Criticism is miles off the mark
Re “Lots of traffic, little data,” Oct. 1
The criticisms leveled at the Los Angeles Department of Transportation’s data practices are uninformed. Traditionally, city traffic agencies collected the sort of data requested by the City Council to improve traffic signal timing schemes, but this is a low-tech approach. The department’s Automated Surveillance and Control Center probably provides North America’s best example of a third-generation traffic-control system. The center’s technical staff members are national leaders in the development of adaptive, wide-area control schemes. They measure congestion second by second and immediately define a sophisticated system-level response. They are the reason congestion has not eaten us alive. The transportation department can and will give the city’s leadership the data the council wants, but do not blame the agency for moving far past the approaches presumed by the City Council.
James E. Moore II
Director
Transportation Engineering Program, USC
Los Angeles
The writer is also chairman of the department of industrial and systems engineering.
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