PART I: INTRODUCTION
In February of 2008, the Volpe Center established two test bed locations across the country to conduct a variety of field tests in support of the United States Department of Transportation's (USDOT) SafeTrip-21 Initiative. The overall goals of the initiative are to:
- Expand and accelerate the U.S. DOT's research in vehicle connectivity with the wireless communications environment.
- Build upon Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) research in advanced-technology applications.
- Explore and validate the benefits of deployment-ready applications that provide travelers, drivers, and transit and commercial motor vehicle operators with enhanced safety, real-time information, and navigation assistance.
The Volpe Center solicited proposals from potential partners with real-time ITS information, navigation, communication, and electronic payment systems currently installed (or with the potential to be installed) in an integrated operational setting. The Test Bed sites were to test and evaluate integrated, intermodal ITS applications, particularly those that do not entail extensive public sector infrastructure requirements but achieve immediate benefits and demonstrate the potential for sustainable ongoing deployment.
The Volpe Center made two awards, one being the California Connected Traveler (CACT) Test Bed, which involved an integrated Test Bed in the San Francisco Bay Area and two independent applications2 that would be deployed in California. The other award was the I-95 Corridor Test Bed, which involved a Test Bed along the I-95 Corridor from North Carolina to New Jersey as well as an independent application.3
The CACT Test Bed includes the following three field test applications:
- Mobile Millennium: This application is a real time traffic information system for highways and arterials in the San Francisco Bay Area. The major source of traffic information was participants' GPS-enabled smart phones, which were tracked as their owners drove around the Bay Area, essentially serving as a large scale deployment of vehicle probes. Traffic information, in the form of speed estimates displayed on a traffic map, was delivered to the participants' smart phones. Analysis of this application involved understanding consumer and stakeholder experience with the mobile application and assessing the highway and arterial models developed using smart phone data.
- Networked Traveler-Foresighted Driving: This application involves providing alerts of upcoming slow traffic to drivers of specially instrumented vehicles.
- Networked Traveler-Transit/Smart Parking: This application involves creating a multi-modal trip planning tool for travelers in the US-101 corridor in the Bay Area. The information is available to all travelers through a website, and to registered users through a smart phone application.
Under the direction and funding of the RITA ITS Joint Program Office, SAIC was selected to conduct an independent national evaluation of the technologies being deployed as part of the two test beds, which are being managed by the Volpe Center. This document presents the findings of the national evaluation of Networked Traveler-Transit/Smart Parking test, one of the three applications that comprise the CACT Test Bed. The remainder of this document is organized as follows:
Part I: Introduction. The current section provides information on the CACT Field Operational test deployed under the SafeTrip-21 Initiative.
Part II: Findings.
- Section 1 – Background. Provides background information on the timeline for development of Networked Traveler-Transit/Smart Parking (NT-T/SP) test and describe the applications. This section also summarizes the evaluation approach, hypotheses, and measures of effectiveness developed previously and detailed in the Evaluation Plan.
- Section 2 – Geo-fencing. Provides a description of the geo-fencing design and implementation into the smart phone application. Presents the results of the geo-fencing evaluation test and lessons learned regarding the prevention of distracted driving.
- Section 3 – Usage Statistics. Details an analysis of usage of the NT-T/SP applications including detailed insight into the user base, the result of targeted marketing efforts and major usage events, and user characteristics.
- Section 4 – User Perceptions. Details the data collection plan and process. Summarizes the user perceptions and presents the results from the registered user survey.
- Section 5 – Deployment Experience Assessment. Details the design, deployment, and operational phases of the deployment by identifying successes, shortfalls, and significant lessons learned.
Part III: Summary and Conclusions. Summarizes the major findings of the evaluation and states the major conclusions drawn from the results.
Part IV: Appendices
2 The independent applications were proposed by vendors. One was related to work zone safety and the other to intersection delay at traffic signals. There was an agreement between Volpe and Caltrans that independent applications could also be tested on the California Connected Traveler Test Bed. [ Return to note 2. ]
3 The independent application to be tested on the I-95 Test Bed was related to work zone safety. [ Return to note 3. ]