Transportation Association of Canada St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador

• Main Authors: Rob Bushman, P. Eng, Curtis Berthelot, Ph. D, Rod Klashinsky
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Canada; Newfoundland
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.132.9757; http://www.transportation.org/sites/ssom/docs/its technology in workzones.pdf

Traffic safety and mobility is a concern to transportation agencies throughout North America, evidenced by the aggressive goals for reduced accidents and congestion set by Transport Canada, the Canadian Council of Motor Transport Administrators, and the Federal Highway Authority. Work zones often act as a compounding factor to intensify issues of safety and congestion on the highway system. Recent advances in the use of Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) and the application of ITS to work zones are providing new tools that can be used for management of traffic in and around work zones. This paper will examine several recent field applications of ITS in work zones, providing a description of the operation of the systems, results of evaluations that have been conducted, and identification of current and future research. One application of ITS in work zones has been dynamic lane merging. Dynamic lane merging creates a dynamic “No Passing ” zone in advance of the construction area that advises motorists to merge early, rather than wait until reaching the final taper area.