Completed

Under the National Scenic Byways Program, the U.S. Secretary of Transportation recognizes certain roads as National Scenic Byways or All-American Roads based on their archaeological, cultural, historic, natural, recreational, and scenic qualities. There are currently 95 nationally designated scenic byways in 39 states across the U.S. Collectively, these roads are known as America’s Byways.

The America’s Byways Program provides Federal leadership, coordination and facilitation for the individual Scenic Byways programs across the country. The America’s Byways Program has completed an ITS Strategic Plan that described a clear vision for how ITS could enhance and improve traveler information along the Scenic Byways. The next step desired by the America’s Byways Program was to pursue a demonstration project in one of the Scenic Byways to demonstrate the effectiveness of ITS.

A challenge that has faced many State DOTs is the operations of rural ITS systems. Whether the systems are kiosks, radio station broadcasts, dynamic message signs or camera surveillance systems, they all need some form of regular maintenance and operations to maintain operational status. When you examine and consider the arrangement of Scenic Byways, these are most often local groups of businesses or communities that have joined together to champion a Scenic Byway. Therefore, there is potential for the local operational maintenance and support that is critical to ITS systems.

This project built on the foundational efforts of the America’s Byways Resource Center to develop the Byways ITS Strategic Plan in order to introduce the concepts and applications of ITS to the scenic byways communities. This report introduced several key ITS applications that could be applied to scenic byways, including:

• Low Power FM (LPFM) Radio
• Highway Advisory Radio (HAR)
• Kiosks and Internet Web Sites
• 511 Traveler Information
• Condition Reporting
• Variable Message Signs (VMS)
• Road Weather Information Systems (RWIS)\

The project selected to two high-quality byway sites that would benefit from enhanced interpretive and traveler information provided using ITS technologies. Specific ITS technologies were selected based on the requirements and characteristics of each selected byways demonstration site. The field demonstration of the ITS technologies were operated for one visitation season on the byway.

The following illustrates the sequence of steps recommended for introducing Intelligent Transportation Systems to the byways community:

1. ENTERPRISE Interaction with America’s Byways
2. Definition of Guidelines for DOT/Scenic Byway Cooperation
3. Development of Business Plan for Demonstration Project
4. Demonstration Deployment(s)

Project Activities

The work completed as a part of this project was as follows:

Task 1: Facilitate Interaction of ENTERPRISE Members and America’s Byways and Identify and Select Candidate Byways

Efforts in Task 1 consisted of travel for the director or assistant director of the America’s Byways Program to attend the December 2003 ENTERPRISE meeting, provided voluntarily by the America’s Byways Resource Center. The intent of this meeting was for ENTERPRISE states to educate the America’s Byways representative on the technologies available in each state, and to allow the America’s Byways representative to present and educate ENTERPRISE members on details of how the Scenic Byways programs work (i.e. Funding, operations, marketing). The intent of this meeting was to select a key Scenic Byways corridor(s) to serve as the test environment and to discuss the potential technologies to deploy at the test site.

A key to the discussions with the America’s Byways program was the detailed discussions on ownership of the technologies deployed, and agreements needed with the local agencies to facilitate ongoing operations and maintenance. Beyond this, discussions focused on the content available and the desired result of traveler information within the candidate byways.

The deliverable of this plan was a brainstormed approach that roughly identified two key Scenic Byways corridors and the deployments planned along these corridors (including ownership of systems, maintenance and operations roles, information content available, and travelers needs for tourism and traveler information).

Criteria for selecting the byways sites included the existence of a Comprehensive Management Plan, a project champion for the byway demonstration, and perhaps the ability to leverage seed funds for deployment of the field equipment. Some byways that could be considered include:

• State Candidate Byway
• Arizona Kaibab Plateau–North Rim Parkway
• Colorado Top of the Rockies Byway
• Iowa Loess Hill Scenic Parkway
• Kansas Frontier Military Byway
• Minnesota Minnesota River Valley Byway
• Minnesota Great River Road Byway
• New Mexico Santa Fe Trail Byway
• Virginia Blue Ridge Parkway
• Washington Mountains to the Sound Greenway

Task 2: Develop Scenic Byways – DOT Joint Development Guidelines

Efforts in Task 2 documented lessons learned from the joint ENTERPRISE / America’s Byways meeting as well as expanded upon the section developed as part of the America’s Byways ITS Strategic Plan which offered guidance for Byways to cooperate with State DOTs on the development and operation of ITS systems. The intent of this document was twofold:

1. To provide each ENTERPRISE state with a series of guidelines for forming partnerships with their local Scenic Byways programs and opportunities for cost sharing, operations and maintenance support sharing, and a sample agreement that State DOTs may use to work together with the Scenic Byways group in each state.
2. To be amended to the America’s Byways ITS Strategic Plan that was and continued to be promoted to the Scenic Byways programs in each state as a guideline for how Scenic Byways’ champions can approach and work together with State DOT agencies in the development of ITS systems.

The intent of Task 2 was not to spend large portions of the project budget, but rather to build upon efforts already conducted during the America’s Byways ITS Strategic Plan development.

This task included the development of the interpretive and traveler information for each of the selected byways demonstration sites. The project consultant worked with the local byway community and the project sponsors to develop and document interpretive and traveler information. A local byway community member, or other organization, could be utilized develop interpretive information on byway attractions for dissemination through the ITS technologies demonstration.

Task 3: Deployment of ITS Systems Along Up To Two Scenic Byways

Efforts in Task 3 made use of the ITS deployment guidelines and working relationship established with the Scenic Byways agencies to move forward with some form of ITS demonstration project. From the perspective of ENTERPRISE member states, the deployment tested the deployment guidelines and examine the potential for true partnering between the DOT and the Scenic Byways champion in each area. It was recommended that the exact equipment, content, operational procedures, and even the contractor to implement the systems not be finalized until this task was underway and discussions are conducted with the selected Scenic Byway representatives. In this regard, dependent upon the byway(s) selected and their interest, it was possible that the Scenic Byway may have the capacity to implement all or portions of the system. However, regardless of how the implementation is contracted, the intent of this task was to encourage the local Scenic Byway representatives to share in the ownership with the DOT to the extent possible.

Therefore, Task 3 had two modules:

Task 3A: Identify Location, ATIS Technologies, Content and Business Models for Demonstration

Task 3A was a series of discussions between the DOT representatives and the Scenic Byways representative in the selected corridor(s) to select and finalize the ITS systems for deployment. As part of these discussions, a deployment plan was developed to identify and address the key issues of each project:

• Development and provision of traveler information content;
• Final selection of equipment and deployment locations;
• Formation of partnerships for ITS (e.g. byways organizations, state DOT, byways resource center, tourism departments, chambers of commerce, etc.);
• Deployment financing (any cost sharing in the initial deployment – perhaps the ENTERPRISE funds are leveraged against local DOT or Byways funds, ongoing operational costs and recovery methods.);
• Roles and responsibilities for ongoing operations and maintenance.

Task 3B: ITS Demonstrations

Task 3B was the implementation of ITS systems. The most likely systems to be deployed included kiosks or HAR/Low Power FM radio broadcasts able to promote local tourism as well as travel conditions and travel information.

In order to prevent a long term operations tail for the ENTERPRISE Program, efforts in this task strived to deploy the systems in a manner that either the local Scenic Byway or the local DOT assume ownership and responsibility for ongoing maintenance, and the ENTERPRISE funding is seen primarily as seed money.

Task 4: Evaluation and Final Report

Efforts in Task 4 documented and summarize the results of Tasks 1 through 3 of the project. The deliverable of Task 4 was a Final Report that was distributed to the ENTERPRISE member states and America’s Byways.

Demonstrations were evaluated to gather feedback on the performance and benefits of ITS/ATIS technology for the byways sites as part of the final report. If project funds permit, a questionnaire or interviews were used to determine how well the ITS/ATIS technologies meet the byways goals. Efforts were made to conduct the evaluation during peak travel periods.

In the past ten years, use of the Internet has grown exponentially. For travelers, a variety of information sources are available. They can collect driving instructions, weather and road conditions, maps and tourism information from a set of sources that grows every day with new public and private sector agencies offering traveler information.

One issue that the traveler had faced was the increasing difficulty of efficiently collecting and easily interpreting information that comes from many independent sources. Because the sites are independently developed, each reflects the preferences of different designers and Internet developers. The result is different site characteristics that may make gathering information more difficult than necessary, including:

• The emphasis of each site may be different, such as tourism, promotion of local facilities, safety, road and weather information;
• the “look and feel” of the each site is relatively unique (e.g., different icons and navigation controls); and
• there are no logical links to sites for adjacent jurisdictions making cross boundary navigation difficult.

These problems increased in severity as more sites came on-line, and as the availability of remote and personal ‘Internet’ style applications, such as personal digital assistants and cellular phones with wireless Internet, increased..

ENTERPRISE has always demonstrated a strong interest in leading the development of traveler information systems standards. Early work on ITIS formed the basis of an ongoing role on the SAE ATIS Standards Committee (Stephen Erwin representing ENTERPRISE and AASHTO).

Another ENTEPRISE project (Internet Applications) addressed the consistency and navigation issues by identifying and recommending Internet common specifications. Specifically, this project has:

• made logical links to sites for adjacent jurisdictions making cross boundary navigation easier.
• developed an open architecture that defines the interaction and linking of Internet information dissemination tools developed by different jurisdictions; and
• established guidelines for data exchange over the Internet in a variety of formats including graphical, tabular and text.

The Internet Applications project, however, stopped short of the mark. In order for the results of the project to be successful they must be accepted by the developers of ITS Internet applications (public sector jurisdictions and private information service providers (ISP)) and to the Standards Development Organizations (SDO).

Only through their acceptance can a common format for data exchange and display on the Internet be achieved. The commercial information providers are very much interested in this standardization. They seek ways to be able to collect and share information more easily. Through common specifications, the public sector is also able to more easily disseminate information. Common specifications have allowed for wider dissemination, and more users who are able to interpret and process data.

This project promotes the common specification recommendations developed in the ongoing ITS Internet Applications project. It has built consensus and support among key public and private sector ITS Internet developers.

Project Activities

The goal of ATIS Internet Guidelines Demonstration and Outreach was accomplished through three tasks. These tasks include development of a demonstration web site, promoting common specification to SDOs and involving Internet developers in the process of defining common specifications.

Task 1. Complete development of the Demonstration Web site

The consultant used the existing travelerinformation.com web site as a demonstration web site. They developed sample web pages that followed the common specifications recommended during the ITS Internet Applications project. The sample pages provided a wide range of examples of text, graphical icons, mapping and tabular information. They demonstrated applications for rural and urban areas, as well as various weather conditions.

The demonstration web site also includes creating functional, organizational and logical navigational tools for developing and linking related web sites and those for geographically adjoining areas.

The site is intended as an example for Internet developers. It also serves as a point of discussion, helping developers identify problem areas and issues that may require further development of common specifications.

Task 2. Involve Internet Developers

The consultant hosted a workshop for both public and private sector agencies to discuss the needs for standardization and the existing common specifications. This workshop followed the demonstration web site and used that site’s examples as a starting point for discussion.

The workshop was also used to disseminate proposed guidelines and provide support to Internet developers. At the end of the workshop, a letter to the appropriate SDOs was drafted and the developers signed it to express interest in the issue of ITS Internet standards being adopted and formally adopted by the SDOs.

Task 3. Promote Common specification to SDOs

The consultant involved the SDOs and made a presentation on behalf of ENTERPRISE. The purpose of this presentation was to have the SDOs consider incorporating ITS Internet standards into their work. The presentation described the current needs for common specifications, including examples of good and poor traveler information exchange on the Internet. It presented the list of agencies interested in ITS Internet standards to the SDOs.

When this project began at least 300 telephone numbers existed for traveler information systems throughout the United States. To overcome the confusion caused by this array of traveler information numbers, the United States Department of Transportation (USDOT) petitioned the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for a national assignment of a singe easy-to remember three digit dialing code, N11. On July 21, 2000, the FCC assigned 511 as a the nationwide telephone number for ITS traveler information. It should be noted that the 511 number assigned to government entities is for both wireline and wireless telephone services. In addition, the USDOT provided up to $100,000 per application to assist in implementation of 511 systems. This funding was made available starting in FY2000 and is available for a three-year period. A total of up to $5 million in Federal funds has been made available for assistance with 511 conversions.

Project Activities

Several ENTERPRISE members and other states that are prospective members planned 511 deployments. ENTERPRISE states that are also CARS Pooled Fund members developed 511 voice responsive systems driven by fully automated XML linkages from statewide and multi-state traffic and travel event databases. NMSHTD may have funded additional CARS 511 software development on top of regular CARS Pooled Fund contributions.

This proposed ENTERPRISE project has complement that effort by dealing with the multitude of less technical issues surrounding 511 roll out. It also provided a platform for leveraging additional federal funding of $100,000 per state by adding to critical mass for actual deployment. Other ENTERPRISE states that are not CARS members or who are pursuing other 511 approaches may have also benefited as these findings apply to all 511 systems, e.g. Arizona’s HCRS.

At least two ENTERPRISE member states had already implemented statewide IVR (interactive voice response) traveler information services – Arizona and Minnesota. Other non-ENTERPRISE states had also gained experience implementing 511 services, including Missouri (Branson), Kentucky, Utah, the Greater Detroit Region, and the San Francisco Bay Area. With many other states and regions preparing for deployment, there was a great need for collective knowledge and deployment guidance in order to effectively use available funding.

The American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO), in conjunction with many other organizations including the American Public Transportation Association (APTA) and the Intelligent Transportation Society of America (ITS America), with support from the USDOT, had established a 511 Deployment Coalition. The program kicked off in January 2001. The goal of the 511 Coalition was “the timely establishment of a national 511 traveler information service that is sustainable and provides value to users.” The intent was to implement 511 nationally using a bottom up approach facilitated by information sharing and a cooperative dialogue through the national associations represented on the Policy Committee.

Finally, Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont were interested in joining in this effort with the ENTERPRISE states. Several Universities in New England pursued a joint study effort to research and evaluate similar regional implementation issues proposed by ENTERPRISE. Five specific tasks had been developed by NETC which provided the framework for research and evaluation and include the following:

Content
– Define traveler information for the participating ENTERPRISE states.

Region
– Research national and other state initiatives.

Inventory
– Inventory ENTERPRISE states to determine the traveler information system that is available.

Review Federal/State/Regulatory Requirements.
– Review requirements in the ENTERPRISE states.

Identify Delivery Mechanisms
– List available technologies – Early adopters

Identify Business Plan for the Enterprise states
– Provide two to three alternatives. Make recommendations on a plan.

Strategy:

Proposed tasks addressed FCC issues, telecom issues, costs, revenues, content, sponsorship, quality control and standards efforts for rural areas. ENTERPRISE members had suggested that the group can better negotiate with the local phone monopolies using collective weight rather than individually.

The proposed strategy for this project was to contact states and other agencies that have experience in developing and deploying 511 traveler information services and to research available information. ENTERPRISE members provided the main input through a series of workshops and phone/email interactions. The knowledge gained from this process was assembled and evaluated to provide a joint plan of action addressing the major institutional/business model/geographic areas.