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Executive Summary

This guidance report is a compilation of documents created during the Camera Phone Proof-of-Concept (POC) Project. The goal of this effort is to improve incident management and response activities in the event of a traffic incident or other emergency situations that affect traffic operations. The project has two main objectives - first to demonstrate the feasibility of using commercial cellular phones equipped with cameras to capture and deliver traffic incident imagery that is useful to follow-on responders, such as tow companies, HAZMAT remediation services, health departments, or highway repair teams. The second objective is to assess the value of these images to follow-on responders based on improvements in time, safety, and efficiency while responding to and clearing traffic incidents.

The Camera Phone POC Project was conducted in partnership with the University of Maryland’s Center for Advanced Transportation Technology (UMD-CATT) and coordinated with the Capital Wireless Information Net (CapWIN) Program1. The United States Department of Transportation (USDOT) Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) Joint Program Office (JPO) and the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) Office of Operations managed the technical tasks, which were performed by UMD-CATT and Noblis, Inc. (formerly Mitretek Systems, Inc.). Independent evaluation of this project was provided by Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC).

Project Background

Municipalities throughout the United States continue to encounter increased levels of traffic congestion. This congestion is often caused by a variety of roadway incidents, including automobile crashes, HAZMAT spills, and disabled vehicles. In many cases, these incidents produce conditions that result in secondary accidents further exacerbating congestion and creating dangerous situations for the responders attempting to clear the incident or manage traffic through the incident scene.

During a traffic incident, emergency response agencies (e.g., law enforcement, fire, rescue, and safety service) often require additional assistance from follow-on responders in order to clear the incident from the roadway. While first responders can use cellular phones, radios, or dispatcher services to call for assistance, they typically do not have the ability to exchange detailed imagery to the follow-on responders. Although closed circuit television (CCTV) cameras have been deployed and cover large segments of the road network in many metropolitan areas, there are many regions without such coverage. In addition, specific details that would be useful to follow-on responders may not be visible to CCTV operators due to vehicle positioning or the CCTV camera resolution. As a result, follow-on responders may arrive at the incident scene without the proper equipment (e.g., tow trucks, HAZMAT transporters) or the personnel required to address the situation quickly and efficiently. In many of these cases, follow-on responders must to return to their station or call for additional support in order to get the right equipment to the scene. This results in longer incident duration, thereby worsening traffic congestion, increasing the potential for secondary incidents, and prolonging a hazardous situation.

Project Overview & Chronology

The Camera Phone POC Project examines the utility of capturing and distributing incident scene imagery to towing and recovery providers, HAZMAT remediation contractors, and other follow-on response organizations using commercial cellular phones and services.

The following summarizes the efforts from the Camera Phone POC Project and the anthology of documents comprising this guidance report. This collection of materials provides valuable insight on the design, development, deployment, and operation of camera phone systems to be used within the public safety or transportation domains. It also presents the benefits and limitations of such systems for those desiring to implement similar capabilities.

The Camera Phone Proof-of-Concept Project - Operational Concept document identifies the general processes, roles and responsibilities, and flows of information that illustrate how this project was expected to improve incident management and response activities. The general concept suggests that at some point during a traffic incident, first-responders might decide they require additional assistance from other response organizations not yet on the scene, such as towing and recovery companies, HAZMAT remediation companies, highway repair crews, etc. In addition to notifying their dispatcher via radio, they can also take pictures of the incident scene and send the images directly to the appropriate follow-on responders, who might be located at central dispatching facilities or in the field.

It is expected that incident imagery will help follow-on responders establish a better understanding of the incident, which will allow them to better define their operational procedures and select the most appropriate equipment or personnel before leaving for the incident scene. Consequently, this should allow follow-on responders to arrive at the incident scene with the proper resources, resulting in accelerated incident remediation and reduced traffic congestion.

With CapWIN coordinating the Camera Phone POC project, testing activities were conducted in the Washington D.C. metropolitan area. The users selected to participate in the POC study were selected from existing CapWIN members, and included personnel from the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT), the Virginia State Police (VSP)2, and several local commercial towing and recovering providers. During the initial phase of this project, these participants were involved in the definition of user needs, which were subsequently organized into a specification used to identify the appropriate technologies for this POC.

The Camera Phone Proof-of-Concept Project – Technical Requirements Specification document defines the mobile devices and the communication services needed to support this project. Specifications are categorized by the following functions: taking a photograph, composing a multimedia message (digital picture with text and/or audio annotation), distributing a multimedia message, receiving a multimedia message, and reviewing the multimedia message. This document also identifies optional specifications, which are not critical to the POC but address new attributes of the devices and services used in multimedia messaging and could provide significant enhancement to a camera phone system used in subsequent operational deployments.

The specification does not stipulate system performance requirements (e.g., message latency), although the goal for this concept system is for the field user to be able to take a digital picture, compose a multimedia message, and begin the appropriate distribution process for that message in one minute or less.There are notechnical security requirements (e.g., user authentication, message encryption) in this conceptual phase of the study. Institutional and administrative security issues are addressed via the existing policies of the participating agencies.

The Camera Phone Proof-of-Concept Project – System Description document provides a basic explanation of the systems and technologies employed during the Camera Phone POC Project. While the description of most components is generic, there is sufficient information to gain an understanding of the systems used for commercial multimedia messaging services (MMS).

The System Description document also describes the specific mobile devices (e.g., camera phones) and wireless services that were selected for use with the Camera Phone POC Project. A marketplace survey was used to identify commercial products and services that met the Technical Requirements Specification. From this list, those that met the budget, schedule and availability constraints were considered for selection.

Infrastructure components include Internet email and web servers, which may be part of the network service provider’s system, or may be part of the organization’s in-house IT infrastructure. While UMD-CATT leveraged existing CapWIN computer/network infrastructure to the maximum extent possible, some additional hardware and services were required to carry out this project.

The Camera Phone Proof of Concept Project - Evaluation Strategy White Paper presents the objectives and areas of concentration for the evaluation of this project. The focus is to qualitatively assess the benefits realized by the use of camera phones to improve response capabilities for traffic incidents or emergency situations. This includes user satisfaction, system performance, system functionality, value, and other institutional and technical issues. Methods used to collect information for this evaluation include field observation, user interviews, archived picture/message assessment, and archived incident data.

The Camera Phone Proof-of-Concept Project – Operational Procedures document describes the actions required to operate the POC system. Procedures are classified as either “domain” or “technical”. Domain procedures identify the proper instance and protocol for users to employ the messaging system (e.g., under what conditions should a police officer consider using the messaging system), while technical procedures identify the proper operation and use of the system.

To facilitate participation, the operational procedures are summarized in the two-page Camera Phone Proof-of-Concept Project – Quick Reference Guide. In addition, a Camera Phone Proof-of-Concept Project – Training Guide was created, and UMD-CATT conducted a two-hour training class for those participating in the study.

The Camera Phone Proof-of-Concept Project - Readiness Report was intended to describe the readiness of all systems and participants at the beginning of the demonstration/test period for this project. As the hardware distribution and user training continued beyond the kickoff date, this document expanded to cover both the status of systems and participants at the start of the demonstration/test period, and the status of the systems after completing user training and hardware distribution.

A user debriefing was held at the end of the demonstration/test period. Two briefings were presented to the project participants. The USDOT Camera Phone Proof-of-Concept Project Technical Issues Overview detailed to the users specific technical issues encountered during the evaluation. The Camera Phone Proof of Concept Project Evaluation Update described to the users the evaluation strategy, evaluation status, summary of usage, and preliminary findings.

The operational improvement provided by the new system and the anecdotal experiences of the participants was documented in the Camera Phone Proof-of-Concept Project – Lessons-Learned Report, which has been posted in the USDOT ITS Lessons Learned database (www.benefitcost.its.dot.gov). This report identifies insights with regard to using such a system for incident and emergency management practices, including:

Potential success areas also exist in ITS customer satisfaction. Unexpectedly, users find it relatively easy to navigate and easy to transmit images and audio clips.

The Camera Phone POC Project serves as a means to promote the USDOT's broader Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) goals of improving safety and mobility in road travel. Used to their fullest potential, camera phones in service for incident management can assist with relaying information which may have an impact on the type of equipment, route of approach, and subsequent responder training.

[1] The Capital Wireless Information Net (CapWIN) program is a partnership between the States of Maryland and Virginia, and the District of Columbia to develop an interoperable first responder data communication and information-sharing network. http://www.capwin.org

[2] VSP helped establish the concept but was not able to participate in the field study due to limited resources

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