Skip to main content

Association news around the globe

ITS New Mexico’s 2015 award has gone to the state’s Bernalillo County for establishing implementation criteria for adaptive traffic control and the installation of the state’s first system on Alameda Boulevard in Albuquerque. This uses Rhythm Engineering’s InSync Technology.
March 15, 2016 Read time: 3 mins
An InSync installation on Alameda Boulevard Albuquerque, New Mexico.
ITS New Mexico

Award for adaptive signalling documentation


8357 ITS New Mexico’s 2015 award has gone to the state’s Bernalillo County for establishing implementation criteria for adaptive traffic control and the installation of the state’s first system on Alameda Boulevard in Albuquerque. This uses Rhythm Engineering’s InSync Technology.

The county, the most populous in the state, has developed a file of the system engineering documentation needed to support the case for deployment. Its initiative is being followed by other NM administrations, with the state DoT adopting the documentation as a template for wider take up. 

Video cameras collect real-time traffic information to enable the optimisation of a new timing system across a designated set of intercommunicating signals covering seven intersections by adjusting green phases in peak periods. The county states that this does not significantly increase waiting times on side streets. Another phase is due to become operational by spring 2016.

“Bernalillo has set the standard and is leading the way for municipalities around us,” says county commissioner Lonnie Talbert.

%$Linker: 2 External <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-16"?><dictionary /> 0 0 0 TTS Italia false #TTS-Italia true false%>
%$Linker: 2 External <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-16"?><dictionary /> 0 0 0 ITS Australia ITS OZ false #ITS-Austraila true false%>
%$Linker: 2 External <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-16"?><dictionary /> 0 0 0 oLinkExternal ITS Finland ITS FInalnd false #ITS-Finland true false%>


TTS Italia

Franco-Italian drive for new ITS markets


To join forces in competing effectively for, and winning, new business in the growing connected vehicle and smart mobility sectors is the challenge being set for French and Italian ITS-oriented companies, following a December 2015 meeting in Rome staged by 4155 TTS Italia and Business France. TTS secretary general Olga Landolfi stressed the value of the event for exchanging experience and information on best practice.

She also highlighted the importance of EC Member States implementing the ITS national plans they submitted to the European Commission. Full-scale enactment of Italy’s own plan, she said, could increase the existing transport infrastructure’s capacity by up to 10%.

“In France,” said French Embassy economic adviser Martin Landais, “the sector is worth between €5bn and €6.5bn (US5.5bn and US$7.2bn) and there is a political will to encourage and support ITS development.” He cited a pilot SCOOP@F project which is focussing on delivering real-time traffic information into vehicles, and due for national rollout during 2017.


ITS Australia

Lifetime accolade for Australia’s Garrett


858 ITS Australia has presented a lifetime achievement award to Andrew Garrett for four decades of service to the transport industry. He is best known for his introduction of Australia’s first school traffic zones and for working on the development of the country’s first dynamically variable speed limits.

  Garrett has also served as an ITS Australia board member at various stages over the past 25 years.

Other winners included: 
Seeing Machines, for their driver distraction and fatigue intervention technology for commercial vehicle fleets. 

The Department of Transport and Main Roads Queensland for its real-time travel information system installed across the state’s south eastern network. 

Data61, for its Advanced Data Analytics in Transport (ADAIT) research into improving urban traffic modelling.


ITS Finland

ITS Finland’s Sampo Hietanen resigns

Sampo Hietanen has resigned after three years as CEO of 7350 ITS Finland to head up the newly-formed 8356 MaaS (Mobility as a Service) Finland – the first such mobility company in the world.

He aims to put into practice the MaaS concept he has helped to create, of replacing private car ownership with a range of subscription-based multi-modal travel options.

He believes that these can “beat the service level of a car, or at least be comparable to it”. 

Hietanen hopes to get an initial system for Finland under way in 2016 and “in one or two other interesting areas.”

A vigorous proponent of MaaS, he presented the concept to 7075 ITS Ireland in November 2015.

As ITS International went to press, ITS Finland was in the process of appointing his successor.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Workshop helps SMEs enter electric vehicles supply chain
    February 27, 2014
    The EU funded Innovative Transport SME Support Action (INTRASME) SME Opportunity Workshop in Berlin on 3 April 2014 will provide small and medium enterprises (SMEs) with an opportunity to understand the electric vehicle supply chain and how it can differ from the more traditional internal combustion engine vehicle supply chain process. The workshop, co-located with Supercapacitors Europe, will focus on the marketing opportunities for SMEs in the light carbon vehicle, light aircraft and smart mobility sec
  • Successful first day for MaaS Market Conference
    March 22, 2017
    ITS International’s Maas Market conference opened this morning to a packed crowd of over 200 delegates at the Inmarsat Conference Centre in London.
  • Elon Musk unveils Los Angeles tunnel plan
    December 19, 2018
    Elon Musk, the boss of Tesla and SpaceX, has opened the first tunnel in a planned network under Los Angeles to help ease congestion in the US city. The world’s media was invited this week to travel in the mile-long tunnel – built by Musk’s Boring Company under the Hawthorne district - in an electric Tesla vehicle. The trip was described as “almost a white knuckle ride” by the BBC: “A bumpy two-minute journey in a modified Model X through a concrete tunnel with a blue neon light in the ceiling.” A C
  • London comes first for public transport but suffers from congested roads, says Here Technologies
    November 30, 2018
    London has the best public transport system in the world - but the UK capital’s roads are among the most congested, says a new report. Here Technologies’ Urban Mobility Index ranked transit efficiency in 38 cities based on their public transport frequency, density and coverage as well as how public transport performs against car speed. Just behind London are Zurich, Toronto, Washington, DC and Stockholm. However, London was ranked 34th for congestion. The top five least-congested cities are: H