Abstract Manager

Vision Zero is a primary responsibility and objective for all transportation professionals, however, as pressure grows to deliver more infrastructure improvements while maintaining operations, the safety of workers continues to be a factor. Advancement in connected technologies, AI and edge processing power have supported the design and development of a range of new solutions that aim to improve the safety of workers operating in work zones on active highway corridors. Although several different solution architectures exist, their application in real world scenarios has not been well tested to date. The presentation will discuss the types of work zone intrusion technologies such as wide area versus perimeter detection, localized versus cloud processing and various alerting technologies. Additionally, context specific considerations of the various technologies such as deployment and redeployment capabilities, calibration and validation, communications and reliability will all be discussed.

The second part of the presentation will call on several current pilot projects that are being undertaken and discuss the objectives of the pilot, some of the challenges and any initial findings that are able to be shared. The pilots include a mix of urban and rural locations for local, arterial and freeway conditions, as well as being deployed in different weather conditions. Some of the initial trial deployments experience communication challenges which will be discussed, and the actioned mitigation will also be described. The presentation will also aim to help attendees understand some of the key questions/criteria to consider when thinking of deploying technology in their own jurisdictions work zones.