When your region is dealing with a major event — extensive accident, large-scale work zone or evacuation — you need to constantly monitor roadway conditions to better react to changing circumstances, and determine the success of your remediation efforts
Here’s how agencies leveraged data and used visualizations to help better monitor and manage congested roadway conditions:
Amtrak NE Regional train #188 derailed shortly after 9:00 PM on May 12, 2015.
Due to the subsequent investigation, SEPTA's Trenton Line was shut down for three days, adding another 1,000 commuters to travel the I-95 corridor in the peak periods.
DVRPC used Congestion Scan to evaluate the impact of increased commuter travel on I-95 in
Philadelphia after an Amtrak derailment. They queried a three-day period from May 12th to May 14th
over a 15-mile stretch of I-95, and compared results to averages for those days.
Congestion Scan results showed a marked increase in travel times and extended queues, due to the increased commuter traffic from SEPTA’s Trenton Line.
This information was made available to the media the next day, and was part of an overall after-action review of the incident and its effect on area traffic.
Fortify was a construction project on I-40 in Wake County, NC that involved a rebuilding of the roadway in the Raleigh area.
This large-scale construction project involved lane closures and traffic shifts that had a substantial traffic impact on this heavily-travelled interstate as well as the surrounding areas.
NCDOT used PDA's Massive Data Downloader to create daily peak-period
travel time reports and monitor congestion through the
construction project as well as several distinct “trips” of alternate routes.
Additional small “trips” (13 & 14) were added by request.
These reports were provided to the State Traffic Engineer, a Work Zone Traffic Control group, the Department's Communications Office, construction firms, news agencies, and researchers to evaluate, report on, and communicate the impacts of the project.
The end result was a better informed public, better work zone management, and better preparation for other major construction projects.
