Quality-of-life study helps MnDOT evaluate performance measures

June 18, 2013 Christine Anderson Leave a comment

As part of a study on transportation and quality of life, MnDOT has partnered with researchers from the University of Minnesota’s Tourism Center to compare current MnDOT performance measures with quality-of-life factors that matter most to Minnesotans.

The evaluation was designed to help MnDOT ensure alignment between the factors that best predict transportation satisfaction among Minnesota citizens and the indicators MnDOT uses to track and measure its performance. The study team was led by Ingrid Schneider, Tourism Center director, and Karla Rains, director of customer relations at MnDOT.

To conduct the evaluation, the research team first analyzed data collected using surveys and focus groups in a previous phase of the quality-of-life study. The data included information on the categories that contribute to quality of life in Minnesota, the role of transportation, and the specific factors or services within transportation that affect citizens’ quality of life.

From these data, the team identified a list of key transportation elements that drive customer satisfaction. Results indicate that the most significant predictors can be grouped into three categories: maintenance/safety, mobility, and transparency. Within those categories, 11 specific items—such as snow and ice removal, road smoothness, commute time, and satisfaction with long-term planning—account for 56 percent of the differences in citizens’ transportation satisfaction.

The team then compared the factors most important to Minnesota citizens with MnDOT’s current performance measures. Overall findings indicate that these existing measures, which track performance in nine major areas, broadly capture much of what is important for Minnesotans’ transportation-related quality of life.

“This was an important key finding for us—we’re already measuring and reporting on many of the things that matter most to our customers,” Rains says. “It was encouraging and comforting to see that.”

In addition to affirming MnDOT’s existing measures, the evaluation identified a few gaps, specifically in the areas of safety, the environment, and transparency. quality

For example, MnDOT typically reports transportation safety in terms of total traffic fatalities and serious injuries from vehicle crashes. However, the quality-of-life study revealed citizen interest in a broader view of traveler safety. As a result, MnDOT plans to include bicycle, pedestrian, and railroad-grade crossing fatality data in future performance measures. “This is already data that we track, but now we plan to add more reporting of fatalities by mode than we have included before,” Rains says.

Based on other study-identified topics of importance, MnDOT plans to add new performance measures focused on air pollution and conduct more reporting of information related to public trust.

“We continue to use this data as guidance in our planning, and it continues to be useful,” Rains says. “We want to make sure we’re listening and measuring ourselves against the things that are most important to our customers.”

Reprinted from CTS Catalyst, June 2013.

Environment, Public Transit

Advanced hybrid buses have better fuel economy, fewer emissions

June 14, 2013 Arlene Mathison Leave a comment

One of Metro Transit’s new advanced “super hybrid” buses—built in Minnesota and billed as the cleanest, most efficient diesel-electric hybrid buses in the United States—garnered national attention at the American Public Transportation Association’s Bus and Paratransit Conference May 5–8 in Indianapolis.

Photo of superbus — Photo: Metro Transit

Unique because of its all-electric accessory systems, the bus was featured at the event so that transit professionals from across the country could experience this new hybrid technology firsthand, says Chuck Wurzinger, assistant director of bus maintenance at Metro Transit. The bus is one of two advanced hybrids built for Metro Transit in 2012. They currently operate on local routes with frequent stops in downtown Minneapolis and its surrounding communities.

The decision to purchase the new hybrids was greatly influenced by the results of a University of Minnesota study aimed at improving fuel economy in diesel-electric hybrid buses, Wurzinger says. The “Superbus” study, led by mechanical engineering (ME) professor David Kittelson, included an energy audit of major accessory systems on a standard hybrid bus. The study was funded by Metro Transit, CTS, and the U of M’s Institute for Renewable Energy and the Environment (IREE).

Study findings indicated that up to half of the fuel consumed by hybrid buses is used to power accessory systems. According to the research team, powering these systems electrically could significantly improve fuel efficiency.

The new advanced hybrids do just that, using all-electric systems to power the heating, air conditioning, engine fans, power steering, and air compressor. These components improve fuel economy, reduce emissions, and allow the buses to be operated in electric-only mode for short periods.

Photo of Metro Transit diesel-electric bus — Photo: Metro Transit

One of the buses also has start/stop capabilities, which allow the engine to shut down at bus stops and traffic lights. “This reduces engine idle time while maintaining all other bus functions, including passenger comfort and safety features,” Wurzinger says.

Although the buses have been in service for only a short time, they are already showing promising increases in fuel economy, Wurzinger says. “We have also operated them consistently on electric power inside the bus garage, which helps keep the air clean in the building. This reduces the amount of ventilation required in cold weather, which means less energy is used to heat the building.”

Along with a standard hybrid bus and a conventional diesel transit bus, one of the advanced hybrids will be monitored and evaluated in a new study conducted by U of M researchers in collaboration with Metro Transit. The multidisciplinary research team includes Kittelson, ME associate professor Will Northrop, ME research associate Winthrop Watts, and applied economics associate professor Steven Taff.

As part of the study, funded by IREE, the team will collect real-world, on-the-road data from the three buses in all seasons on a variety of route types. The researchers then plan to compare the efficiency and emissions of the buses and make recommendations to Metro Transit about which configuration is the best for a given application. Data collected from the study will also allow Metro Transit to work with bus manufacturers to optimize bus performance.

“We believe the results will be useful in writing bus technical specifications and also in determining if a certain type of bus is best suited to a certain type of bus route,” Wurzinger says.

Ultimately, this information could be used to determine which buses to assign to which routes as well as which type of bus to purchase given fleet replacement or expansion requirements.

The project is scheduled for completion in 2015.

Reprinted from the CTS Catalyst, June 2013.

Materials and Construction

Construction kickoff at MnROAD, the state’s high-tech road research facility (updated)

June 7, 2013 Matt Leave a comment

*Editor’s note: This article was updated 6/11/13 with additional information provided by MnROAD engineers.

You’re probably aware that MnDOT recently kicked off its 2013 construction season, comprising $1.1 billion in new transportation investments in more than 300 projects across Minnesota. What you might not know is that another MnDOT construction season has begun at MnROAD, the department’s unique, high-tech pavement test facility located near Albertville, Minn.

MnROAD serves as a proving ground for innovative pavement designs, equipment and construction techniques that help transportation professionals all over the world strengthen roads, cut costs, and reduce construction times. It has a two test tracks — a 3.5- mile mainline carrying “live” traffic and a 2.5-mile closed-loop, low-volume roadway — that are used for state, university and private industry pavement research. These tracks are made up of dozens of individual “cells,” which are unique stretches of pavement each representing several research projects.

This summer, several test cells are being torn up and repaved. Cell 40, a 20-year-old concrete pavement, will receive an innovative 3-inch thick unbonded concrete overlay. To increase the capacity of such a thin overlay , a fiber-reinforced concrete mixture will be used. To separate and cushion the thin overlay from the existing concrete, two different thicknesses of nonwoven geotextile fabric will be laid. This will help MnROAD researchers to understand how much cushioning is needed, as well as the drainage capacity of each fabric. Fabric interlayers are gaining popularity as an alternative to asphalt interlayers.

Thin concrete overlays of asphalt, commonly known as whitetoppings, will also be used to reconstruct Cells 60-63. Similar to Cell 40, fiber reinforced concrete will be used to test its benefit in supplementing load transfer at joints and across cracks. Pavement built with this material will be strengthened by the fiber, prolonging a road’s lifespan, and potentially allowing for thinner concrete pavements. Findings from Cells 40 and 60-63 support the ongoing development of improved design procedures for concrete overlays.

Cell 13 reconstruction is using recycled concrete aggregate provided by the contractor’s stockpile from other pavement projects. The concrete from the stockpile will be included in the concrete mix — a new practice to understand how to better recycle paving materials and ascertain the cost and benefits of this practice. Cell 13 will also be testing two innovative types of preformed joint sealants, and several joints drained by geotextile drains.

Construction updates are available on the MnROAD website as well as information regarding current research projects.

Image from MnROAD's 2013 construction kickoff. — Removing concrete in MnROAD Cell 13.

Maintenance Operations, Materials and Construction, Traffic and Safety

‘Three Ways to Cook a Pothole’

June 5, 2013 Nick 2 Comments

In April, we posted about an innovative pothole-filling technology being developed by the Minnesota Department of Transportation and the University of Minnesota, Duluth. The technique involves zapping pothole patches and the surrounding pavement with a special truck-mounted, 50,000-watt microwave. Researchers have found that heating the base and the patch material at the same time creates a stronger, longer-lasting bond that provides for a more permanent pothole fix.

Last week, the MnDOT/UMD microwave technology found its way into a new MnDOT video (above) that also explores two other experimental pothole-patching methods. One involves using a large “electric oven”-type heating element instead of a microwave. The other utilizes a new exothermic (i.e. heat-generating) asphalt mixture containing taconite from northern Minnesota mines. The video compares the potential benefits of all three of the new technologies, which the department hopes will someday lead to “more pothole-patching power for the taxpayer dollar.”

New publication highlights success in traffic safety

June 4, 2013 frieb003 Leave a comment

The Minnesota Toward Zero Deaths program has published Minnesota TZD: 10 Years of Progress (PDF), a 12-page report highlighting the program’s successes in the decade since it began. Before 2001, efforts to improve traffic safety were mostly carried out by individual state agencies. In response to an increasing trend in the number of traffic-related fatalities and serious injuries in the state, the Minnesota Departments of Public Safety, Transportation, and Health in 2003 established the Toward Zero Deaths (TZD) program to integrate safety programs in Minnesota. Since then, traffic fatalities have decreased by 40.5 percent. This report describes some of these efforts in the areas of driver behavior, roadway environment, emergency response, and partner collaboration.

Minnesota TZD: 10 Years of Progress (PDF)

Policy and Planning

Searching for common ground in the ITS privacy debate

May 21, 2013 Arlene Mathison Leave a comment

Should your vehicle be able to gather, store, or transmit information about where it’s been—or where it’s going? On the surface, it seems like a simple question. However, it inevitably gives rise to many others: Who will see the data? How will it be used? Can it be given or sold to a third party? Under what circumstances? Clearly, there are no straightforward solutions or answers in the debate surrounding privacy issues in intelligent transportation systems (ITS).

“The difficulty and complexity of these issues has resulted in an increasingly disconnected public discussion about privacy and ITS,” says Frank Douma, a researcher in the University of Minnesota Humphrey School of Public Affairs. “In one camp are privacy advocates, and in the other camp are technologists and the ITS industry, who generally view privacy issues as secondary when compared with the tremendous benefits of these technologies. The disconnect often results in the two sides talking past each other, with too little energy spent finding potential common ground.”

According to Douma, one cause of this disconnect is a lack of clarity on both sides about the needs, goals, and interests of those involved. To address this divide, a multidisciplinary team of U of M researchers has published a report that sheds new light on the ITS privacy debate by mapping and assessing the interests of all participants. The team was led by Douma and research assistant Tom Garry, and the project was sponsored by the ITS Institute, a program of the University of Minnesota’s Center for Transportation Studies.

The ITS privacy debate involves an interlaced web of participants with multiple interests.

Researchers began their analysis by pinpointing exactly who should be concerned about privacy as ITS technologies are developed and implemented and what their goals are with respect to privacy data. A number of diverse participant groups were identified, including ITS developers, transportation users, the government, data collectors, data users, and secondary users such as marketers and litigants.

“We found few black-and-white divides among participants in the privacy debate,” says Douma. “For example, transportation users are not simply pro-privacy, and data collectors are not inherently anti-privacy. Individuals are willing to share their locational data in exchange for real benefits in a variety of circumstances, such as GPS guidance or electronic tolling. However, there are also limits to this willingness.”

Because of this nuanced landscape, researchers concluded that while there is no all-encompassing solution to the ITS privacy debate, there are a number of potential avenues and tools for finding common ground. Their recommendations include setting limits on the time data can be retained, prohibiting unrelated secondary use of data, designing ITS systems with privacy in mind, avoiding the collection of personally identifiable locational information when possible, and implementing privacy policies such as the use of clear privacy notices.

“It’s also important to remember that the positions of participants in this debate are not entrenched,” says Douma. “As technology changes, privacy expectations will also likely evolve as well, such that what may seem important today is less so, and something we are not considering today could be critically important in the future. Consequently, it’s very important that this conversation continue in the years to come.”

Reprinted from the CTS Catalyst, May 2013.

Freight and Railroads, Maintenance Operations, Materials and Construction, Traffic and Safety

Portable weigh-in-motion system demonstration

May 17, 2013 Nick Leave a comment

Weigh-in-motion (WIM) systems consist of sensors placed in road pavements to measure the weight of vehicles passing over them, along with other data such as speed, axle load and spacing, and vehicle type. This data is used to enforce weight limits on trucks and is also useful in a wide range of other applications, such as pavement design and traffic analysis.

However, constructing and maintaining permanent roadside WIM stations is expensive, so these systems are installed primarily on roadways with heavy traffic, such as interstate and trunk highways, and rarely used for rural local roads. Meanwhile, heavy truck volumes on local roads are increasing, significantly shortening their lives. A less costly, portable WIM system is needed for such roads so that collected data can be used to better design these roads to accommodate heavy truck traffic.

One solution for bringing WIM technology to local roads is to implement a portable, reusable system similar to pneumatic tube counters used to conduct traffic counts. With funding and technical assistance from MnDOT and the Local Road Research Board, Professor Taek Kwon of the University of Minnesota—Duluth has developed a prototype system that has already proven to be nearly as accurate as the more expensive, permanent systems. MnDOT Research Services staff drove up to MnROAD this week to observe a live demonstration of the technology, and made this short video.

The research being conducted here is part of an implementation project based on Kwon’s original study, the results of which can be found in this research report and its accompanying two-page technical summary from MnDOT Research Services.

Bicycling, Pedestrian, Policy and Planning

Bicycle and pedestrian counting initiative monitors nonmotorized traffic in Minnesota

May 15, 2013 Arlene Mathison Leave a comment

In a continuing effort to better understand nonmotorized traffic patterns in Minnesota, researchers from the Humphrey School of Public Affairs have partnered with the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT) to develop guidelines and analyze information collected in bicycle and pedestrian traffic counts throughout the state.

The research team, led by Professor Greg Lindsey, aims to develop consistent methods for monitoring and assessing bicycle and pedestrian traffic that can be used in both permanent, automated traffic counts and short-term manual counts. The goal is to provide evidence for decision making that Minnesota cities have historically lacked, Lindsey says. “We’ll have practical, useful information about bike and pedestrian traffic that can help local jurisdictions as they plan and invest in infrastructure,” he says.

As part of the 18-month project, the research team created a set of tools and methods for short-duration manual counts of nonmotorized traffic, held training workshops, and organized a statewide counting effort involving 43 Minnesota municipalities last fall. The overall response was positive, Lindsey says, and some communities are already using their collected data to submit grant proposals for projects related to nonmotorized traffic.

In addition, Lindsey and his team have examined traffic information from six permanent counters on Minneapolis trails. The continuous counts collected at these locations help the researchers understand traffic patterns and the factors that affect them, Lindsey says. For example, the team found that bike and pedestrian traffic vary by trail type, time of day, day of week, and season.

“Once we know the patterns at permanent sites, we can develop factors that help us expand short-term counts from other locations with similar conditions,” Lindsey says. The factors could be used to estimate anything from total daily traffic to annual traffic, as long as the short-term count location is similar to an existing model.

Based on the overall results of the study, the research team developed recommendations for MnDOT. These include continuing to coordinate statewide short-term field counts, demonstrating the feasibility of automated counting technologies, and beginning to integrate nonmotorized and vehicular traffic databases.

Based on these recommendations, MnDOT is moving forward with a new project that will collect more short- and long-duration counts throughout Minnesota, says Lisa Austin, ABC Ramps coordinator at MnDOT. The next phase of work aims to collect counts for pedestrians on sidewalks, bicyclists on shoulders and in bike lanes, and pedestrians and bicyclists on multiuse trails. MnDOT plans to install more permanent, automated counters in suburban and midsize cities and to conduct additional manual counts in smaller cities around the state, Austin says.

“We’re really excited that this bike and pedestrian counting project is moving into wider implementation,” Austin says. “This next phase will help us see which automated counting technologies work well and make recommendations for moving forward on a broader scale.”

Reprinted from the CTS Catalyst, May 2013.

Traffic and Safety

White House honors MnDOT traffic boss for work on rural intersection safety

May 9, 2013 Nick Leave a comment

The White House named Minnesota Department of Transportation State Traffic Engineer Sue Groth one of its 12 transportation “Champions of Change” for her role in implementing life-saving technology to help prevent collisions at rural intersections. The rural intersection conflict warning systems, which use sensors and lights to give motorists real-time warnings about traffic conditions, were developed by MnDOT’s Office of Traffic, Safety and Technology.

It’s worth noting that MnDOT Research Services and the University of Minnesota are also currently working on a project to develop a low-cost version of these systems using LEDs and solar panels. The ongoing research, being conducted by University of Minnesota— Duluth Professor Taek Kwon, is a continuation of the Advanced Light-Emitting Diode Warning System project completed in 2010.

Here’s the press release from MnDOT:

ST. PAUL, Minn. – On Wednesday, May 8, 2013, the White House honored Sue Groth, Minnesota Department of Transportation’s state traffic engineer, as one of 12 people who are Transportation “Champions of Change.” The Champions event, “Transportation Technology Solutions for the 21st Century,” focused on individuals or organizations that have provided exemplary leadership in developing or implementing transportation technology solutions to enhance performance, reduce congestion, improve safety and facilitate communication across the transportation industry at the local, state or national level.

“These Champions represent the very best in American leadership, innovation and progress,” said Secretary Ray LaHood. “I’m proud to recognize these transportation leaders who work every day to grow our economy and help us reach our destinations more quickly, efficiently and safely.”

The MnDOT Office of Traffic, Safety and Technology has been selected as a Champion of Change for their work to reduce fatal and life-changing crashes on Minnesota roadways, while enhancing mobility for all users. OTST is being honored for designing, testing and helping to deploy dozens of life-saving rural intersection conflict warning systems throughout Minnesota, while leading a national effort to do more of the same throughout rural America. These systems save lives at rural intersections that might otherwise not warrant or afford more traditional traffic control devices or geometric improvements.

U of M transportation research highlights video

May 8, 2013 Arlene Mathison Leave a comment

U of M transportation research highlights during 2012-2013 include a smartphone app for visually impaired pedestrians, pedestrian and bicyclist safety in roundabouts, methods for counting bike and pedestrian traffic on trails, and a filter that takes phosphorous out of storm water.

Crossroads