Research Progress & Insights

Goal 1: Professional Development

• From 2010 to June 2014, the ITS PCB program delivered professional development by:
  • Analyzing audience needs to better target specific groups of ITS practitioners and decision makers.
  • Delivering and archiving 78 T3 webinars.
  • Partnering with professional organizations such as the Consortium for ITS Training and Education to provide free online training courses, including five new courses in Performance Measures, Cyber Security, Archived Data, Road Weather Management and more.
  • Developing 35 online ITS Standards Training modules taken by over 600 students.
• Reached over 7,000 transportation professionals in 2013.
• Delivered 26 training sessions on emerging research topics to state chapter meetings of ITS America.
• Developed and delivered pilot Connected Vehicle 101 workshop in 2013.
• Developed and delivered two ITS case studies, Adaptive Signal Control and National ITS Architecture, to expose students to real-world decision making through a scenario-based learning tool.

• Feedback from the ITS community identified that easily accessible, free online training is a priority. Stakeholder requests for the latest information about Connected Vehicle research resulted in the CV101 pilot in 2013. University faculty chose case studies as the preferred method of introducing ITS topics into their courses.

• Web-based version of CV101 and additional course development are underway.
• ITS Transit Standards Training modules in 2015.
• Build on success of ITS case studies to offer additional pilot programs to facilitate ITS teaching in the academic environment in 2014.

Goal 2: Leadership Outreach

• In 2012-2013, The ITS PCB Program conducted audience analysis and identified partnership opportunities for expanded leadership outreach, within transportation operations and with future leaders in the university environment.
• Partnered with National Transportation Operations Coalition to provide workshops for potential model users.
• Held university workshop with younger faculty members to promote ITS resources for the classroom and deliver message of ITS as a dynamic and engaging career. Collaborated on first-ever student day at 2011 ITS World Congress, where students met with ITS leaders.

• Highly successful ITS deployment is typically led by a local champion who has both the vision and knowledge to facilitate local efforts. Based on this understanding, new PCB efforts are being developed to better develop and support champions, through partnership opportunities.

• Partner with the Operations Center of Excellence on a leadership pilot program in 2014.
• Continue to provide university faculty and student leadership opportunities.

Goal 3: Knowledge Exchange

• Developed the ITS ePrimer to provide transportation professionals with fundamental concepts and practices related to ITS technologies. The ITS ePrimer is both a stand-alone reference document for the practitioner as well as a text for education and training programs, incorporating multimedia examples about currently deployed ITS technologies and connected vehicles.
• Redesigned website to provide an ITS learning portal for one-stop shopping for courses, technical assistance, technology transfer, and P2P events. This effort included an improved search capability of the T3 Archives and the addition of an ITS for Students section.
• Integrated T3 Archive with the ITS Knowledge Resources Databases. Databases offer a unique collection of reports, studies, technical documents, and instructional guides for planning, procuring, and deploying ITS.
• Proposed PCB Video Library to expand knowledge of existing and emerging ITS technologies in an engaging format.
• Initiated update of 60+ transit fact sheets.

• New learning technologies offer innovative solutions for providing on-the-job learning in a 24/7 environment. The ITS PCB program is working with the ITS community to identify how to leverage existing programs, such as the T3 archive, while adding new solutions such as the ePrimer or Video Library.

• Continue development of ITS PCB website as a learning portal by integrating partners’ course offerings.
• Update and maintain ITS ePrimer with new information and examples.
• Start building video library; choose 1 to 2 courses for pilots for 2014.

Goal 4: Technology Transfer

• Supported ITS JPO’s goal to accelerate research into deployment by offering training on emerging research results and foundational topics that support the adoption of new technology such as standards training and systems engineering.
• Developed baseline of current ITS Program technology transfer process.
• Worked with Connected Vehicle Test Beds, and ICM Program, to incorporate technology transfer principles in their Knowledge and Technology Transfer plans.

• A recent study on technology transfer highlighted that the ITS Program is responsible for one of the largest research programs in the US DOT. However, technology transfer is a significant challenge because the program’s research is not directly tied to an implementation program.
• The report on technology transfer has helped highlight the many other innovative mechanisms to technology transfer that are being utilized by other government agencies, national laboratories, universities, and industry. The PCB program is identifying whether new solutions can be implemented in the near term to address current challenges in ITS operations and deployment.

• Restructure the Peer-to-Peer technical assistance program so that PCB resources extend to more agencies facing ITS planning, procurement, deployment, and operational challenges.
• Expand Connected Vehicle pilot workshop to make it web-enabled and cover topics with more depth. Develop new course offerings on emerging technologies.
• Evaluate the impact of foundational topics training to see if it has changed the behavior of students to following systems engineering principles and apply standards in the design, procurement, deployment, and operation of ITS technologies.