Atlanta Tests Electronic Traffic Information System
<H1>Atlanta Tests Electronic Traffic Information System</H1><H2>Logging On: Detailed directions</H2><H3>By Rowland Stiteler</H3><I>Atlanta </I>- If business brings you here during the height of Olympic mayhem and high-tech gadgets fit your fancy, don't bother pulling into a gas station for directions around the city.
In fact, if you happen to be using some of the devices available through Atlanta's Traveler Information Showcase this summer, a gas station attendant might want to ask you for information about road conditions, fastest routes around town or even where to find a good restaurant.
Travelers who pick up hand-held computer units from Traveler Information Showcase kiosks at Hartsfield International Airport will be linked to a $140 million interactive system designed to give them precise and constantly updated information on how to get around Atlanta this summer. Travelers who opt not to pick up the devices can obtain similar information plus turn-by-turn directions by renting special cars equipped with computers from Hertz and Avis.
A third electronic navigation aid is available as well. If you have a laptop computer, a cellular phone and a modem to link the two, you can access a special information homepage on the Web (http//:www.atlanta.netrans.net).
"You can get turn-by-turn directions by simply entering your location and the location you want to go to," said Nels Ericson, a spokesman for the project.
The Internet system also contains a vast database of information about the city, including accommodations, entertainment and dining.
While Showcase is described by officials as an experimental system designed to show off the best of what computer technology has to offer travelers, it's not expected to link a large percentage of the thousands of visitors flocking to the Olympics this summer. "It's more of a test to determine the market for high-tech directional information systems, and a way to show what's available for those who happen to gravitate toward high-tech devices," Ericson said. But the Showcase does have long-term implications for business travelers, he said, because it is a model on which future information systems, both in Atlanta and around the nation, will be based.
While the "smart cars" that use computers linked to the satellite-based Global Positioning System (GPS) have been available from rental car companies and at dealerships for a few years, the Atlanta system, which began operation June 1, is more advanced than any previous system because of the vastness of its resources, according to Showcase officials. The system, funded through the Department of Transportation, involves a huge citywide network of closed-circuit videocameras, radar sites, mobile and airborne spotters, and other sources, all feeding into computers at the Georgia Department of Transportation's Transportation Management Center in Atlanta. It's also something of a "who's who" of high-tech corporations, with Hewlett-Packard, SkyTel, Etak, Siemens, SanDisk and other technology players involved.
In addition to the hand-held computers, the Showcase system will include computer kiosks at commuter rail stations and bus terminals through which visitors can access up-to-the-minute traffic and directional information. Also, a cable television system, described by a Showcase spokesman "as a sort of Weather Channel for traffic information in Atlanta," provides traffic and direction information for visitors.
The Atlanta system has been cited by Transportation Secretary Frederico Peña as the first example of an intelligent transportation infrastructure, the likes of which the DOT hopes to see in place in the nation's 75 largest metro areas in the future.
The Atlanta system is now the most advanced hybrid of the various computer-based transportation management systems in the United States, a DOT spokesman said. It involves nine technologies that will be used in systems of the future, including computerized traffic signal control systems, freeway management systems, transit management systems, traffic incident management systems, electronic toll collection, electronic fare collection, railroad grade crossing systems, emergency response systems and traveler information systems. The Atlanta model, said a Georgia DOT spokesman, is unique in America at the moment because it integrates all of those systems to some extent.
The bad news for technology buffs is that the Showcase experiment will end Sept. 1. But the cable television traffic information system and the Internet Website will continue to operate, Ericson said. He said the cost of acquiring the hand-held computers, which also will be available at some hotels, will be "minimal.