The initial system will span from New Jersey to North Carolina covering approximately 1500 center line miles of freeways and 1000 center line miles of major arterials and is projected to be operational in mid-2008. Ultimately the system may expand throughout the entire eastern seaboard.

INRIX was awarded the contract as a result of a competitive solicitation process conducted by the University of Maryland on behalf of the I-95 Corridor Coalition and its member agencies. The solicitation process began officially in early 2007 with release of a Request for Proposals and concluded in December with a sole contract award to INRIX. The I-95 Corridor Coalition region handles 565 million long distance trips, 5.3 billion tons of freight, represents $3.95 trillion of the Gross Domestic Product and is equivalent to the third largest economy in the world (1).

The real-time traffic data to be provided will be available to the I-95 Corridor Coalition and its members in mid-2008 and is targeted to support various applications including travel time on signs, 511 systems, incident management systems, Internet-based traveler information services, congestion performance measures, and other planning and operations applications.

The INRIX Smart Dust Network and INRIX Traffic Fusion Engine provide a unique platform to deliver the project by aggregating and blending traffic data from a variety of sources including over 750,000 GPS-enabled vehicles and traditional road sensors. This highly accurate method allows for the delivery of best-available traffic information and is an extremely scalable and cost-effective program that provides the Coalition with many of the highly desired and preferred elements sought in the RFP.

Specifically, the INRIX method of collecting and delivering this real-time traffic data presents the opportunity to grow coverage into state highways and arterials to other regions within the Coalition without the need for the deployment of expensive new road-side equipment.

"The member agencies of our 16-state Coalition identified multi-state availability of real-time traffic data as a key element of achieving our goal to improve transportation services through information sharing and coordinated management and operations," said George Schoener, Executive Director, I-95 Corridor Coalition.

"We selected INRIX as they had the ability to specifically deliver the coverage and quality of the traffic information we require for this significant initiative. INRIX real-time traffic data will support the development of seamless networks of corridor-wide traveler information systems and support the coordination and implementation of interagency efforts in response to major incidents and special events."

The project, and INRIX's approach, is ground-breaking in a variety of ways. The I-95 Corridor Coalition initiative is the largest implementation of real-time traffic flow data sharing across a multi-state region and the first multi-state project leveraging GPS vehicle probes and traditional road sensor information.

With the Indefinite Deliver, Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract initially slated for a period of three years (with the opportunity to extend the contract length up to ten years), it is designed to accommodate additional task orders to expand coverage, integrate data into existing systems or create applications to use data as the Coalition and/or a specific agency member desires.

With well over 12,000 center line miles of freeways in the 16-state region spanning from Maine to Florida, this contract could evolve into the largest network of its kind, by far. INRIX has offered several additional data enhancement options for the Coalition and/or its agency members to consider if additional source data is desired to improve or expand coverage.

PBS and J, a nationally recognized architecture-engineering-construction services and program management consulting firm, under subcontract to INRIX, is leading a multi-disciplinary team that will assist the Coalition and its members in an on-call basis for data integration, application development and data analysis tasks.

Another distinctive element of the project is that pricing for expansion of coverage, enhanced data options and consulting resources have been established in the base contract, greatly simplifying task order creation.

"The award of this contract by the I-95 Corridor Coalition is a significant milestone for public-private partnerships of real-time traffic information," said INRIX president and CEO Bryan Mistele. "We applaud the Coalition and its member agencies for the foresight to establish such a bold corridor-wide project and we look forward to our collaboration."

Related Links
I-95 Corridor Coalition
GPS Applications, Technology and Suppliers

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