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Category: Research Program
ADMS VIRGINIA
Transportation Management Center Applications of Archived Data
Operational Test
http://cts.virginia.edu/stl_adms.htm
Project Partners:
- Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT)
- Virginia Transportation Research Council
- University of Virginia Center for Transportation Studies
- Open Roads Consulting, Inc.
- George Mason University
- Federal Highway Administration (FHWA)
INTRODUCTION “ADMS Virginia ” (Archived Data Management System) is an operational test designed to develop and demonstrate applications of archived data collected by intelligent transportation systems (ITS). This program, recently completed in December 2004, produced an operational system that is making a significant impact by providing ready access to data and analytical tools that support activities such as:
- Planning for operations
- Incident management
- Regional planning
- Air-quality modeling
- Special event planning
- Performance measurement
The success of ADMS Virginia has been made possible through an innovative public/private/academic partnership, leading-edge research to support advanced
ADMS functions, utilization of industry and ITS standards, and attention to best practices in systems and software engineering.
HOW ADMS VIRGINIA WORKS
Traditionally, ITS deployments collect large quantities of data to support real-time system management and information dissemination. In the past, once these functions were complete, the data was largely unused. The purpose of ADMS Virginia, an implementation of the archived data user service (ADUS), is to retain this data, subject to strict quality control standards, and make the data, along with associated analytical tools, available to transportation professionals. The design philosophy used in Virginia ADMS is to apply “data warehousing” concepts to create a system that effectively supports improved decision-making for the stakeholders.
The current version of ADMS Virginia focuses on Virginia’s two most populated regions – Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads and incorporates data from the following systems:
- VDOT’s Hampton Roads & Northern Virginia Smart Traffic Centers (freeway management systems)
- VDOT’s Northern Virginia Smart Traffic Signal System
- City of Norfolk’s Traffic Signal System
- Hampton Roads Transit Routing and Scheduling System
- VDOT’s Statewide Traffic Counts program
- Weather Stations
This data is made available to users through an innovative web-based system. As a result of this design, a user from any location or organization can gain access to the system with simply a web browser and internet connection. The system includes modules tailored for specific users of the system, and also incorporates web-based geographic information systems (GIS) capabilities.
While ADMS Virginia is currently focused in Hampton Roads and Northern Virginia, it is designed to support statewide expansion. As stated by J.R. Robinson, VDOT’s recently retired ITS Director, “The benefits that we are already seeing from the use of ADMS
Virginia in the Hampton Roads and Northern Virginia regions have provided the motivation for VDOT to support an aggressive effort to expand the system statewide – providing us with the capability to truly measure mobility on a statewide basis that is unmatched in this country.”
IMPACT OF ADMS VIRGINIA To illustrate the impact of this research program, 5 key functional capabilities of the system and how the stakeholders perceive them are discussed:
Planning for Operations
In order to effectively manage incidents, it is critical to learn from the past. ADMS Virginia allows operators to examine incident time-lines, including traffic patterns and weather conditions, to improve incident management.
Stephany Hanshaw, director of the Hampton Roads Smart Traffic Center emphasizes this impact, “ADMS Virginia provides a tool to be used to optimize our incident response plans. This is a great project for us operations guys. It is a great return on investment.” Amy Tang McElwain, of VDOT’s Northern Virginia District, goes on to say, “ Not only does ADMS Virginia leverage the investment that we made in ITS, the system also equips our engineers with a needed tool to proactively assess the traffic conditions and develop strategies to better manage traffic.”
Emergency Planning & Operations
ADMS Virginia improves emergency planning by providing comprehensive data to a wide user community, and by directly incorporating experience learned from previous events.
John Yorks, Traffic Engineer in the City of Hampton, relates this impact as follows: “ Our goals for the city’s signal control system include developing timing plans for both planned and unplanned traffic events including concerts, holiday traffic, hurricane evacuations, work zones, etc. Having a library of real data from VDOT and other localities at our fingertips is invaluable in developing plans for special events which impact both City and VDOT facilities.”
Regional Planning
One of the problems that traditionally plagues effective regional transportation planning is the lack of quality data. ADMS Virginia has made an immediate impact on planning by relating ITS data directly to transportation planning models.
Camelia Ravanbakht, Principal Transportation Engineer of the Hampton Roads Planning District Commission expands on this impact, “As a regional planning agency, we constantly are in need of many types of traffic data on a regional level. The Hampton Roads MPO staffs use speed, volume and incident data from ADMS Virginia to calibrate the long range transportation planning/air quality model of the region."
Environmental Analyses
Transportation agencies depend on air quality models to estimate the impacts of proposed improvements on the environment.
Amy Costello, lead on the VDOT Air Quality modeling program, describes the impact of ADMS Virginia on her activities, “ For the first time in Virginia, the ADMS system provides the customer with instant real-time and archived traffic data from several systems. This quick, easy to use, reliable data source not only greatly improves access to quality data, but also saves time and makes it easier to obtain real data in a usable format.”
Performance Measurement
Finally, as transportation agencies move to a focus on operations, it is essential that mobility performance measures are available to measure congestion and the quality of travel. ADMS Virginia directly computes a number of mobility performance measures, allowing users to investigate these measures for locations and times of their choosing.
VDOT’s Stephany Hanshaw discussed this impact: “ The immediate benefit provided by the ADMS has been internal transportation system performance analysis. This internal evaluation at the lowest level allows us to begin to determine the local benefit of ITS and traffic and congestion management strategies. ADMS gives me the tools I need to do this.”
RESEARCH CONTRIBUTIONS OF ADMS VIRGINIA As a research effort, one of the key long-term impacts of ADMS Virginia is to improve the state-of-the practice in the area of the archived data user service (ADUS). Two key research contributions made possible by, and implemented within ADMS Virginia, are highlighted in this section.
Best Practices of Systems and Software Engineering Tailored for ITS
The development of ADMS Virginia has been user-driven, based on a clearly defined concept of operations and requirements. To make early impacts of the system tangible to users, the project team used a phased “build” approach. This approach has been very successful, leading to on-time and under-budget deployment. The impact of this is described by Barbara Skiffington, President of the project software development firm Open Roads Consulting , Inc.: “ We are very pleased with the phased deployment approach adopted by the team. Two significant results are being seen. First, by providing incremental operational releases, stakeholders are able to access the application very early in the development process. This enables stakeholders to use the system and provide feedback throughout the effort resulting in a system that fits their specific needs. Secondly, open architecture development and incremental delivery of the system allowed the team to deploy the critical functionality first and build refined functionality within subsequent builds."
Extraction, Transformation, and Loading (ETL) of ITS Data
A key aspect of data warehousing is to develop a sound ETL process. The purpose of this process is to identify errors in operational data, fix errors when possible, and add value to raw data that makes it more useful to analysts. The research team has developed advanced data screening algorithms, data imputation algorithms, and data characterization techniques. Advances in the ETL process are contributing directly to the on-going ITS standards development process. As stated by Shawn Turner of Texas Transportation Institute, a leader of developing ADUS standards, "ADMS Virginia is advancing the practice of data archiving by clearly demonstrating effective data management and quality principles. The system will make the "best practices" list for data archiving and should provide a wealth of information to decision-makers in Virginia."
Ultimate Measure of Success – Transition to Production System
While the examples presented above highlight specific advances made in this research program, the most telling indicator of success is that ADMS Virginia has become an integral part of VDOT and local government programs. Because of the benefits of ADMS Virginia demonstrated during the operational test, and the large user-base created, VDOT has invested state funds in transitioning ADMS Virginia to a production system to be managed by their Information Technology Applications Division. As stated by Brian Smith, director of the Smart Travel Laboratory at the University of Virginia, “We are thrilled to see that the results of our research program will be put to direct, long-term use in Virginia.”
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