UPDATE: Monday, September 22nd, 2014
The WSRTC Steering Committee gathered for the Annual Meeting on June 17th, 2014, before the start of the 9th annual Western States Forum in Yreka, California. The meeting agenda can be reviewed here or on the Consortium’s Documents page.
Photo by Doug Galarus
The meeting was called to order with a welcome and meeting overview. Introductions were made around the group. Fourteen people attended the meeting, representing California, Oregon, and Washington state departments of transportation, WTI, and the FHWA.
Since the Western States Forum began immediately following the Consortium meeting, an overview of the Forum was first on the Consortium’s meeting agenda. Thirty-six rural ITS engineers and practitioners represented six states (CA, ID, MT, NV, OR, WA), five state DOTs, one City Public Works Department, two universities, and the FHWA. The diverse technical program included six presentations on as many different topics. You can review them on the Forum website along with the technical content from previous Forums.
Various aspects of the Pooled Fund were discussed, particularly remaining funds and subsequent Task Orders, and future funding contribution levels. The current travel task order (Task Order 4) will expire at the end of October. With funds remaining, the group preferred rolling them over into a new Task Order with a new Scope of Work and an end date the same as the Pooled Fund in June of 2016. The One-Stop Shop task order will also be extended through the end of the Pooled Fund (June, 2016) in order to facilitate collection of more winter weather data.
The discussion turned to whether there was interest in a Phase 2 of the Consortium and what future contributions should be. Some representatives felt the Consortium is of benefit to the members and expected to participate in the next phase of the Pooled Fund. Others needed to follow-up with their state leadership for an official response.
Photo by Doug Galarus
David Veneziano and Doug Galarus reported on the status and progress of the three incubator projects. The Survey of Safety Warning Devices report will be finalized and sent out to the Consortium members as well as the contacts interviewed during the course of the survey. The data analysis approach using GIS for alternative routes, along with the other tasks for the Regional ICM Planning project, are being summarized into a final report for review and comment. Work on the Bluetooth technology incubator project has been deferred.
Doug Galarus discussed completed, current and upcoming research projects of interest to the group. These included Professional Capacity Building (PCB) for Communications, OSS Phase 2, WeatherShare Phase 3, Integration of Aviation AWOS with RWIS Phase 2, and WeatherShare Integration with Caltrans QuickMap.
The meeting concluded with the traditional roundtable discussion about Rural ITS and related projects each of the member states are working on. The group engaged in dialogue on several subjects, sharing contacts and relevant experiences on a variety of ITS technologies.
To review the meeting minutes, click here, or go to the Consortium’s Documents page. The presentation from the meeting is also on the Consortium’s Documents page.
Watch for an update about the Western States Forum on the Forum’s project page!
The next meeting of the WSRTC will tentatively be held via teleconference or at a regional conference in the November to January timeframe. An update about the National Rural ITS Conference in Branson, Missouri, will be coming soon! Please check back.