Page 14 - July- August 2018
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Future of Mobility from page 13                the Design Spark, his group discussed        resilient. ORNL is the largest science
                                               ways to make their community more            and open science lab in the country
further intelligent mobility development       self-sufficient as they move from a rural    and is focused on research involving
in Tennessee, focused on connected and         community to a large, urban corridor.        efficient transportation across multi-
automated vehicles, trucking and freight       One of the action items his group            modal systems. According to Davies, “By
efficiency, cybersecurity, electric vehicles,  identified was to form a multi-jurisdiction  2030, we’ll have 1.2 billion more internal
and multimodal commuting. The group            planning committee. They’ve made             combustion engines on the road before we
is made up of 20 public and private            great progress by forming a four-county      make a transition to electric or automated
founding members, including Stantec.           regional committee to examine these          vehicles. So, we are currently working to
                                               issues and started a public education/       make them as efficient as possible from a
  TDOT and Knoxville shared the                outreach program on the topic of smart       fuel economy and emissions standpoint.
progress they are making in identifying        mobility.                                    We’re codeveloping engines and biofuels.
mobility solutions with the larger group.                                                   We’re working to optimize energy
To start, they are installing new Advanced       TennSMART’s Fall Meeting is likely         efficiency, biofuels and renewable fuels in
Transportation Management Systems              to be held in Chattanooga, and a day         these areas.”
(ATMS) - the central software used to          prior, they are considering holding
control Intelligent Transportation System      a Design Spark with representatives            Today, especially with the known
devices like traffic signal timing, CCTV       from Chattanooga and the surrounding         challenges of climate change, unbalanced
cameras, and Dynamic Message Boards.           counties. At the meeting, the group          social and economic equity, and an
Automated Traffic Signal Performance           would present their outcomes as part of      obesity epidemic, all linked to our built
Measures, an advanced software                 a 360 validation process to spur further     environment and transportation systems,
monitoring system for traffic signals,         discussion and gain consensus among the      changes to our current mobility systems
are also being installed in Knoxville          larger group.                                are required. And, Tennessee is setting the
and they are working with GridSMART                                                         stage by investing both time and money
on pedestrian detection to prevent               Another founding member active             into smart mobility research and options.
conflicting green lights if someone is in      in TennSMART, Oak Ridge National             Footnotes:
the crosswalk. The city is also examining      Laboratory (ORNL), will play a significant   1. https://ideas.stantec.com/sustainable-
the use of adaptive traffic signals (traffic   role in advancing research needed to move    resilient-design/resilience-in-a-transportation-
signals that change according to actual        Tennessee to the next level. According to    system
traffic demand).                               Rich Davies, PhD and Deputy Director         2. https://ideas.stantec.com/autonomous-
                                               of ORNL’s Sustainable Transportation         mobility/autonomous-vehicles-could-ruin-
  And, kudos to John Ward, Assistant           Program, now is the time to take steps       our-downtowns-but-not-if-we-act-now
Planning Director of Cookeville. At            to make transportation systems more

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