From the Managing Director
By Tom Kern

Last week, I attended the Vehicle to Infrastructure Deployment Coalition (V2IDC) meetings in Detroit. The V2IDC is organized into five Technical Working Groups (TWGs) and anyone is welcome to join these groups. At the V2IDC section of the website, you will find contact details for the liaison for each TWG who will help you join. The V2IDC section of the Center’s website continues to host the content of this initiative so stay tuned for updates that come out of last week’s meetings. Alongside these discussions, our colleagues at CAMP held a couple of days at the Fowlerville, Michigan test facility. Participants were able to experience in a range of automobiles the emerging V2I technology that equips cars with several new applications. We saw first hand the display of red light violation, curve speed, and reduced speed zone/lane closure warnings.  Congrats to the team for the progress being made and a special thank you to the drivers of both the autos and the tractor rig that participants were able to ride in. For more information, contact Carl Andersen at Carl.Andersen@dot.gov.

Maryland Regional Operations Forum
By Steven Lavrenz, PhD, EIT, NOCoE Technical Services Manager

On Wednesday, April 20^th, I had the opportunity to attend an FHWA Regional Operations Forums (ROF) at the Maritime Institute in Linthicum Heights, Maryland. This was my first time attending an ROF since coming on as NOCoE’s Technical Services Manager, and I was not disappointed!

For those that are not aware, the ROFs are a product of SHRP2, jointly organized by FHWA and TRB. They typically consist of a weeklong series of technical sessions, peer exchanges, and team-building exercises, centered around a variety of TSMO topic areas.

One thing I admire in particular about the ROFs is their very focused approach to disseminating TSMO knowledge and best practices. Meeting participation maxes out at around 20 individuals, and attendees are typically TSMO champions (officially or unofficially) within their respective organizations. For a more detailed description of the ROFs, I encourage you to click on “Learn More” within the Regional Operations Forums box on the NOCoE website homepage. To continue reading, please click here. 

FHWA Proposes New Performance Measures to Reduce Congestion on the Nation's Highways
The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) today released a proposed rulemaking outlining new performance measures to assess travel reliability, congestion, and emissions at a national level. The proposed regulation calls for an increased level of transparency and accountability in establishing and achieving targets for performance impacting commuters and truck drivers. Please click here to read more.  

Safety Management Plans for the Connected Vehicle Pilots Now Available Online
Safety management plans for two of the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) Connected Vehicle Pilot deployment sites (Wyoming and Tampa, Florida) are now available online. Sponsored by the USDOT's Intelligent Transportation Systems Joint Program Office, the Connected Vehicle Pilot Deployment Program seeks to combine connected vehicle and mobile device technologies in innovative and cost-effective ways. Ultimately, this program will improve traveler mobility and system productivity while reducing environmental impacts and enhancing safety. Please click here to read more. 

Register for the ITE 2016 Annual Meeting & Exhibit!
The future of transportation is here. The ITE 2016 Annual Meeting & Exhibit August 14-17, 2016 in Anaheim, California is about embracing the rapid change occurring in our profession, meeting the challenges of new models and technologies and being ready to take advantage of the immense opportunity offered by this new era. The ITE 2016 Annual Meeting & Exhibit will offer something for everyone this August including technical sessions on connected vehicles, multimodal transportation, intersection design, and complete streets. Please click here for more information and here to register.