SMART_SARTA_Project_Narrative.pdf

Project Narrative (v 3.0) | SMART Rider: Advanced Safety Technologies for Transit

a. Overview/Project Description. Advanced vehicle safety and intersection management systems prevent death and injuries by reducing the number of accidents and the serious nature of those that cannot be avoided. Today, a little more than 33% of a new light-duty vehicles sold have these fully commercialized technologies, and they are not yet available as standard features on most transit vehicles. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), 94% of serious crashes are due to human error. An estimated 60% of the injuries and deaths could be avoided with the use of advanced vehicle safety technologies according to the National Safety Council (NSC) Using 2022 FTA National Transit Database (NTD numbers), advanced vehicle safety systems could have prevented more than 4320 transit related injuries and 65 transit related deaths across the U.S Safety is a primary concern for transit authorities and bringing this number to zero is a number one goal.

In order to solve the real-world problem of serious vehicle crashes through the use of advanced vehicle safety and intersection management systems Stark Area Regional Transit Authority (SARTA), operating in Stark County located in Canton, Ohio, in partnership with NEORide, Butler County Regional Transit Authority (BCRTA), Western Reserve Transit Authority (WRTA), and the Ohio Transit Risk Pool (OTRP), along with an industry partner, Perrone Robotics, is applying for funding for the SMART Rider project. All 3 transit are transit partners of NEORide, a Council of Government consisting of 25 transit agencies across 5 states (Arkansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, and West Virgina). This project proposal is focused on improving transportation safety through collision avoidance using advanced vehicle safety technologies to improve alerts and warnings, crash mitigation, and driving assistance. With integration of vehicle safety features including lidar, radar, cameras, and sensors onto publicly owned revenue service transit vehicles, these features that are part of Perrone’s TONY/MAX system package will enable transit drivers to operate vehicles more safely and effectively by improving how they react to dangers including intersection management where there is the highest risk for a crash to occur with the use of technology but without the need for dedicated short range communication (DRSC) equipment. These proven technologies used in the light-duty market are ready to become standard features on transit vehicles, and this project will generate robust performance metrics to support that and position the technology to be deployed at scale. Here the technology will be integrated on to buses with a driver behind the wheel for collision avoidance purposes only. These buses will be operating in rural and urban areas, including university towns and suburban downtown areas. Input and feedback will be collected throughout the project from both the transit operators and drivers so that the project team can monitor and adjust to gain acceptance of the technologies. Their input will also be used to develop training programs in partnership with key stakeholders at universities, colleges, and other educational centers.

The primary goal of this proposed demonstration project is to evaluate the effectiveness of and enhanced transit fleet safety from integrating advanced vehicle safety technologies on to vehicles in transit fleets; preventing death and injuries by reducing the number of accidents and the serious nature of those that cannot be avoided. This project utilizes two SMART grant technology areas - Connected Vehicles and Systems Integration - and addresses the need for collision avoidance on transit vehicles by retrofitting up to 3 vehicles (Ford e450 and Gillig 35’ platforms) within each transit partner’s current operating fleet vehicles with the TONY/MAX advanced vehicle safety system package. This system will enable collision avoidance on publicly owned transit vehicles that can also support bus yard management and includes data logging and telematics features that will allow the project team to collect data that will be shared following a Data Management Plan developed in accordance with the Public Access Plan and as provided in the FY23 SMART Grant NOFO. This project works to greatly enhance transit safety for a fraction of the cost that a transit would pay for a new vehicle with all of the same features today, which includes eliminating the cost of DSRC equipment and installation at intersections. In Stage 1 when we gain driver’s acceptance of the technology and do not find any barriers, the project team will have information to build out fully realized implementation plans to take the lessons learned and metrics that were captured in Stage 1 and enlarge the scope by applying the same technology to up to 40 additional vehicles to provide a greater dataset for analysis while also enabling bus yard management in Stage

2. The bus yard management will use the same TONY/MAX technology (Stage 1) and integrate with commercially available yard management systems. The data and learnings from this project across both stages will be collected and stored to help to inform industry of the benefits of advanced vehicle safety technologies in real-world applications in a four-season deployment with varying operational domains across the transit partners located throughout Ohio.

b. Project Location. This project will be conducted as a regional partnership with 3 NEORide transit agencies that are all operating in areas that contain partially disadvantaged areas (88.32%) across Ohio. The project location spans 92 disadvantaged census tracts. The primary location for this project is at SARTA in Canton, Ohio who operates throughout Stark County. Other project locations include Butler County (BCRTA) and Mahoning County (WRTA). Using CEJST the percentage disadvantaged population in each of the operating areas are 87.59%, 86.55%, 90.82% respectively for a total project area average of 88.32%. These locations include both rural and urban areas, and individually are midsized communities, but as a regional partnership, they compose a large community. A KML project location file has been included to show a visual reference of the project location (see Appendix IV).

c. Community Impact. This project’s regional partnership is composed of 3 eligible applicants located in the state of Ohio whose combined service area population is a large community; Stark, Butler, and Mahoning have an estimated 986,713 in total populations as of 2022: 372,657, 388,420, and 225,636 respectively. An estimated 88.32% of the project area’s population is considered disadvantaged. The deployment of the advanced vehicle safety technologies will result in measurable improvement in safety performance among participating transit agencies, resulting in at least a 60% reduction in accidents and incidents, as reported by the NSC in injuries, property damage and potentially deaths. Safety: Investments by transit agencies in vehicle technologies can increase safety and public trust in transit, which builds ridership and also reduces accidents, incidents, and related costs. According to the FTA’s NTD, there were 5,846 collisions, 115 fatalities, and 7,211 injuries reported for transit in 2022. This project works to bring those numbers closer to zero. Climate Change and Sustainability: The reduction of greenhouse gas emissions is a particularly important tangential outcome for this project as transits work to increase ridership and thus reduce use of single-owner vehicles across their communities. Improved safety and reliability of transit has been shown to increase ridership. Workforce Development: Increased ridership will also result in the creation of more transit-related jobs across the project communities and will increase access to safer and affordable transportation for workers to commute to work, school, medical appointments, and training opportunities. Equity and J40 Initiative: Because public transit is utilized more heavily by lower income community members, benefits from transit improvements will accrue more significantly to the disadvantaged communities across Stark, Butler, and Mahoning Counties. The transit partners operate in areas of high environmental and transportation disadvantage that fall within the 90th percentile along with some of the highest poverty rates in the nation. The project area covers 92 census tracts that are J40 Disadvantaged Communities. Transportation and environmental disadvantaged numbers are especially high within the project area in terms of population, on average 88.32% of the population belong to the J40 disadvantaged population. The influence of these negative externalities would be measured using quantitative methods included cost of claims, cost of operations, and cost of risk; all of which should decrease over time.

d. Technical Merit Overview

1) Identification and Understanding of the Problem to Be Solved. The primary goal of this proposed demonstration project is to evaluate the effectiveness of and enhanced transit fleet safety from integrating advanced vehicle safety technologies on to vehicles in their fleets; preventing death and injuries by reducing the number of accidents and the serious nature of those that cannot be avoided. In 2022, Americans took 6.19 billion trips on public transportation; 34 million times each weekday, people board public transportation. Public transportation is a $80 billion industry that employs more than 420,000 people. More than 6,700 organizations provide public transportation in the U.S. While transit operators are trained experts on vehicle safety, even the safest driver cannot avoid all collisions. Advanced vehicle safety features integrated onto transit vehicles have enormous potential to increase safety while reducing risk or even eliminating collisions altogether by assisting operators and providing alerts or warnings of potentially dangerous situations based on findings from vehicles equipped in the light-duty market. This project is needed to bring those benefits from the light-duty market to public transit. Each of the following advanced vehicle technologies re included in this project and will provide benefits to transit:

• Cruise Control, when used correctly, contributes to a number of safer driving benefits by controlling the vehicle’s speed so there is less risk of the driver accelerating and speeding past other drivers, and reducing the potential for erratic driving behavior while also improving fuel efficiency by reducing or event eliminating unnecessary accelerations and decelerations.

• Adaptive Cruise Control, when used properly, reduces the number of vehicle collisions by up to 14% based on the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) data. It does so by controlling the distance between moving vehicles to a safe distance with automatic speed adjustments.

• Forward Collision Warning reduced 50% of front to rear crashes, 56% front to rear with injuries, 41% large truck front to rear crashes, as well as 14% claim rates for damages to vehicles, 24% claim rates for injuries to passengers in other involved cars according to a National Safety Council (NSC) Highway Loss Data Institute and IIHS study.

• Lane Keeping reduced head on collisions by 11% and injury crashes resulting from a head on by 21% according to a NSC Highway Loss Data Institute and IIHS study.

• Data Logging provides the ability to analyze or visualize vehicle statuses and in the event of an accident it records information before, during, and after a crash. Data elements such as vehicle dynamics such as speed and braking status, and safety system performance. The data recorded provides future benefits for improved safety technologies.

2) Appropriateness of Proposed Solution. Analysis of the National Motor Vehicle Crash Causation Survey, conducted by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, shows that driver error is a factor in more than 94% of crashes. Although it is important to remember that multiple factors contribute to all crashes, the largest portion of driver error crashes involve the driver failing to recognize hazards. Without the technology proposed in this project, these damages, injuries, and fatalities will continue. Since as early as 1980, most of the advanced vehicle safety technologies available have been proven to identify and react to potential hazards faster than a human driver across the light-duty market. These technologies are primed and ready to be deployed on transit vehicles, where the technology is not yet a standard feature. Integration and demonstration of these advanced vehicle safety technologies with transit will allow the project team to gather real-world data, to demonstrate the efficacy of these technologies on transit vehicles, and to document the impacts and benefits of these technologies in the field.

Safety is the number one priority for public transit, and while transit vehicles operate in all kinds of conditions from rural dirt roads to paved city streets in densely populated areas, no matter the operating environment, there are unlimited conditions that can lead to a crash. Advanced vehicle safety systems have been proven to mitigate or eliminate the risks of a crash by aiding and warnings and alerts to the operator. These technologies support intersection management and, after having been proven across the light-duty market, are ready to be standardized for the transit market, which data and reporting from this project can help to inform. Until drivers have a means to control everything moving and operating outside the transit bus, improved safety system integration is critical.

3) Expected Benefits. It is expected that having the TONY/MAX system installed in transit buses will result in a reduction of at least 60% in annual accidents and incidents (based on case studies performed in the light-duty market over the last decade) and will limit disruption of transit service due to such incidents and reduce losses and insurance claims. Ancillary benefits such as enhanced public perception of transit service and the potential for increased ridership (targeting at least a 5% annual increase) are also expected. This Stage 1 project also provides an opportunity to measure the actual impacts in public perception, ridership, and incident / loss data from these improvements. Each measure will be evaluated quantitatively to capture and validate the expected benefits. The data gathered in this project will also serve as a valuable resource to the Department of Transportation and other transit authorities seeking to improve safety while increasing ridership and expanding routes to encourage commuters to utilize public transportation. Reduced accidents, claims and losses will lower operating costs and are projected to result in a significant reduction in insurance costs and/or claims payables.

e. Project Readiness Overview

1) Feasibility of Workplan. This project as proposed is ready to begin the moment it is awarded.

The project partners have already met on several occasions developing the project concept and the technology proposed is off the shelf and ready for installation. SARTA, in partnership with BCRTA, BCRTA, NEORide, and the OTRP, along with their industry partner Perrone Robotics has developed a comprehensive and realistic workplan to deliver a scope of work aligned with the SMART 2023 goals and objectives, focused on evaluating the effectiveness of enhanced transit fleet safety by integrating advanced vehicle safety technologies on to vehicles in their fleets; preventing death and injuries by reducing the number of accidents and serious nature of those that cannot be avoided. Improvements will be measured to comparing baseline crash data to data collected after a year of operating with the advanced vehicle safety technologies. The $2,995,000 project budget (Federal: $1,975,000 / Non-Federal: $1,020,000) supports the four task workplan: Task 1 - Administration, Task 2 - Stakeholder Outreach, Task 3

– Vehicle Retrofit, and Task 4 - Operations, Data Collection, Analysis, and Reporting. (See Appendix II for Budget Narrative)

Work and responsibilities within these tasks are distributed across project partners via a detailed plan in the Statement of Work. The Gantt chart shown captures the scope of work and schedule for this demonstration project.

At this time, this project will not require any exemptions, waivers, permits or special permissions, and the project team will work to meet all legal, policy and regulatory requirements throughout the project.

2) Community Engagement and Partnerships. The project team has incorporated a comprehensive plan of community engagement that provides education and information about the project before, during, and after the demonstration. The team will leverage the outreach plans and established relationships of each of the partner transit authorities in addition to specific plans and activities supported as part of the project. The engagement activities for this project will be focused on enabling/accelerating advanced vehicle safety technology deployments at a national level.

These efforts will be augmented at the regional level by partner NEORide, that plans, promotes, furthers, and enhances transportation options through cooperative arrangements and coordinated action.

For training and education program development, this project will also leverage already strong advanced vehicle education programs at The University of Akron, University of Cincinnati, and at Stark State College. These represent strong examples of programs that provide innovative educational opportunities to the workforce; preparing students for the next generation of vehicle technology. ITLC will lead the creation of these partnerships for workforce development and training programs. The project team will leverage these existing programs and partnerships as well as with other education and training institutions across the state of Ohio. Both skills and academic training needed to meet future needs of the industry offer workforce development opportunities to a diverse population with a focus on the historically underrepresented groups.

Providing Access for Riders with Disabilities and ESOL individuals is a critical element of this project seeks to improve safety and efficiency for all riders. This is particularly important for disabled riders, who rely on public transit. Among participating transit agencies, ridership of people with disabilities was as high as 13% in 2020. The integration of the advanced vehicle safety technologies will only serve as a benefit and have no negative impacts on these populations for which public transit is critical. A critical part of our engagement and information activities before, during and after this project is to ensure that these populations are included and that our materials and outreach are accessible to these populations and that their impressions, experiences, and feedback are captured as part of the final report. All data and feedback collected will be consolidated in a final report on the project, its progress, and its benefits.

3) Leadership and Qualifications. The entire project team are recognized leaders in public transit and in expanding the use of public transportation to address climate concerns and improve quality of life for residents in the communities they serve. NEORide is successfully breaking down artificial boundaries, streamlining operations, and making it easier for riders to use public transit to travel across Ohio and beyond. Their success is shown in the growing number of transit partners across 5 states. OTRP, formed almost 30 years ago, has been working to reduce Ohio public transit members’ risk by providing shared solutions. Perrone Robotics has more than a decade of extensive expertise in advanced vehicle safety systems with a targeted support of transit.

In addition, these partners, as well as the participating transit agencies, have established working relationships that maximize the probability for project success. Key personnel who will be leading this project each bring decades of expertise, experience, and demonstrated performance to deliver a successful demonstration project that could make a real difference in expanding safe and efficient public transportation in these and other communities across the nation. Members of this team have successfully worked together on multiple projects. Most recently, several of the same partners, led by NEORide, successfully closed out a $1.9M FTA IMI multi-year grant to fund the purchase and installation of validators for use with the EZfare mobile ticketing platform and ticketing integration for 10 transits with Transit app, Moovit, Uber, data collection, and survey research, and the development of an innovative alternative payment application that will enable users to pay for transit and other transportation services using their phone or a "smart card" rather than cash. This project team is committed to the success of Stage 1 of this proposed project and the growth and continuation into Stage 2 and beyond.

https://www.metro-magazine.com/technology/news/738393/la-metro-taps-transit-to-replace-smartphone-app