One of the leaders in big data analytics for the transportation industry, StreetLight Data Inc., has expanded the facilities offered by its InSight platform with the launch of annual average daily traffic (AADT) metrics for Canada.
Providing the most accurate, on-demand traffic volumes for over 4.5 million miles (7.2m km) of Canadian and USA roadways spanning 2018 and 2017, the company’s AADT metric enables the creation of smarter cities and for authorities and transportation agencies to make better infrastructure planning decisions. With federal requirements put in place by the USA’s Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act (MAP-21), local and state government agencies must increase reporting of performance metrics for planning and funding allocation. This has increased the need for quick, easy, dynamic and cost-effective AADT measurements. AADT is a critical metric for transportation planners and highways engineers analyzing infrastructure projects, estimating road safety, or seeking road improvement funds. Historically, AADT counts have been measured manually and at high cost. The process of getting approval, training staff, collecting actual counts, and validating the data can typically take months and cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.
With StreetLight’s Insight platform, users can query the software for accurate AADT counts for virtually every Canadian and USA roadway, with results delivered in minutes. Trained and tested using more than 9,100 and 1,800 permanent loop counts respectively in the USA and Canada, StreetLight’s AADT can be rendered for bi-directional traffic, or zero in on traffic moving in one direction on a roadway, including ramps, freeway-to-freeway connectors, and arterial or local/minor roads. Each analysis also includes a ‘confidence range’ or prediction interval for the metrics provided.
Collected from over 65 million smartphones and navigation devices in connected cars and trucks, StreetLight adds context to this ‘core data’ from numerous sources, such as parcel delivery and other digital road network data. Based on over 100 billion monthly location records across North America, StreetLight’s algorithms draw on 365 days of data on more than 4.5 million miles of roadway. Available for urban and rural roads large and small, the company’s USA and Canada AADT counts considerably outperform industry-standard accuracy targets.
Applying proprietary machine-learning algorithms and artificial intelligence (AI) to over four trillion spatial data points over time, StreetLight measures diverse travel patterns and makes them available on-demand via the world’s first SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) platform for mobility. From identifying sources of congestion to optimizing new infrastructure to planning for connected and autonomous vehicles (CAVs), StreetLight powers more than 3,000 global projects every month.
“We recognize the challenges of securing accurate road counts for one of the largest but most sparsely populated nations in the world,” said Laura Schewel, CEO and co-founder of StreetLight Data. “With our AADT Canada release we can now bring complete traffic data sets to planners covering both Canada’s largest cities and extensive rural areas.”
