February 14, 2022
ITS America Committees Kick Off 2022 Work
Two weeks ago, ITS America’s six committees – Automated Vehicles, Emerging Technologies, Mobility on Demand, Smart Infrastructure, Sustainability and Resiliency, and V2X and Connected Transportation – held their 2022 kick-off meetings. The new leaders kicked of the year with a review of 2021 accomplishments and overviews of the 2022 focus areas. This year, along with new priorities and goals, we are launching new working groups to tackle key issues for ITS America members. Here are the highlights from the kick-off meetings:
Automated Vehicles
The Automated Vehicles Committee, chaired by Greg Winfree of Texas A&M’s Transportation Institute with support from Vice Chair Christina Aizcorbe of Velodyne Lidar, kicked off a broad agenda for 2022. The committee’s primary focus areas include hosting a cross-industry roundtable with the goal of helping to standardize industry terms, deploying the AV Principles the committee developed last year, and co-leading the Cybersecurity Working Group with the Smart Infrastructure Committee. The committee also briefly reviewed the chief accomplishments from 2021, including sector-level calls, the task forces’ development of the principles, and the subsequent report.
Emerging Technologies
The Emerging Technologies Committee is chaired by Andrew Liu of AECOM with support from Vice Chair Maureen Bock with the Oregon Department of Transportation. This year, the committee’s work revolves around three task forces and working groups: Urban Air Mobility, Personal Delivery Devices, and Digital Twinning. Urban Air Mobility (UAM) began last year as a task force focused on educating members and fostering conversations on UAM and will focus this year on producing a UAM 101 resource, which will address and define common language about UAM and eVTOL as well as current technology and trends in this emerging market. The Personal Delivery Devices Working Group will focus on hosting a series of peer exchanges and producing a white paper, which will address the opportunities, challenges, consensus, and areas of disagreement on several key areas, including but not limited to the policy and regulatory implications of PDDs, their societal goals and benefits, the national trends and research taking place related to PDDs, and best practices from early adopters in this industry The Digital Twinning Task Force, new this year, will hold its first meeting this quarter.
Mobility on Demand
Sophia Mohr of the Central Ohio Transit Authority chairs the Mobility on Demand Committee, with support from Vice Chair Josh Johnson of Spin. Before the kick-off call, we distributed a survey to committee members to help identify focus areas. The top five priorities identified were reimagining transit, equity, public-private partnerships, addressing barriers, and outreach and coordination in the MOD ecosystem. The committee will also create a Friends of MOD working group, which will hold roundtables and other events with the broader MOD community to foster collaboration and knowledge-sharing. The Universal Basic Mobility/Mobility Wallet Working Group will also continue its work this year, with a focus on consideration of MOD technology and deployment through an equity lens, and spotlighting ITSA members who are pursuing great projects and pilots relevant to universal basic mobility, mobility wallets and mobility equity.
Smart Infrastructure
The Smart Infrastructure Committee, led by Ted Bailey of the Washington State Department of Transportation with support from Vice Chair Dan Corey of AECOM, opened with a strong focus on the implementation of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA). This committee will house the IIJA Implementation Working Group, which will include members from all six committees. The working group used a live survey to collect real-time feedback from attendees about priorities around IIJA. A version of the survey will also be circulated to the working group members and eventually to the entire membership of ITS America. The committee will also work with the AV Committee to launch a new Cybersecurity Working Group.
Sustainability and Resiliency
The Sustainability and Resiliency Committee is led by Jannet Walker-Ford of WSP with support from Vice Chair Seleta Reynolds of the Los Angeles Department of Transportation. The committee reviewed 2021’s accomplishments, including the Board of Directors’ approval of the Sustainability and Resiliency Policy and Road Usage Charge Principles. This year, the committee will continue to focus on Road Usage Charge (RUC) issues through the RUC Working Group, with particular attention to the implementation of IIJA’s National Per-Mile User Fee Pilot and the work of the Federal System Funding Alternative Advisory Board; launch a new focus on resiliency, which will include defining the concept, diving deeper into operations and climate resiliency, and information sharing; and delve into intersections between IIJA and sustainability and resiliency.
V2X and Connected Transportation
The V2X and Connected Transportation Committee, led by Steve Kuciemba of WSP with support from Kelly Bartlett of the Michigan Department of Transportation, will continue to focus on the future of V2X by undertaking research, conducting a transportation stakeholder survey, and leading the industry conversation regarding deploying V2X in a limited 30 MHz spectrum environment. It will also launch the V2X Decoded Working Group to serve as a non-technical compliment to the Future of V2X Working Group. The new group will work to find consensus around industry terminology, expand conversations beyond high-speed/low-latency dedicated spectrum, and create resources to make V2X more understandable and accessible to non-technical audiences. For more information on this work, please register for “ITS America’s Future of V2X Survey Webinar,” February 23 and 2 pm EDT.
The committees have agendas full of exciting, ground-breaking work in 2022. If you are interested in signing up for any of the committees, working groups, or task forces, please do so here.
