Cooperative ITS: Are we getting close to true road services interoperability?

31 August 2015

In the last few decades, continuous development of data collection, processing and communications technologies have made available to users and traffic managers the mechanisms to increase their awareness of the traffic environment.

Under the name ‘A co-operative effort’, the article -featured in STA’s regular section in the Thinking Highways magazine and written by Mr. Jorge Alfonso and Prof. José Manuel Menéndez of the Technical University of Madrid- reviews the current Cooperative ITS standardisation and deployment situation.

STA supports course on 'Sustainability Assessment of Transport Infrastructures' (Palermo, Italy, 16-23 Sep 2015)

10 August 2015

The Smart Transportation Alliance (STA) sponsors a groundbreaking course aimed at civil engineers, researchers and academics with an interest in sustainable engineering.

The high-level training, organised in the context of Super ITN (Sustainable Pavement & Railway Initial Training Network), brings together world-class academics and researchers from Virginia Tech (US) or Network Rail (UK), among others.

'Infrastructure safety and security: When smart is not enough', a column by STA Chairman José F. Papí

24 August 2015

From a user perspective, transportation infrastructures should offer the highest safety and security levels that technological progress to date allows.

In this column featured in the second 2015 issue of Thinking Highways (Europe And Rest Of The World Edition), STA Chairman José F. Papí discusses the importance of adopting a 'dual outcome' approach when investing in 'safe' and 'secure' transportation infrastructures.

24 November 2015: book your agenda for the 1st STA Annual Conference

17 August 2015

The 2015 STA Annual Conference will offer an innovative and informative review of the current state of deployment of Smart Transportation Infrastructures connecting people and businesses.

The event will take place in Brussels (Belgium) on Tuesday 24 November 2015 and will be coupled with the award ceremony of the 1st edition of the “STA Annual Innovation Awards”. Delegates can participate either in-person at the conference’s venue or remotely via state-of-the-art online tools. A draft programme will be announced soon.

NEWS OF INTEREST

India To Welcome Its First Green Airport That Will Operate On Solar Power.

Cochin International Airport (CIAL) marks an airport of many firsts: A pioneer in PPP model, and the first airport to build a rehabilitation package for evictees, CIAL is now introducing itself as India’s first green airport that shall operate on solar energy later this month.

Recharging without cables: the road ahead for electric cars.

Electric vehicles are undoubtedly a form of transport with a future, but many technical challenges have to be overcome before they replace petrol and diesel-fuelled cars. Researchers in Zaragoza in northern Spain are working on resolving one of the biggest problems; how to efficiently recharge batteries.

The Texas A&M Transportation Institute (US) recently unveiled their semi-regular report on urban traffic congestion.

While the focus and themes of the report are largely the same as previous years, big changes are underway in how we study, think about, and address metropolitan traffic congestion. This new, modern approach calls into question whether the endless pursuit of congestion relief makes sense anymore as a practical policy goal.

System eyed to direct planes for landing after major earthquakes in Japan.

A Japanese transport ministry panel decided Wednesday 26 August to develop a system to automatically select airports where planes in flight will be allowed to make emergency landings if their original destinations inaccessible due to an earthquake.

Vietnam: Developing a Green and Efficient Public Transport System. 

With support from the World Bank, Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam is developing a rapid bus transit system using green technology, which runs through the city's important economic corridor.