Moving Violations

Besides toll and occupancy violation, police officers enforce other moving violations to maintain safety and enhanced operating conditions. The implementation of priced managed lanes adds new and unique enforcement duties to their responsibilities. From both a safety and financial perspective, one of the most important of these new responsibilities will be the enforcement of priced managed lane access to ensure that vehicles enter and exit only at designated locations, such as breaks in buffer or barrier separation. Illegal buffer crossings pose a safety risk for vehicles in both the priced managed lanes and the adjacent general-purpose lanes, and can represent a source of revenue leakage if vehicles bypass toll zones to avoid payment. However, WSDOT and MnDOT have operated priced managed lanes with minimal buffer separation for years on SR-167 and I-394, and on neither facility has there been substantial reported revenue loss due to weaving. Additionally, research on SR-167 by WSDOT indicates that illegal buffer crossings are more typically found with drivers entering the managed lane, rather than illegally existing the facility. Part of these findings may be based upon the conversion of previously continuous access HOV lanes to buffer-separated managed lanes. For these and other situations like them, informative marketing and signage is necessary to educate drivers about the locations of priced managed lane access points to minimize buffer crossings that are a result of driver confusion.

7.4

Incident Management

Effective and responsive incident management protocols are critical for the successful operation of priced managed lanes. In order to provide reliable, time-saving travel for users, not only must priced managed lanes maintain enhanced operating conditions during recurring congested periods, but they must also be managed effectively during non-recurring events or incidents to ensure that users are not adversely

affected. And since many of these users will be toll-paying customers, it is important that the value of the managed lanes be maintained so customers can enjoy the benefits for which they paid. Without incident management protocols, the integrity and reputation of the priced managed lanes can be compromised leading to low public acceptance and reduced revenue potential.

Priced managed lanes must be equipped with incident surveillance and detection equipment, monitored by observant (and preferably dedicated) staff at least during periods of peak demand, and staffed with trained and experienced responders with drills and exercises to improve responsiveness and safety. If construction is anticipated in the proximity of the priced managed lanes, operators should incorporate 24-hour service patrols, temporary collision investigation sites, immediate-tow rules and procedures, and agreements with construction contractors to assist in clearance of debris.

The incident management process provides coordination among the various agencies responsible for incident management functions to ensure safe and efficient responses. The intention is to ensure that incidents that affect priced managed lane operations are handled efficiently and are properly communicated to operators. The following describes a typical incident response plan for priced managed lanes:

• Detection. The focal point for initial awareness of an emergency incident or situation is likely to be the local police dispatch system, which is staffed 24/7 and fields calls from police officers and citizens via the 911 emergency system. However, the automated sensing capabilities of the priced managed lanes introduces a secondary level of incident awareness, depending upon the coverage of the sensing equipment and frequency of system interaction with managed lane users within the facility. • Categorization. Police dispatch will categorize the incident and create a new entry that reflects the

description as provided. Priced managed lane operators will be alerted by either active monitoring of the dispatch log or direct lines of communication within a traffic management center (TMC). In some instances, courtesy patrols may address the incident before a report has been made to police dispatch. If there is no discernible effect on traffic flow nor need for police presence at the site, these incidents may be cleared without being logged.

• response. Incident response is dictated by the severity of the incident, which can generally be classified as minor or major. Minor incidents such as a stalled vehicle or minor debris on the roadway will likely not require a manual override of managed lane operations to execute a response. However, it is important that managed lane operators receive detailed information about the time and location of the incident in case there are adverse impacts on operations during incident response. Major incidents such as injury accidents or hazardous spills may require the police responders to use the managed lanes to divert traffic while the response is being executed. In these cases, managed lane operators will need to initiate a manual override of tolling equipment to display the appropriate information about the use of the lane. The implications of diversion and override decisions upon revenue and facility performance should be identified in operations documentation.

• Clearance. Throughout the clearance of the incident, the police officer or other responsible

responder is in control and will initiate all necessary actions, as applicable, to address the emergency or situation that has arisen. After the conclusion of the event, it is vital that records are kept as information is passed, decisions are made, and the incident/situation develops. Once normal operations resume, the managed lane operators return to normal operating mode and normal signage. In many circumstances, the police officer may briefly use the managed lanes to provide

Priced Managed Lane Guide

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access to emergency responders, or may direct general traffic into managed lanes. Although these situations do not typically escalate to police dispatch, the managed lane operators may still require knowledge of these actions and/or observations in order to properly process account adjustments. The incident management plan and concept of operations for the priced managed lanes facility should identify a communication protocol for these situations.

• Accounting. At the conclusion of the incident, some projects have policies where they try to address tolls charged to customers either in response to customers filing complaints or proactively through a review of the event log. Practices vary widely based on current experiences.

7.5

Maintenance Operations

Maintenance of the toll equipment, software, traffic sensing, and related toll enforcement systems for priced managed lanes requires specialized attention, which may be specific in nature to the technology deployed by the tolling integrator and systems vendor for each facility. This technology may also be employed in other lanes of the roadway. For example, dynamic tolling requires collecting significant amounts of data across multiple lanes of traffic (managed lanes and general-purpose lanes) in order to operate effectively. Maintenance on toll collection equipment is usually conducted at night during periods of low utilization when lanes can be closed. These tightly integrated systems require a high level of reliability and preventative maintenance. Performing preventative maintenance helps avoid unforeseen equipment outages. Every attempt should be made to provide maintenance access off the roadway to equipment cabinets so that access to devices does not requiring lane closures. In addition, adding in redundancy—more toll readers and detectors than are needed—is another strategy being used on project such as I-85 in Atlanta in order to avoid outages.

In addition to the tolling and enforcement systems, priced managed lane corridors feature virtually continuous installation of ITS technologies, including sensor loops, independent closed-circuit television (CCTV) systems for traffic / incident monitoring, ramp metering, active traffic management, and other traffic control systems, often under the purview of the region’s traffic management center. Typically, the priced managed lane operator will have no role in the maintenance of regional ITSs, unless the TMC and managed lane operator are integrated with one another. Similarly, issues pertaining to communications networks can affect the priced managed lane operator. In these situations, the operator and the appropriate entities should establish appropriate performance guidelines within the facility’s concept of operations and interagency agreements.

7.6

Supporting Technologies

Increasingly, priced managed lanes may be implemented concurrent with other efforts for transportation systems, management, and operations.