Rural Issues with Optimal Sensor Placement for Transportation Applications

Many types of sensors are used in managing transportation systems. These sensors supply criticalinformation used by transportation managers for a variety of purposes such as real-time responseto changes in travel and traffic conditions, or planning for improvements to the transportationsystem. In the absence of well developed methodologies to plan the deployment of these sensors,the processes that are used in selection of their location do not always follow a set of criteria thatoptimize their usefulness. Development of location selection guidelines will assist transportationmanagers in making the most efficient use of these sensors. This is particularly true in ruralareas, given the unique challenges related to topography and remoteness. This report provides anoverview of some of the issues and concerns encountered in locating sensors in rural areas thatare used for assessment of travel conditions, incident detection, incident verification andcollection of planning data. The sensors discussed include road weather information system (RWIS) stations, closed circuit television (CCTV) cameras and inductive loop detectors.Dynamic message signs (DMSs) are also examined as they are commonly co-located with otherdevices.