Skip to main content

Virginia installs ATM to ease congestion on I-66

The Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) has begun work on installing an active traffic management |(ATM) system on interstate 66 through Arlington, Fairfax and Prince William counties from the Washington, DC line to Route 29 in Gainesville. Designed and built by TransCore, the system is intended to improve safety and incident management and will include new sign gantries, shoulder and lane control signs, speed displays, incident and queue detection, and increased traffic camera coverage.
November 17, 2014 Read time: 2 mins
The 1747 Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) has begun work on installing an active traffic management |(ATM) system on interstate 66 through Arlington, Fairfax and Prince William counties from the Washington, DC line to Route 29 in Gainesville.  

Designed and built by 139 TransCore, the system is intended to improve safety and incident management and will include new sign gantries, shoulder and lane control signs, speed displays, incident and queue detection, and increased traffic camera coverage.

Sensors, traffic cameras and overhead signs will enable VDOT to change the signs to give drivers real time advance information on upcoming traffic, crashes, congestion or closed lanes. VDOT hopes that getting people out of closed lanes before they reach incidents will make the slowdowns less abrupt and less severe. If there is standard traffic, the signs could be changed to give drivers a warning about exactly how far away the congestion begins.

Although ATM is a relatively new concept in managing traffic in the United States, it is popular in Europe, such as the Highways Agency’s smart motorways project in the UK.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Fotech Solutions performs acoustic track
    July 14, 2020
    Harnessing distributed acoustic sensing technology across urbanised city transport networks can deliver real advantages for traffic flow, says Stuart Large of Fotech Solutions
  • US Cities push for smarter poles
    June 25, 2018
    US Cities The need to connect existing infrastructure has led various US transit authorities into imaginative alleyways: David Crawford examines some new roles for street furniture. US cities are vying with each other in developing schemes to create a new generation of connected places. Their strategies include taking advantage of their streetlight poles’ height and ubiquity to give them new roles in supporting intelligent nodes. They are now being equipped for collecting real-time data on key transport
  • ITS World Congress 2025: home runs and deep dives on Tech Tours
    July 16, 2025
    There's plenty to see beyond the conference and exhibition at #ITSAtlanta2025
  • Sony helps Rio get a better view of the Olympics
    June 29, 2016
    With the Olympics approaching, Sony’s Stephane Clauss examines how the latest camera technologies can help cities cope with the huge crowds attending major events. This August will see more than 10,000 athletes head to Rio de Janeiro for the Olympics Games. Alongside them will be their coaching staff, a hoard of logistics teams, thousands of volunteer marshals (London 2012 had 70,000) and millions of spectators. All such major events have nervous jitters on the way to the opening ceremony. This year has see