Role of ICT in Transportation

ROLE OF ICT IN TRANSPORTATION

 

1.1 INTRODUCTION

       The progress and inspiration of the private automobile is without parallel. The number of motorized vehicles grew from 75 million to 675 million in the last half of the previous century, with more than four-fifths of these vehicles being used for personal transportation (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, 1996). Towards the end of the previous century 15 members of the European Union experienced substantial growth of car travel as a 40% increase in passenger kilometres (Marshall, Bannister, &McLellan, 1997). The road transport traffic forecast for Europe expect an increase in road traffic of up to 150% by the year 2025 (Bielli, Carotenuto, &Delle, 1998). There should be a proactive aggressive approach in advance planning and implementation of large-scale land transportation measures. A sustainable transport approach is needed throughout the world to bring together traffic congestion problems and social concerns to an end. Transport in advanced capitalist economies is entering a new era of technological development. Advances in IT, based on linking the power of mobile devices and ICT, are creating fresh opportunities for modernizing traffic infrastructure. For the world’s leading cities, where traffic congestion is wreaking havoc with the economy and the society, these IT-Based transport innovations will play a major role in plans for ‘sustainable development’ (Loukopoulos, 2005). The fact now is that though many ICT applications have been developed and put into practice, they have not been fully up to the mark because of their non-customer centric approach. Therefore it is of utmost importance, when the applications and technology are developed for road transport congestion control, then their design should be in synchronization with that of the customer perquisites and ought to be more user friendly and ubiquitous (Weisers, 2008), keeping in view that the customers in this context can belong to all age groups, with varied technological ‘know how’ skills.

We in this thesis have based the term ‘sustainability’ as the one that is directly proportional to the decrease in traffic congestion. The most primitive and old method (A Primer: Federal Highway Administration, 2008) being used for controlling congestion across the world has been the usage of congestion pricing where in travellers are charged to use the roads during peak hours (Bielli, Carotenuto, &Delle, 1998). With ICT coming into the picture the method of congestion pricing has grown by leaps and bounds, and has been used to promote not only the reduction in traffic & reduced emissions at one place, but also to promote greener vehicles with use of exemptions (A Primer: Federal Highway Administration, 2006), improved public transportation and other benefits. We study the role of ICT in reducing the road congestion and help an individual and an urban area, to achieve a sustainable lifestyle and a sustainable economy respectively. Now this explicitly moves with the choice of technologies in coordination with the research to attain solutions for the perspective of traffic congestion. The connection between ICT and sustainability is addressed by choosing two levels, i.e., the social and economic sustainability from all three levels of economic, environmental and social sustainability (Elkington, 2004).

With the growth of real time information solutions, our study has taken a further step ahead of doing what is considered the most difficult step in controlling traffic, i.e., to change driver behaviour, by giving them options to choose from alternative route, travelling mode and travelling time (Stockholm Traffic Administration, 2009). The underlying concept and motivation for this part of the study is the so called universal principle of information equals power, which implies that if the commuters can have the information then they can take real time decisions to reach their destination faster. In simple terms, the summation of energy consumed in providing information and actual energy consumed on the road should be less than the future energy consumption without real time information.

1.2 PROBLEMS OF TRANSPORTATION IN USING MANUAL TOOLS

Traffic congestion has discernable, but seldom researched effects on community life, social interaction and liveability, all which are important components of psychological and physical wellbeing, and quality of urban life (Elkington, 2004). There are numerals of detailed situations which cause or exaggerate congestion, most of them lessen the volume of a road at a given point or over a certain length, or surge the number of vehicles required for a given volume of people or goods. The most important consequence of traffic congestion is the increase in travel time, especially at peak hours, and this has reached beyond the level of acceptance in some cities that have an upper hand on the liveability standards. Besides this, the slow pace of circulation is a source of exasperation and triggers aggressive behaviour in drivers. The poor accessibility can also have a greater influence on the economy of the city, as a lot of time usually is wasted in congestion. According to a December 2006 report by Bruce Schaller of Schaller Consulting, the total value of time wasted by NYC traffic congestion comes to about $8 billion annually (Nzbcsd, 2003).

To control the traffic congestion, and increase the volume of the roads there have been a wide range of policies been proposed with the aim to alleviate the increasing negative consequences of the automobile use, and ultimately guiding the society towards a sustainable future. Some social Travel Demand Management (TDM) measures like ideas on either restricting sales and ownership has been the case in Singapore (Foo, 1998), or by demarcating the car as a status symbol & convenient accessory of modern life (Wright & Egan, 2000). However such policies can’t possibly reduce the travel demand to a great extent as it demands dramatically radical changes in social behaviour of human beings, and thus there is an increasing need of intelligent systems for it. This is where the role of Information and communication technologies (ICT) and the emergence of the mobile devices have stronger influence towards congestion free transport. The most important point will be, put simply, how ICT has played its role in giving hand to the above presented problem in a variable duration, e.g. Congestion pricing has its footprint for quite a long period starting with manual ways, like the drivers pay with cash & get access to the road, which increased the waiting time and further caused congestion in the payment area. However the advancement of ICT at the present has paved way for a fully automated pricing scheme that levies the charge without the distraction of the driver, and has proven to be a perfect example of ubiquitous computing.

2.1 PROSPECT OF ICT IN TRANSPORTATION IN INDUSTRY

   The idea thus really is to optimize the existing system and reach a state of equilibrium. In our study we keep our focus on the road network of intra cities to study the factors that cause traffic congestion, and the valuable IT solutions within the urban areas, which with the technological advancements have already been implemented, & have a documented record of success. The purpose of the study thus delves into two categorical aspects, namely technological and success. In the former we study the various existing technologies built across global cities and with later, the purpose is to study the success of the technological implementation to evaluate the catch of our topic “The Role of ICT in reducing traffic congestion to bring sustainable transportation”. Let’s begin with an example, we commute on busy, overcrowded public transport or sit in congested traffic on the road to make it to the office on time. After the end of a long day, we repeat the process in reverse before arriving home tired, and then have to start all over again the next day. Now investigating the reasons of the growing nature of traffic we observe that ICT can give us the power of flexibility to control the traffic by providing us the options for substituting physical travel that reduces, travel demand, or by giving the power of flexibility to Public agencies to implement travel demand management policies. However the same ICT that increase flexibility for public agencies or substituting business also gives the flexibility power to individual and business to create absolute new travel demand leading to a cyclical cause and effect loop (Samuelson & Zeckhausen, 1998). This is where we focus our thesis on to understand the cause and effect cycle, and to answer how ICT systems (the answer and the creator of problem) can help in traffic reduction.

2.2 KEY CONCEPTS

2.2.1 Traffic congestion

For our work, we refer to the definition by Thomson and Bull (2001), “Up to a certain level of traffic, vehicles can circulate at a relatively free determined speed. At higher levels of traffic, however every additional vehicle interferes with the circulation of others. In other words Congestion is a situation where the introduction or addition of a vehicle in to traffic flow that might have the power to increase the journey time of others”.

2.2.2 Information and communication technology

 ICT refers to technologies that provide access to information through telecommunications. It is the extension of Information Technology (IT) which focuses primarily on the usage of communication technologies for the transmission of information. This includes the Internet, wireless networks, cell phones, and other communication mediums.

 

 

2.2.3 Transport Sustainability

Sustainable systems are the ones that allow the basic access and development needs of individuals, companies and society to be met safely and in a manner consistent with human and ecosystem health, and promote equity within and between successive generations. (ECMT, 2004). It is generally accepted that sustainable development, and more specifically, sustainable transportation, implies finding a proper balance between (current and future) environmental, social and economic qualities (L.Steg & R.Gifford, 2005).

2.2.4 Road Pricing

 Road pricing is a generic term for the variety of different measures and practices which involves levying charges for the use of the road. This idea being one of the oldest approaches became more popular for the reason that it had great influence on the traffic congestion reduction.

2.2.5 Real Time Information

 Real time information denotes information that is delivered immediately after collection. There is no delay in the timelines of the information provided. Real-time data is often used for navigation or tracking. Some uses of this term confuse it with the term dynamic data.

2.2.6 Extensibility

 As the very word suggests, it is the capability of an existing application to extend its usefulness to other independent applications by expanding or adding to its existing capabilities. It can be a very rooted approach at the very code level design principles, or at the stage of writing a program, protocol etc., or it could be at a structural level, like in the case of traffic congestion control to develop applications that can help in substitution of physical travel with e-options to reduce the very travel demand itself.

2.2.7 Driving behavior

Driving behavior can be linked close to a person’s choice of drive and it results mostly from what he/she thinks and feels; it has very less to do with what he/she knows or can do. Most of the times, a driver makes decision on an unconscious level, based upon an inner set of values as to what actions are acceptable or unacceptable. By adopting to some preventive behaviour habits, a driver will automatically process information and execute decisions that result in low risk and high gain.

2.3 ICT AND SUSTAINABLE TRANSPORTATION

Information and communication technology plays a vital role in the sector of transportation. The ICT market continually launches new applications that support traffic congestion control, transport logistics and transport infrastructure management. In addition to all these ICT has also invaded the new era of transporting information rather than people. The ICT applications have the potential to increase the efficiency of transport networks and decrease the negative externalities, e.g. decrease the congestion and increase the quality of transport networks. However their actual impacts on transport sector and the sustainable development are still unknown. In the transport sector, the deployment of ICT in the developed cities like Stockholm has been the era of developing sensing capabilities both of vehicles and traffic monitoring.

 

CONCLUSION

Information and communication technologies (ICT) have considerable importance for transport systems, as they provide access to travel information, planning tools, opportunities to share transport modes, to work at-a-distance, compare transport mode cost, make payment, improve safety and health, and to communicate travel patterns. Over the past decade, there has been massive growth in the availability of transportation ICT, in particular smartphone applications. There is considerable evidence that ICT has profoundly changed the ways in which transport systems are perceived and used, and mobilities performed; with far-reaching implications for transport mode choices and transport demand. Against this background, the paper seeks to conceptualize ICT with relevance for transport systems, and to discuss the implications for the environmental sustainability of the transport sector. Findings suggest that while some ICT innovations foster and support sustainable transport choices, others raise new and significant barriers to more sustainable transport futures.

 

REFERENCES

A Primer: Federal Highway Administration. (2006). Congestion pricing. Washington: FEDERAL HIGHWAY ADMINISTRATION.

A Primer:Federal Highway Administration. (2008). Technologies That Enable congestion pricing. Washington DC: U.S. Department of Transportation.

Abowd, G. D., & Mynatt, E. D. (1999). Ubiquitous Computing: Past, Present and Future. Atlanta: GVU Center and College of Computing. Alliger, G. M., & Alliger, K. j. (1993). Using signal-contingent experience sampling methodology to study work in that field. Personnel Psycholog, 525-549.

Anderson, J. (2005). Cognitive Psychology and Its Implication. New York: W.H.Freeman and Company. Banister, D., & Stead, D. (2004). Impact of Information and Communications Technology on. Transport Reviews, 611-632.

Bayliss. (2000). Urban Development and its Implications for Mobility. International Union of Public Transport (UITP) Mexico conference. Behrends, S. (2009). Sustainable Frienght Transport from an Urban Perspective .

Bielli, Carotenuto, & Delle. (1998). Transport and environment. Transportation Research D, pp. 389-397.

Black, W. R., & Geenhuizen, M. v. (2006). ICT Innovation and Sustainability of the Transport Sector. European Journal of Transport and Infrastructure Research, 39-60.

Bull, A. (2004). The causes and costs of congestion. In Traffic Congestion: The problem and how to deal with it.

Göteberg: Chalmers University of Technology. Benbaset, I., & Goldstein, D. K. (1987). The Case Research Strategy in Studies of Information Systems. MIS Quarterly, 369-386.