Conversations about Connected Work Zones

2021 is behind us.  Road equipment is in the shop preparing for 2022.  The trade show season is starting, and it is the time of year for conversations and planning.  For me, the end of the season has brought on one conversation after another where agency folks and contractors have asked ‘where should they start with connecting work zones?’

In 2016 a couple of us from #ATSSA made the first appearance at the Automated Vehicle Symposium (AVS) and presented the realities of work zones and pavement markings.  That session, and follow-up sessions in ’17 and ’18 started the auto and highway industries down a path where road construction equipment has become an IoT that speaks to the vehicles traveling our highways.  We have defined data protocols through the #WZDX, contractors seeing real improvements to safety are upfitting their fleets with connected technologies, and the auto industry is making plans to put this data in the dash of cars both automated and traditional.  A little more than 5 years after we first addressed the AVS it is safe to say that 2022 will be a breakout year for connected work zones.

So, where do we start?  I think it is important for practitioners in the field to understand that, while there is a lot of technical debate about complex protocols, the first steps are pretty simple.  The navigation and auto companies are going to start by looking for those places in the road network where a travel-lane has been impacted by construction.  These companies are looking for reliable data, generated through IoT methods, gathered into one or two databases that combine to represent the whole industry.  What that means for contractors and agencies is that we need to get our lane closure notifications automated, and that means connected arrow boards that send their status to a shared database.

At iCone, we are into our fifth year upfitting all brands of arrow boards with connectivity through an IoT. We have learned a lot.  

First, the construction industry is willing.  Contractors are already embracing the opportunity for safety improvements by communicating to drivers.  Contractors are leading public agencies 8:1 on adopting connected arrow boards.  As a result, thousands of lane closure events are real-time connected to millions of drivers in North America every day.

Secondly, connecting arrow boards is a great place to start.  No training is necessary, workers already use this traffic control tool daily.  Highly reliable and very affordable lane closure data from connected arrow boards are allowing the auto/navigation industry to make a big step toward safer navigation and automation.  

Marking the location of lane closures doesn’t have to be a big task.  Our existing traffic control plans and the equipment used in them are largely sufficient, we just need to add connectivity.  Arrow boards already mark almost every lane closure on the interstate system.  Contractors and agencies can upgrade their legacy arrow board fleet or buy new equipment that is connected.  Iowa was able to upgrade the construction industry’s equipment in less than one year.

As an industry we can get this conversion done in a matter of years, not decades.  After we get the arrow boards done we will move on to portable signals, flaggers and striping operations.