Air Quality & Weather Systems

Ireland’s National Roads Authority (NRA) has awarded a five-year contract worth US$4.9 million to Finnish road weather information solutions provider, Vaisala for the supply of winter maintenance decision-making tools, solutions and services. The turn-key contract is the continuation of a long-standing partnership between Vaisala and the NRA, and includes maintenance of over eighty weather stations across Ireland as well as a provision for expanding the network with new weather stations and thermal mappi

The California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) recently completed a smart corridor project on State Route 12 in Solano, Sacramento and San Joaquin counties, and I-5 in San Joaquin County. The project utilises intelligent transportation system (ITS) technology for five electronic message signs and four closed-circuit TV cameras to provide drivers with up to date travel information, enabling them to choose an alternate route in the event of congestion or roadway incidents.

The municipality of Quito is investing US$30 million in a bid to improve transit in the city. The city has also replaced 6,000 old traffic signals and installed almost nine kilometers of fibre optic cable, together with 1,700 cameras. A mobility management centre has been opened, which will monitor traffic and manage the new traffic signal system currently installed at 312 intersections. The city hopes to control up to 600 intersections by late 2014.

The Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) is to begin work on a US$24 million intelligent transportation system (ITS) network in north-west Florida. The network will include 183 traffic cameras, 17 overhead message signs, 135 microwave vehicle detectors, 40 travel time sensors, three road and weather information sensors and eight highway advisory radios.

Motorists in Singapore can look forward to improved real-time traffic information and better traffic flow as the country’s Land Transport Authority (LTA) begins works to enhance existing electronic signboards along the expressways. The 380 existing island-wide expressway motoring advisory system (EMAS) electronic signs will be replaced with thirteen new signs. The new signs will be more readable, as they can display text and simple graphics in up to seven colours, including green, cyan and purple. The first

The Vaisala road weather system deployed by Idaho Transportation Department has won a "Best New Innovative Product, Service or Application for 2013" award at the 2013 National Rural ITS Conference in St Cloud, Minnesota. The award highlights new technology that furthers the development and/or deployment of rural intelligent transportation systems (ITS) applications, as well as specific and measurable outcomes that result from the product or service. The Idaho Transportation Department, using Vaisala's

One of the ten key projects launched in 2006 by Korea’s Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport aims to build the world’s most intelligent highways. In a world where eighty per cent of traffic accidents on expressways are attributed to driver negligence, Korea records the lowest level of traffic safety among OECD member countries. The smart highway project aims to reduce the accident rate and encourage people to use expressways more conveniently by integrating information, automobile and road mana

Four major bridges over the lower Mississippi are to get intelligent transportation systems (ITS) upgrades, thanks to a US$10 million grant from the US Department of Transportation TIGER (Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery) fund. The project will expand existing ITS systems in each of the three states to complement previous state and private investments.

Ecuador’s Municipal Public Transport Company of Guayaquil (EPMTG), which was created to manage traffic and pedestrian access routes in the Ecuadorian city, is to implement an intelligent transportation system (ITS) from January 2014. A traffic management centre will monitor the city’s 350,000 vehicles using cameras, photo radar, traffic signals and variable message signs. Around 1,500 intelligent traffic lights will be connected to 150 cameras. An international tender to implement the system was laun