TransportGooru

The following report about the Distracted Driving Summit is prepared Adam Hopps, a transportation whiz, who participated virtually over the past 2 days (September 30 & Oct 1, 2009), tirelessly taking notes while observing the Summit proceedings online.  Shortly after the event finish, Adam e-mailed his observations for sharing it with the rest of the community.  Please note that these are Adam’s thoughts and by no means should be considered as a summary of the event.  Thanks, Adam for helping us stay informed.

—————————————————————————————————————————————————

Thanks to the US D.O.T.’s efforts at opening up participation in their Distracted Driving Summit, I spent the last two days as one of 5,000 online viewers who watched industry reps, academics, legislators, and policy experts discuss what Secretary LaHood describes as, “the epidemic of distracted driving.”

For those of us not in the building the department also provided an online “chat and tweet room” so that every expert, novice, and personal advocate could give their two cents in response to what was being said live. It’s a perfect symbol of democracy in the Web 2.0 ear, where on one computer screen you can see live a public servant of 20 years desperately trying to convince people to adopt legislation to allow police to enforce drivers who text, while reading “Mark K” write: “We have too many cops. They like things orderly. Freedom is chaotic, so too many cops affects society.”

It’s also a reminder of how transportation is truly a democratic issue – perhaps one of the few issues that affect every individual daily. We all go places every day. We have loved ones who go places. We are doing this constantly, and as the summit pointed out of course, we move dangerously and with reckless behaviors.

The summit drew on a wide variety of people to make this point:

1. Victims of distracted driving reminding us of the end results
2. Transportation researchers informing us our risk of accident increases 2300% when we text
3. Law enforcement officials telling us the type of distraction doesn’t matter – all distractions are deadly
4. Legislators preaching to us that we need laws to prevent these behaviors
5. AAA reporting that people do it even though they know it’s dangerous
6. Wireless companies ensuring us they want to help as much as anyone
7. Teens sharing with us the life changing effects of their distracted driving.

. . . . And many more people from all areas of the transportation field reminding us that distracted driving kills.

The value of the summit was in the substance of the presenters and the nature of the experience. Even though Secretary LaHood ended the summit by announcing policy changes and an executive order from the President banning all federal officials from texting while driving, these two days were more about the U.S. DOT engaging academia, industry and public officials on an extremely important topic. Sure, there were plenty of Mark K’s commenting wildly in the chat room, but there were also thousands of people discussing the best way to enforce a texting law, or how to really educated teens on driving or even debating the nature of federal transportation laws.

So the people are engaged, we know we need to end distracted driving, but how do we do it? Two major solutions were presented: Do we create a society where law enforcement is responsible for punishing us when we fall to the temptation to text while driving? Or do we make our technology safer and more intuitive and design systems to prevent distractions?

In his closing, Secretary LaHood laid out the end goal: “Driving while distracted should just feel wrong – just as driving without a seat belt or driving while intoxicated.”

Click here to read the Secretary’s blog about the summit and to replay the proceedings.

Note: Please register your comments/kudos below for Adam in the comments box below.

(Source: Ars Technica; CNET)

At Technology Review’s EmTech conference last week, MIT professor Joel Schindall told the audience at a panel on energy storage why ultracapacitors may have a significant role to play in our transportation future. The good properties of these devices—fast charge/discharge cycles and an essentially unlimited number of cycles—make them a compelling choice for powering an electric vehicle. Schindall also explained why their downside, a far lower charge density than batteries, might not be as much of a problem as it might appear at first glance.

Schindall, who had spent some time away from academics, explained that during his first stint at MIT, a capacitor that could hold 350 Farads would have filled the whole stage. Before he returned, someone working on fuel cells had accidentally produced the first ultracapacitor. Now, with refinements, he was able to walk on stage with a 350 Farad ultracapacitor that was about the size of a D battery. The current generation of devices use activated carbon to hold charges, as its highly complex topology creates a lot of surface area across which charge differences can build up.

Although the improvements have been dramatic, Schindall said that ultracapacitors still badly lag batteries in terms of the storage density, holding only about five percent of the charge per volume of lithium batteris. Which is unfortunate, because they have some properties that would make them excellent for a variety of applications, including very rapid charging and the ability to withstand many more charge cycles than a battery. Schindall claimed they could be recharged indefinitely, since “greater than a million times, to me, is indefinite.”

Schindall’s research group has focused on replacing the disordered structure of activated carbon with a more ordered one that can increase the packing: carbon nanotubes. His research group has developed a vapor deposition process that can grow densely packed, vertically oriented clusters of carbon nanotubes on conducting surfaces. Current industrial processes for the production of carbon nanotubes tend to produce a variety of diameters and lengths, but Schindall told Ars that the process his group has developed keeps everything very regular—he was actually surprised by how even the lengths were.

In the U.S., early-stage companies designing the materials and electrolytes for ultracapacitors include Graphene Energy,EnerG2, and Ioxus. Much hyped EEStor, backed by venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, has signed asupply deal with electric vehicle company Zenn, although its products are still not commercially available.

Compared to batteries, ultracapacitors can’t store a lot of energy, so they wouldn’t typically be used alone to run plug-in electric vehicles. On the other hand, ultracapacitors are “power dense,” which means that they can discharge the energy they do have quickly. Conversely, they can be recharged quickly–in seconds or minutes, and with almost no degradation in performance over time, say backers.

Schindall projects that ultracapacitors eventually will be able to store as much as 25 percent of the energy of batteries, a jump he said would be “disruptive.” Right now, nanostructures developed by MIT researchers can hold twice as much energy as activated carbon. In the coming months, his team expects to show it can hold five times the energy as activated carbon, he said.

Click here to read the entire article.

(Source:  Autoblog green)

Image Courtesy: Autobloggreen

If nothing else, the big news of the day is that your iPhone can now make cars honk. The key fob would, of course, work just as well, but it’s not as flashy as using your phone.

The horn honking feature is part of the newly-released Zipcar App, which makes finding, reserving and controlling your Zipcar possible through the iPhone (and, over WiFi, the iPod touch). The app wont’ be able to unlock any car in the system – you still need to scan your Zipcard to start the reservation; only then is the app able to honk that horn. The App is free and available now in iTunes. You can take a tour here.

(Source: Green Car Congress)

Click here for more details

Researchers from the US Department of Energy’s (DOE) National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Idaho National Laboratory (INL) and Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) are cooperating to develop and test a method for predicting the real-world fuel and electricity consumption of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) by adjusting dynamometer test results. After examining data on the only PHEV currently available in large numbers, the new adjustment method shows promise for reasonably predicting PHEV average fuel and electricity use, despite differences in design.

Current rules for conventional vehicles do not work for plug-in hybrids because the vehicles run on both electricity and gasoline; industry debate centers on the rules for estimating miles per gallon. This was highlighted by the reaction to GM’s announcement that the Chevy Volt would attain 230 mpg in the city cycle, given a single charge per day, along with combined cycle electricity consumption of 25 kWh/100 miles, based on a draft EPA methodology. (Earlier post.)

PHEV testing is further complicated by the fact that these vehicles operate in two different modes based on the distance they are driven (initially depleting energy from the large vehicle battery, and eventually sustaining the battery charge for longer distance driving). Consensus is building on techniques to handle these first two complications, but one question that remains is how to adjust raw certification cycle test results to best predict a PHEV’s average real-world energy use.

Click here to read the entire article.

Funding of transportation-related infrastructure is at a crossroads. Traditional funding mechanisms, such as general and specific tax revenues, are proving to be insufficient to maintain existing facilities and fund expanded capacity. Infrastructure providers and operators are looking to users to make up for the shortfall. Transport-related infrastructure offers an exceptional opportunity for raising funds to establish and/or sustain such infrastructure while providing an attractive return on investment to both public and private investors. Key to achieving such returns are the prices charged to users. But how should user charges be set?

• Should every user pay the same fee?
• Is it practical, commercially worthwhile, and socially acceptable to charge differential prices?
• How should the price be set relative to the cost of alternatives modes or routings?
• How are these pricing principles changed when the facility is congested?
• Can pricing be used to reduce the problems of congestion?
• How does private operation of a facility change the pricing objectives?
• How might the public sector regulate prices?

These questions and more will be addressed in this two-and-half day course offered by the Transportation Center at Northwestern University.

Click Here for a Full-Brochure of the Program.

View Faculty

Facilities & Location

Registration & Fee*Registration

Program Fee (after 10.5.09) $2,700
Early Registration Fee (before 10.5.09) $2,160
Government & academic rate $2,160
Registration

Who Should Attend

The course is aimed at professionals who currently, or might in the future, set user charges; financial personnel; and engineers and project managers who oversee facility maintenance and new construction. It is also applicable to consultants to infrastructure providers, and those who finance infrastructure projects.

Course Format

Program content will be thoroughly integrated by the course faculty, so that participants will emerge with a comprehensive understanding and perspective of transportation infrastructure pricing strategies.  The focus of the course is on the economics of pricing. Some prior knowledge of economics, such as might be obtained from an introductory college level microeconomics course, will be useful.

Topics to be covered include:Full Program Schedule

For additional information please visit the Northwestern University Transportation Center website or contact: Ms. Diana Marek, Program Registrar – 847-491-2280; dmarek@northwestern.edu

Will a city need all the latest technology and they will solve the traffic problems? If not, then what are the correct choices.

Technology has been playing an important role in promoting vehicular safety, reducing driving stress, comfortable travel and increased  efficiency of the whole transport system. These technologies applied in a package are called “Intelligent Transport System (ITS)”. When carefully applied the ITS will create an efficient, safe and comfortable transport system.

Often, policy-makers are in a situation where they are not properly informed on the right technological choices. The GTZ Sourcebook module  on “Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS)” focuses on the choices for a city and also informs the reader of the various viable ITS options, their function and advantage. (German Technical Cooperation Agency (GTZ) is a member of the Sustainable Urban Transport Project (SUTP – ASIA).  The project is carried out in cooperation between German Technical Cooperation Agency (GTZ), the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP), CITYNET, UNHABITAT and the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA). The office is based in Bangkok (Thailand).

The focus of this module on ITS is on ITS applications that support the concept of sustainable transport by encouraging the following desirable outcomes which can be expected to find general acceptance:

• Equitable access and improved mobility and including reduced demand for motorised private transport; and improve the modal split in favor of walking, transit, and cycling;
• Improved transport efficiency and productivity;
• Improved safety and security; and
• Reduced environmental impact and improved ‘liveability’, especially in congested city centres.

The module was written by Mr. Phil Sayeg and Prof. Phil Charles and updated by the authors. The authors also wrote ITS Australia’s Intelligent Transport Systems Hand- book that was published in 2003 and edit their quarterly Members’ Information Pack. They are currently contributing to the development of the first ITS Strategy for Bangkok, Thailand.

More information on the updated module (3.15 Mb) and download links are available from the Sustainable Urban Transport Project (SUTP) website.

(Source: USA Today; Carkeys, UK)

Image Courtesy: USA Today

Automobile technology has exploded over the past two decades and todays cars are far more “intelligent” than the cars of the 70 and 80s.  These days there are more computers and sensors (collectively captured under the term Intelligent Vehicle, a terminology that is more familiar to those involved in Intelligent Transportation Systems) operating side by side with the driver to ensure that the vehicle operates at optimal efficiency while managing the safety of the vehicle by avoiding or alerting/warning about impending collisions.   The state of the art technology deployed in some cars can even slow down the vehicle by applying brakes without driver’s assistance, just to minimize the impact of the crash.  Now, that will soon become yesterday’s technology, thanks to vehicle safety pioneers at Volvo who are hard at work to deploy “full auto brake” and “pedestrian safety” functions.   USA Today reports on this latest vehicle technology development at the Volvo shop.

By now, collision avoidance systems that automatically apply the brakes to a speeding car have become pretty common. But while cars will suddenly slow if they detect an accident is about to happen, automakers have been hesitant to bring them to a sudden and full emergency stop.

Volvo is about to change all that. With the launch of the S60 next year, Volvo will introduce a “full auto brake” and “pedestrian safety” function. Cars will come a full stop at speeds less than about 15 miles an hour if their radar systems detect they are about to strike a car or a person. If the car is going faster, the car will try to come as close to a full stop as possible.

“If the car is traveling faster, the aim is to reduce the impact speed as much as possible. In most cases, we can reduce the collision force by about 75%,” says Thomas Broberg, Volvo’s safety expert. “Considering the large number of pedestrian fatalities that occur, if we manage to reduce the fatality risk 20 percent, this new function will make a big difference.”

Carkeys.com, a British website reports that this effort is part of Volvo’s 2020 vision, which has two goals – firstly, that nobody will be killed or injured in a new Volvo and, secondly, that the average CO2 emissions of the entire range will be below 100g/km. As part of addressing this first goal, the first step forward from the current situation regarding safety is the introduction of Collision Warning With Full Auto Brake and Pedestrian Safety, both of which will be introduced in the new S60, due to be launched next year, and Volvo is also upgrading its Adaptive Cruise Control so that it now maintains a gap to the vehicle in front at speeds right down to zero, rather than the present 18mph minimum.

Further development depends on vehicles being able to communicate with each other – the idea being that they recognise it and take steps to avoid a collision regardless of what the drivers are doing – and this in turn will require a suitable infrastructure. “We believe that the key is to use systems that are already available for other purposes,” says Jan Ivarsson, Volvo’s Head of Safety Strategy. “The air around us is already charged with communication, most of it used for pleasure or convenience.

“Adding traffic safety communication to this existing architecture is a far more sensible route than trying to invent and agree on a completely new ‘language’ for communicating in the traffic environment.”

Fifty years ago, Volvo introduced seat belts, which are now a “standard” in all vehicles entering the market(s) and has been credited for saving millions of lives world over since its introduction.  Hope this new introduction can repeat the magic for the 2nd time and further cut the vehicle-related fatalities and crashes.  Click here to read the entire article.