         Gary Duncan will help with the manufacturers perspective on detection.

8.      NCHRP Flashing Yellow Update – Peter Koonce

·         Project status report for NCHRP 3-54

·         Umass –Amherst and Texas Transportation Institute are conducting full scale virtual world testing of displays using full size sedan.  Testing displays (5-section vertical, 4-section vertical, and cluster display) to evaluate the affect of different configurations and indication in adjacent lanes. All data and results to be summarized in Working Paper to be published at the end of the summer.

·         Field implementation sites include: Montgomery County, MD and Woodburn, OR (ODOT). Other sites nearing implementation include Broward County, Florida and Kennewick, WA. There is still a need for additional volunteer agencies to assist. Please contact Kent Kacir, Principal Investigator (503) 670-1460.

·         Website: www.kittelson.com/pplt

·         Gary asked about Tucson experience

 

9.      Lessons Learned

·         Li Han asked about default cycle length for any arterial road. Virginia uses 300 seconds. What would be reasonable? Variance occurs between 75-150. New Jersey uses 90-120. When do you use leading versus lagging green?

·         Gary Piotrowicz discussed issues related to establishing yellow clearance intervals when red light enforcement is used.  Michigan practice is to clear traffic during yellow (not yellow + red) and then tack on 1-2 seconds of red.

·         Penn DOT is reported to have a well documented clearance interval procedure.

·         Kevin Balke suggested having a workshop on Red Light running/clearance interval timing design procedures.

·         Tom proposed a Task Group to look on “Proper design of right-of-way change intervals at traffic signals”

·         Kevin Balke

·         Les Kelman

·         Craig Roberts

·         Gary Piotrowicz

·         Peter Koonce

·         Gary Duncan:  Dynamic Message Signs (DMS) have seen the most wide spread use of NTCIP.  Baltimore has 1300 controllers out for bid with all optional NTCIP objects. 

·         Bob Rauch:  At least 5 locations have NTCIP deployed. 

·         Paul Olson:  Commented there is still broad confusion among agencies on what does NTCIP compliance mean.

10. Lou Neudorff - Information Needs for Traffic Management along the National Highway System

·         “Accurate information” primer, what are the minimum requirements for information that is necessary for the transportation system?

·         First draft of the product distributed, send comments to Jeff Randall or Lou Neudorff - lneudorff@gardnersys.com

·         Stand alone effort at this point, working in concert with FHWA

·         Applications are briefly described in the white paper, more what than how, accuracy is addressed.

 

11. Rich Cunard, TRB

·         TRB 2002 – January 13-17, 2002.

·         Paper Submittal is August 1. All authors must submit via website. A different process, but considerably improved, using email address as the login for everyone to the website.

·         Word is encouraged as the word processor of choice, conversion of everything to a pdf format. All figures and tables are at the end of the paper. Details are on the website.

·         The review process will include line numbers for each page to make comments more effective.

·         Expecting 1,800 papers.

·         Poster sessions are encouraged again by TRB for keeping the session counts at a manageable level.

·         Tom Urbanik suggested that the location for poster sessions should be improved.

·         Rich Cunard identified that the comments were generally positive from the email survey.

·         TRB has changed the web site to www.trb.org. All details are included there. Preliminary announcements will be coming out in a month. Reservations should be made as soon as possible.

·         TRB Signal Systems Committee is not a cosponsor of the “Costs of ITS”. 80 workshops are scheduled and space is becoming an issue. Saturday is not a real good option for TRB.

·         Research and Technology Partnership report will be released August 14th. Operations and Mobility identified a research agenda for the future intended to be included in the Reauthorization process.

·         F SHRP – SHRP report to be released in November.

·         Pitu asked about paper submittals (tables and figures) and the organization, author comments prompted this change in the process.

12. Attendants

A list of attendants at the meeting is attached.

 

 

The meeting adjourned at 11:30 am