One of the providers of integrated wireless traffic detection and data systems for Smart Cities, Sensys Networks, has revealed how its flagship traffic data platform, SensMetrics, has recently been helping several agencies manage their traffic signals.
Sensys Networks says that several recent successful implementations of SensMetrics have resulted in reduced traffic delays, lowered emissions and increased safety. Launched in 2016, the software enables on-demand signal retiming by time of day, day of week, and season, and provides high-resolution data 24/7/365 before/after performance and safety metrics. The company says Departments of Transportation (DOTs) are seeing the benefits of using SensMetrics for traffic signal performance and retiming, with the platform changing how traffic signals are managed.
The examples cited include:
• In partnership with the University of Alabama, Alabama DOT’s focus has been on traffic signal optimization for reduced delays and more reliable travel along its corridors. Through installation of SensMetrics’ automated turning movement counts and performance measures, ALDOT and its partners have not only reduced travel delay, but quantified and monitored the resulting benefits to motorists.
• Montgomery County DOT in Maryland selected Sensys Networks to deliver both detection and before/after performance measures at multiple locations using a single platform. As a result, MCDOT gets actuated signal detection, travel times, traffic volumes, and performance measures to both monitor and manage traffic demands and changes. MCDOT is using the platform’s turning movement count to optimize timing plans, and to automatically produce performance measures, such as percent arrival on green, wait time, and Purdue Coordination Diagram to quantify traffic impacts after the optimization.
• Beaufort County in South Carolina was for looking for a scalable and cost-effective method to do before/after comparisons, measure seasonal changes in traffic patterns, and evaluate the impact of development projects on traffic volumes. SensMetrics was initially installed at one intersection, and is now being expanded to 10 additional locations. These deployments will more than pay for themselves if the timing improvements can remove the need for expensive lane additions at a single intersection.
• In Boston, Massachusetts, Verizon and Sensys Networks have partnered to deploy SensMetrics with an integrated dashboard to show safety and mobility performance metrics, as part of the city’s Vision Zero initiative to reduce traffic fatalities.
“The days of manually counting vehicles and using that data to time signals are numbered,” noted Amine Haoui, Sensys Networks’ CEO. “With our platform, data is continuously collected and analyzed, performance degradation automatically detected, and timing plans updated to maintain near optimal performance.”
