Overview
Now in its 14th year as an integral part of the ITS World Congress, AASHTO International Day (presented by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials and National Operations Center for Excellence (NOCOE) in partnership with the Transportation Association of Canada (TAC)) brought together transportation officials from around the world to take on topics of consequence addressing the transportation challenges and opportunities facing public agencies. The 14th Annual AASHTO International Day (AID) had as its purpose:
- To seek the perspective of policy experts and practitioners representing each of the three ITS regions (ITS America, ITS Europe (ERTICO), and ITS Asia Pacific) on the state of art of integration of technology and infrastructure operations.
The 2015 ITS World Congress AASHTO International Day was dedicated to an information exchange on infrastructure readiness for connected and automated vehicle (CV/AV) initiatives. At the 2016 ITS World Congress AASHTO International Day experts discussed the importance of integrating and adapting current ongoing ITS deployments and operations with the CV, AV, and other emerging technologies.
The 2017 World Congress event focused on peer-exchange sessions on the range of current CAV deployments, pilots, and initiatives now taking place around the United States, Canada, and internationally with specific attention to:
- Policies and Programs to support CV and AV Deployment with specific emphasis on government relations, institutional frameworks, and infrastructure owner and operator roles.
- CV and AV Technical programs and field deployment initiatives; including CV and AV pilots, testing and reporting results; planning-level scenarios; research and development to integrate current and upcoming technologies to mainstream ITS, CV, and AV systems; standards; cyber security; privacy; and security certificate management systems.
Highlights and Presentations
Ten contributors from around the world presented on the two panels. Here is a listing of presenters and highlights from their remarks. Links to their full presentations are available on this webpage.
Panel 1: Policies and Programs to support CV and AV Deployment with specific emphasis on Government relations, Institutional Frameworks, and Infrastructure owner and operator roles.
Moderator: Carlos Braceras, Executive Director, Utah DOT
- Dr. Johanna Tzanidaki, Director of Innovation & Deployment, ERTICO
ERTICO’s engagement with the European Union and its member states (shaped most recently by the signing of the Amsterdam Declaration in April 2016) has helped to generate a comprehensive approach to strengthen and accelerate deployment of cooperative, connected, and automated mobility.
- Wee-Shann Lam, Group Director for Technology & Industry Development, Land Transport Authority, Singapore
The Land Transport Authority (LTA) is fully proceeding fully on four tracks to accomplish AV deployment in Singapore (fixed route and scheduled services such as buses; point to point mobility on demand such as driverless pods or taxis and ride hailing services like Uber; freight and utility; and key enablers such as public acceptance and standards and regulations around AV (related to highway codes, functional and usage safety, cyber security, and vehicular data management) that would facilitate the deployment of this new technology.
- Craig Hutton, Director General, Strategic Policy, Transport Canada
Integration of CAV technologies into the Canadian transportation sector will require a high degree of collaboration and investment across all orders of government, industry and other stakeholders and has led a National Policy Framework and efforts to prioritize actions over the short, medium and long-term to regulate vehicle safety, align regulations and standards, encourage innovation, educate the public, protect data privacy and security, build and upgrade infrastructure, and prepare for the eventual transition to roadways with both automated and non-automated vehicles.
- Ken Leonard, Director, ITS Joint Program Office (JPO), U.S. DOT
The Department recently released a new, non-regulatory approach to promoting the safe testing and development of automated vehicles—Automated Driving Systems: A Vision for Safety. It paves the way for the safe deployment of advanced driver assistance technologies by providing voluntary guidance that encourages best practices and prioritizes safety and technical assistance to States and best practices for policymakers.
- Leslie Richards, Secretary, Pennsylvania DOT and AASHTO
Because a state DOT cannot and should develop automated vehicle policies in a vacuum, PennDOT has started a Statewide Connected and Automated Vehicle Strategic Plan that will: build upon existing research, identify the steps to prepare for AV technologies, define a comprehensive set of focused, reasonable and deployable applications, consider various levels of investment, and provide critical missing data and information pertaining to the early deployment of connected and automated vehicles.
Panel 2: CV and AV Technical programs and field deployment initiatives including CV and AV pilots; testing and reporting results; planning-level scenarios; research and development to integrate current and upcoming technologies to mainstream ITS, CV, and AV systems; standards; cyber security; privacy; and security certificate management systems.
Moderator: Shailen Bhatt, Executive Director, Colorado DOT
Presenters:
- Francois Fischer, Senior Manager, ERTICO
ERTICO’s Technical program and field deployment pilot to support CV/AV takes on connected driving via the Intercor initiative (seeking to validate a number of communications, security and C-ITS services) and CV/AV with CONDORDA (focusing on a number of emerging technologies) and AUTOPILOT (applying three use cases and engaging in the important role of the Internet of Things (IOT)). ERTICO importantly plays a strong role to support assessment and testing on a range of CV/AV initiatives funded by the EU.
- Masato Minakata, Project Manager, Vehicle Safety Planning, Toyota Motor Corporation
Japan’s longstanding SIP-adus initiative (the Cross-Ministerial Strategic Innovation Promotion Program for Automated Driving systems for Universal Services) continues to make significant progress to realize automated driving via its intensive cooperative R&D program across 11 areas. Large-scale FOT for the final step to the goal began in October 2017 (See here for details).
- Francois Thibodeau, City of Montreal Innovation and Mobility Team
The City of Montreal has been conducting a number of pilot projects to further CV/AV that will be on display at the World Congress. They include a DSRC demonstration (RSU + Controller + cars (around Palais des congrès)) and the Notre-Dame Corridor de Mobilité Intégrée with Port Authority with the objective of using 40 RSU as part of the initial goal of SPaT Challenge and the intent to develop a strategy to integrate with existing infrastructure and enable new services that will ensure safe travel for people, optimize the mobility of people and goods, and promote a sustainable approach.
- Martin Knopp, Associate Administrator for Operations, U.S. Federal Highways Administration, U.S. DOT
While automated vehicles potentially offer new benefits in travel comfort, convenience, and affordable accessibility, there are also questions on how automated vehicles might negatively affect mobility, congestion, traffic flow, contribute to urban sprawl, diminish public transit use, increase fuel use, or lower tax revenues previously generated by driver licensing, fees, or fines. So, it is critical for the US DOT and the stakeholder community to prepare the roadway infrastructure for automation, explore the benefits of automation and other innovations, position FHWA to serve as a resource for transportation agencies, and assess current programs and policies to ensure they meet future needs and support innovation. The 2035 CV/AC scenario development process, the CV pilots, the NCHRP project 03-127 on Cybersecurity of Traffic Management Systems, the National SCMS (Security Credential Management System), research into Cooperative Adaptive Cruise Control (CACC), and ongoing work on truck platooning are emblematic of the Department’s efforts to pave the way for CV/AV.
- Bill Panos, Director, Wyoming DOT and AASHTO
The (US DOT funded) Wyoming DOT Connected Vehicle Pilot designed to test and deploy advanced dedicated short-range communication (DSRC) technology to improve safety and mobility (supported by 75 roadside units and 400 instrumented fleet vehicles), will use vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V), vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I), and infrastructure-to-vehicle (I2V) connectivity to improve monitoring and reporting of road conditions to vehicles on I-80 (402 miles along Wyoming’s southern border and the essential east-west connector for freight and passenger travel). The corridor averages more than 32 million tons of freight deliveries each year. The data collected by fleets and roadside units gives drivers in Wyoming improved travel information through services like the Wyoming 511 app and the commercial vehicle operator portal (CVOP).