State Efforts Towards the Real-Time Systems Management Information Program Requirements for Travel Time

Federal Regulation 23 CFR 511 promises to improve the traveler information that assists motorists to make better travel decisions. In accordance with this regulation, all state departments of transportation (DOTs) are required to provide real-time traveler information including construction activity, lane blocking incidents, adverse weather conditions, and travel times on certain facilities, by November 8, 2014. In this study, the researchers used an online survey to collect information from State DOTs and their associated representatives from the US Federal Highway Administration (FHWA). A survey was distributed electronically to FHWA representatives, State DOT Operations Engineers, and State DOT Intelligent Transportation Systems Coordinators who were active in the implementation in their agency’s real-time systems management information program. The survey results illustrated that, processing of field data into travel times is most frequently done with software from vendors, and the majority of the agencies currently meet the accuracy thresholds required by the new law. The findings also revealed some practices that require improvement, including methods for identifying inaccurate travel times and the use of statistics for data sampling purposes. Overall the findings of this study are relevant to both practitioners and researchers because they detail current reported practices of how DOTs are collecting, processing, and disseminating travel time data, and how DOTs are measuring the quality of the data.