Pilot Test of a Thermal Infrared Video System for Performance Measurement of Roadway Snow and Ice Control
Real-time performance measurement can provide quality control for productivity improvement and efficient use of resources. Visual roadway snow and ice control (RSIC) performance measurement is common when assessing the state of road surface (snow-covered, icy, bare, etc.), but is generally a subjective assessment made by RSIC operators and/or supervisors. The objective of this project was to pilot-test an objective method for processing real-time thermal imagery comparing roadway conditions in front of, and behind, an active RSIC vehicle. Two cameras were mounted on a plow truck, one forward-facing and one backward-facing, and test imagery was collected in the winters of 2014, 2015, and 2016. Differences in the temperature of the road surface created by the RSIC pass were quantified with a tool developed in MATLAB®. The tool imports the dual thermal video recordings and extracts still images every second. Analysis zones are captured and re-oriented and the difference in image intensity (a representation of temperature change) between the two images is calculated on a pixel-by-pixel basis. The tool was successfully applied to a RSIC service run and the average difference between the front and rear images on a reconnaissance (no plowing or spreading) and plowing pass across 4 minutes (240 frames at one per second) of imagery was calculated at 6.6 and 14.5, respectively (statistically significant at p = .01). While thermal video is well matched to RSIC evaluation, there are a number of challenges that make it impossible to implement this performance measure at a full scale for real-time feedback.
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Supplemental Notes:
- This paper was sponsored by TRB committee AHD65 Standing Committee on Winter Maintenance.
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Corporate Authors:
500 Fifth Street, NW
Washington, DC United States 20001 -
Authors:
- Sullivan, James L
- Dowds, Jonathan
- Scott, Darren M
- Novak, David C
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Conference:
- Transportation Research Board 96th Annual Meeting
- Location: Washington DC, United States
- Date: 2017-1-8 to 2017-1-12
- Date: 2017
Language
- English
Media Info
- Media Type: Digital/other
- Features: Figures; References;
- Pagination: 13p
- Monograph Title: TRB 96th Annual Meeting Compendium of Papers
Subject/Index Terms
- TRT Terms: Image analysis; Methodology; Performance measurement; Snow and ice control; Thermal imagery
- Subject Areas: Highways; Maintenance and Preservation;
Filing Info
- Accession Number: 01627650
- Record Type: Publication
- Report/Paper Numbers: 17-00649
- Files: TRIS, TRB, ATRI
- Created Date: Feb 27 2017 5:12PM