Kapsch gets connected with mobility platform

First published at ITS America - June 7, 2019

Steve Sprouffske of Kapsch

Municipalities and DoTs around the country are building infrastructure to support the inevitability of connected vehicles hitting the streets—but not a lot of transportation agencies have seamless visibility into that infrastructure, argues Jeff Adler, a vice president at Kapsch. He hopes to change that through Kapsch’s connected mobility platform.

Based in the cloud, Kapsch’s solution gives transportation officials visibility into connected intersections—including signalling, dynamic messaging and pedestrian crossings.

A video monitor at the company’s booth shows a live feed from a traffic control centre in Marysville, Ohio, where you can see vehicles approach intersections as they traverse a map as well as signal states. While not all the vehicles are connected, video monitoring solutions identify and track the vehicles in the city. This live map gives traffic engineers a bird’s-eye view of traffic as well as the ability to drill down to individual intersections or corridors.

“We really want to remove the silos that typically exist between different departments like traffic and transit,” said Steve Sprouffske, head of Kapsch’s connected vehicle practice. “The goal is more connected services.”

A mobile application designed for blind pedestrians also ties into Kapsch’s connected mobility platform. Voice commands and vibrations communicate to the user as signals change and vehicles approach the intersection. It also gives the user directional information—such as “You’re near a crossing but not facing it”—and keeps them within the crosswalk boundaries. The app is currently being tested in cities in North Carolina, Virginia and Ohio.

Booth 525