CHALLENGES TO EFFECTIVE ARTERIAL TRAFFIC MONITORING: LESSONS FROM THE I-95 CORRIDOR COALITION’S VEHICLE PROBE PROJECT

摘要

Methods to effectively monitor arterial traffic have commanded center stage as new tools andtechnologies such as vehicle probe data and BluetoothTM traffic monitoring have emerged to costeffectivelyprovide accurate, real-time, continuous, network-wide monitoring of freeway systems. Withinmetropolitan areas, the network of high-volume, multi-lane arterials is critical to the daily movement ofcommuters to jobs and services, to distribute freeway traffic to local streets, and to provide diversionroutes during major incidents. Many of the same technologies that have revolutionized freeway trafficmonitoring promise to do the same for signal-controlled arterials. However, initial demonstrations andimplementations reveal a variety of issues, many of which are inherent to the fundamental nature oftraffic flow that differentiates arterials from freeways. The I-95 Corridor Coalition’s Vehicle ProbeProject (VPP) has successfully delivered high quality freeway travel time data on a roadway networkcomprised of over 5,000 centerline miles since its inception in 2008. The project also includes acomponent consisting of approximately 900 miles of arterials that link the major freeways and providediversion routes in the event of incidents. The validation program that monitors data quality for freewaysalso collects data samples on the arterial network. This paper characterizes the critical challenges inproviding quality traffic data on arterials based on data collected as part of the I-95 VPP and throughinteraction of a committee of transportation professionals that provide guidance to the project. Thefindings from the I-95 VPP are germane to any probe-based arterial traffic monitoring system.