The 55 roadside units report road hazards, optimize de-icing operations, warn of congestion and emergency vehicles, and monitor pavement condition. The instrumented vehicles, which include 10 cars, a semi-truck, and a bus, have forward-collision, road-departure, blind-spot, lane-change, and curve-speed warning system and advance geographic information systems. They also have recording devices that download to the University Transportation Center so that researchers can observe in real-time and accumulate data for later transportation.

Test bed development and vehicle instrumentation will be finalized by the end of the year. Research already underway includes safety and human factors of adaptable stop/yield signs; connected vehicle applications for adaptive lighting; intersection management using in-vehicle speed advisory/adaptation; eco-speed control; “intelligent” awareness system for roadway workers; emergency vehicle-to-vehicle communication; connected vehicle enabled freeway merge management; infrastructure safety assessment; infrastructure pavement assessment; and connected vehicle-infrastructure application development for addressing safety and congestion issues related to public transportation, pedestrians, and bicyclists. Future research projects include optimized routing, road hazard reporting, optimized de-icing, beacon for at-risk pedestrians, and vehicle-to-vehicle communication to enhance rear signaling.

The consortium universities will conduct education and outreach programs to safely and efficiently implement successful connected vehicle and infrastructure technologies.

The Northern Virginia test bed is a tremendous asset with respect to testing and deployment of research findings. Key elements of this test bed are strong partnerships with local agencies, including law enforcement and transit providers, particularly the Fairfax County Transit Authority.

—Center Director Tom Dingus, who is also director of the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute

Southwest Virginia test bed resources include Route 460 in Montgomery County, for real-world testing as in Northern Virginia, and Virginia’s Smart Road, a closed circuit transportation research facility in Blacksburg where experimental procedures can be tested.

The test beds provide a variety of roadway types, topography, and driver types that allow us to exercise connected-vehicle systems across a range of environments under controlled conditions, so that a high number of equipped vehicle interactions will occur.

—Morgan State Consortium Leader Andrew Farkas, professor and director of the National Transportation Center