1. TRAFFIC MANAGEMENT Real time information
P
robably anyone reading this
has been in this situation more
times than they can count.
The traffic on the motorway
has already slowed to a
crawl and the VMS sign ahead flashes:
CONGESTION NEXT 20km.
Brilliant! At this point you are
committed to stay in the jam with the
most viable alternate routes well behind
you and the ones ahead now filling up as
drivers bail out at the first opportunity,
quickly tying up the secondary roads.
You are on a modern, well-managed
highway in a major city with a good
current generation ITS infrastructure. The
traffic management centre is fully aware of
the situation. Roadside cameras and loop
detectors in the system are all working
perfectly generating a stream of images
and probe data in real-time as they were
designed and (procured at great expense)
to do. So why didn’t all this technology
prevent the traffic jam that you and about
30,000 others are sitting in right now
or that the one that millions around the
world experience on a daily basis?
The simple answer is that real-time
transport management, no matter how
much data is available or how quickly and
effectively it can be processed, simply isn’t
good enough.
For decision-makers from city managers
to operations centre supervisors to
individual drivers to have the means to
avoid delays caused by any number of
events, they must be able to anticipate,
forecast and take action well ahead of
what’s happening at that moment.
MORETHAN AN EDUCATED
GUESS
This is exactly the situation that
predictive analytics are designed to
address – for virtually all transport
modes whether highway, bus, ferry, rail,
or any combination or sub-category
thereof. As it has in other areas of both
artificial intelligence and ‘big data’
management technology, IBM and
other members of the global ICT
David E Pickeral on when real time isn’t good enough
Predictive
text
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2. TRAFFIC MANAGEMENT
community are developing predictive analytics as the essential
next step in ITS evolution.
Recognising the substantial investment in transport
monitoring technology to date, predictive analytics is about
enhancement not replacement. Enhanced assets such as
analytical tools, trackers, dashboards, ATMS and TIS become
an order of magnitude more effective by integrating multiple
sources of data – in far larger volumes than ever before possible
– to look ahead of real-time with a high degree of accuracy.
A SENSE OF HISTORY
IBM’s Traffic Prediction Tool (TPT), which has been piloted
in Singapore, is in the process of being selectively deployed
elsewhere around the world. Through its synthesis of both
real time and historical data, TPT is able to provide extremely
accurate predictions about how and to what extent specific
incidents or events will affect all modes within the transport
ecosystem collectively and individually. As a result, all
stakeholders are empowered with accurate information
accompanied by actionable recommendations far earlier than
ever before possible. This gives transport operators the ability
to mitigate or even eliminate problems in the transport system,
not merely react to them.
The result is that predictive analytics, when used in concert
with advanced traffic management, ensures the reliable
and unhindered flow of goods and people through existing
Traffic in Singapore which piloted IBM’sTraffic PredictionTool
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3. Real time information
DavidPickeralisGlobalDevelopmentExecutiveforSmarter
TransportationatIBM,basedinWashington,DC
depicker@us.ibm.com
www.linkedin.com/in/pickeral
ReadmoreinourARCHIVESatthinkinghighways.com/archives.aspx
fyi
transport channels without the need to expand physical
infrastructure or replace existing ITS systems. Additionally,
there are socio-economic and environmental benefits. In any
geography or economy, that translates to a win-win situation.
Today there are more than a billion cars worldwide and that
number will double by 2020. Traffic increased 236 per cent
as the population grew 20 per cent between 1982 and 2001 in
the US. Clearly the situation demands a different paradigm
so we can get more throughput out of existing road, rail,
runway and waterway infrastructure. By starting the process
of deploying analytical tools across all modes as budgets and
schedules allow, transportation planner will take positive
steps to ensure that as the years progress transport modes
of the world stay ahead of this growth both collectively and
individually, ensuring the flow of goods and people as the
century progresses.