Subject: [NEXTEL-1] ITS America Initiatives Foster Integration of Public Safety and Transportation Efforts to Speed Traffic and Save Lives

From: Marcel <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 27 Apr 2003 16:52:21 -0400

Intelligent Transportation Society of America

Vol. 13, No. 4, April 2003

FEATURE ARTICLE

ITS America Initiatives Foster Integration of Public Safety and Transportation Efforts to
Speed Traffic and Save Lives

One of the keys to reducing the 41,000 annual fatalities on our nation's roads is
increased integration,
communication, and cooperation between public safety and transportation agencies. ITS
America is a major
player in this effort through a series of initiatives designed to foster greater
understanding and partnerships
between these public service organizations.

One of every three emergency response vehicles dispatched onto a major roadway runs
headlong into
congestion, losing valuable time when rapid response is essential to saving lives and
reducing the threat of
secondary accidents caused by the backup. Armed with the real-time road condition data
tracked by
transportation agencies, these responders could better choose routes and decrease response
time.

Likewise, transportation officials could minimize traffic delays and increase their own
efficiency if they could
obtain remote, first hand knowledge of what first responders encounter when they arrive at
the scene of an
incident. For example, a police car equipped with the capability to transmit digital
photographs and a GPS
system would enable the on-site officer to transmit the exact location of an incident and
a view of its details
directly to the desktop of a transportation supervisor. This would free the supervisor
from having to make a trip
out to the incident site to survey the situation and deploy the appropriate resources to
clear the road, again
saving valuable time.

Unfortunately, many agencies do not currently share this type of information. What's more,
although the needs of
public safety and transportation agency responders are inextricably intertwined, their
respective on-site
missions can often clash. Emergency medical service (EMS) responders are focused on
tending to those
injured, while law enforcement officials are busy trying to document evidence regarding
the incident. All the
while, transportation officials are concerned with the task of clearing the site and
restoring traffic flow as quickly
as possible.

New and continuing ITS America programs are vital to increasing integration and
cooperation and highlighting
the importance of ITS in advancing public safety and transportation management efforts.
ITS America manages
the Public Safety Advisory Group (PSAG) that provides mission critical guidance to the
U.S. DOT's ITS Public
Safety Program. This program encourages transportation and public safety agencies to
better integrate their
on-scene incident response, clearance, and recovery operations. It also fosters new
partnerships between
these agencies to ensure more interoperability of communications systems and incident
management
procedures.

ITS America has also added new features highlighting public safety to its 2003 Annual
Meeting and Exposition,
to be held May 19-22 in Minneapolis. A Public Safety Pavilion will provide attendees with
the opportunity to visit
a special section of the showroom floor dedicated to exhibitors that provide ITS solutions
to the public safety
market. A special Blue Ribbon Panel will address ways in which ITS solutions – driven in
part by heightened
need for Homeland Security solutions - have brought public safety and transportation
communities together with
the potential to save thousands of lives through greater coordination, faster incident
response, and enhanced
911 services.

This year's annual meeting education sessions will also feature a public safety program
track. Among the highly
informative sessions scheduled are:

ITS Public Safety Integration: Field Operational Tests and Deployments,
New Partnerships in Public Safety – A Leadership Forum, and
Traffic Incident Management – Cooperation with Emergency Partners

Additionally, ITS America 2003 will provide attendees with exception networking venues,
where ITS solutions
providers can explore partnership opportunities with the technology and integration
companies that provide
products and services directly to the public safety market.

ITS America also boasts a Public Safety stakeholder forum, designed exclusively for ITS
America members.
The forum, which includes police, fire, rescue, and medical agencies, as well as suppliers
of ITS Public Safety
related products and services, is geared to keep members up-to-date and active in the
public safety
community.

The primary goals of the Public Safety Forums are to:

Provide information to its members within defined interest areas
Encourage and focus involvement by the membership
Provide networking opportunities
Generate project proposals
Provide volunteers to support project teams

An open meeting of the Public Safety Forum will be held in conjunction with the 2003 ITS
America Annual
Meeting and Exposition on Tuesday, May 20, at 4:00PM.

For more Public Safety information: http://www.itsa.org/publicsafety.html
For Annual Meeting exhibitor and sponsorship information:
http://www.itsa.org/its2003.nsf/Files/exhibitpro/$file/exhibitpro.pdf
For Annual Meeting program and registration information:
http://www.itsa.annualmeeting.html
For details regarding "First Response: Answering the Call" Conference and Symposium:

http://www.itsa.org/resources.nsf/E67A236E2C98FA7A8525659D0056432A/9CAECEE75470DADF85256CCD006ABA30?OpenDocument

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