The Software-Based Challenges Faced by Traffic Incident Managers

There are many tools in the toolbox of traffic incident management, however, as any good tradesmen will tell you, poor quality tools and an unorganized toolbox lead to slower and less effective work. This is the precise problem faced by traffic incident managers (TIMs) as they use a complicated and convoluted system of software to deploy the tools of traffic incident management. It is the aim of this paper to highlight and quantify the human-computer system challenges faced by TIMs within a Midwestern DOT, so that traffic incident management may be improved by providing TIMs with better tools and an organized toolbox from which to work. The authors of this paper identify the challenges and areas of inefficient faced by TIMs by using behavioral coding, the construction of a hierarchical tasks analysis, and Visual, Auditory, Cognitive, and Psychomotor (VACP) workload modelling.With these methods, the authors found that the human-computer system used by TIMs is challenging to operate and has several inefficiencies. Behavioral coding revealed that a significant amount of time is spent filling our reports, using maps, and communicating with a variety of personnel. The task analysis provides the requirements that must be met by a redesigned system, and identifies several inefficient and redundant processes. Also, VACP modelling shows that TIMs are mentally overworked a significant amount of time, and that the four primary mental processing channels are not utilized equally.

• Supplemental Notes:
  • This paper was sponsored by TRB committee AHB20 Standing Committee on Freeway Operations.
• Authors:
  • Monaghan, Quinn
  • Walton, Jamiahus
  • Gilbert, Stephen
  • Sharma, Anuj
• Conference:
  • Transportation Research Board 97th Annual Meeting
  • Location: Washington DC, United States
  • Date: 2018-1-7 to 2018-1-11
• Date: 2018

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Digital/other
• Features: Figures; References; Tables;
• Pagination: 7p

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Behavior; Coding systems; Incident management; Software; Task analysis; Traffic managers
• Subject Areas: Data and Information Technology; Highways; Operations and Traffic Management;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01660295
• Record Type: Publication
• Report/Paper Numbers: 18-04678
• Files: TRIS, TRB, ATRI
• Created Date: Feb 20 2018 9:27AM