Pilot Application of Biometric-Based Vehicle Occupancy Detection on Managed Lanes for Congestion Reduction

The Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act (MAP-21’s) focus on performance measurement ushered in a shift in emphasis from moving vehicles to moving people, measured as passenger throughput. This recognizes the underutilized capacity of empty seats in buses, vanpools, and single-occupant passenger cars on urban Interstate highways, even as these facilities experience peak period traffic congestion. One approach to optimizing efficiency and reliability of travel for all transportation system users is to initiate programs to incentivize filling those empty seats, thereby reducing the number of peak period vehicles on the highway. Such programs can now take advantage of emerging vehicle occupancy detection technology. This enables measuring the number of passengers in a vehicle for purposes of high occupancy vehicle (HOV) and high occupancy toll (HOT) lane management and incentivization. This proposal seeks to pilot the use of an innovative biometric vehicle occupancy detection technology for purposes of measuring its occupancy count validation (OCV) accuracy, and delivery of immediate reward notification to carpoolers and vanpoolers to remove motor vehicles from congested facilities, and restore travel reliability on those facilities. Where HOV/HOT incentivization policies presently exist, particularly on Express Lanes, cheating levels can reach 50% or higher depending on the dynamically adjusted price at the time. It is expected that as policy makers look to deploy congestion pricing and road use charges in the future, accurate vehicle occupant counting will be an increasingly important tool to incentivize carpooling and vanpooling to reduce vehicle congestion. If successful, this technology, paired with relevant and immediate rewards, could help optimize HOV/HOT lane operation.

• Record URL:
  https://nicr.usf.edu/2021/05/17/2-6-pilot-application-of-biometric-based-vehicle-occupancy-detection-on-managed-lanes-for-congestion-reduction/

Language

• English

Project

• Status: Active
• Funding: $108057
• Contract Numbers:

  69A3551947136

  79075-10

• Sponsor Organizations:

  Office of the Assistant Secretary for Research and Technology

  University Transportation Centers Program
  Department of Transportation
  Washington, DC  United States  20590

  National Institute for Congestion Reduction

  University of South Florida
  Tampa, FL  United States  33620
• Managing Organizations:

  National Institute for Congestion Reduction

  University of South Florida
  Tampa, FL  United States  33620
• Project Managers:

  Li, Xiaopeng

• Performing Organizations:

  National Institute for Congestion Reduction

  University of South Florida
  Tampa, FL  United States  33620
• Principal Investigators:

  Hendricks, Sara

  Winters, Philip

• Start Date: 20210701
• Expected Completion Date: 20220930
• Actual Completion Date: 0
• USDOT Program: University Transportation Centers Program

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Carpools; Congestion pricing; Detection and identification systems; High occupancy vehicle lanes; Incentives; Vehicle occupancy
• Subject Areas: Data and Information Technology; Highways; Operations and Traffic Management; Passenger Transportation;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01784700
• Record Type: Research project
• Source Agency: National Institute for Congestion Reduction
• Contract Numbers: 69A3551947136, 79075-10
• Files: UTC, RIP
• Created Date: Oct 14 2021 12:10PM