Welcome to PcTrans News Briefs Site

PC-Trans now an e-zine

In case you haven’t heard, PC-TRANS has gone electronic. Our magazine, pc-trans, and our software catalog will be available only through our web site at: www.kutc.ku.edu/pctrans.
We will notify our customers by e-mail when each new issue is available. To receive our notices, we need your e-mail address. Please take a minute to send a message to pctrans@ku.edu with “pctrans” as the title. In your message, simply say “add to list.”
Don’t miss out on the latest news on our transportation software. Send us a message today! (Rest assured: We will not release our e-mail list to anyone for any reason.)
This move to the web allows us to be more current and accurate with our information, to have it available worldwide 24 hours a day, and save money and natural resources.
—Mehrdad Givechi, PC-TRANS manager

New Web Site for Nation’s Water Data

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) has unveiled its new, online WaterWatch website which gives visitors an instantaneous picture of water conditions nationwide in near real-time. The entire Nation's current stream flow conditions, including high flood-flows and low drought-flows are depicted on maps with color-coded dots representing conditions at about 3,000 stream gages. The WaterWatch website is http://water.usgs.gov/waterwatch/.
WaterWatch has a point-and-click interface allowing users to retrieve maps and graphs of real-time stage and discharge data for individual stations. From the National map, you can click on a state to find state data and click further to find near real-time data at an individual gage.
WaterWatch also serves as a geo-spatial front end to NWIS-Web, the USGS online National Water Information System that provides access to real-time and historical surface-water, groundwater, and water-quality data. The NWIS-Web address is http://waterdata.usgs.gov/nwis/.
WaterWatch maps and graphs are organized into three distinct categories: real time, daily, and 7-day average stream flow. This provides users with a broad perspective on short-term and long-term stream flow conditions and variations. The latter category is particularly useful for identifying regions undergoing prolonged wet and dry spells.

TSIS/CORSIM 5.1

At the time this publication was being assembled, the new version of TSIS/CORSIM (5.1) was released by the Federal Highway Administration.
For more information on its availability, contact Mehrdad Givechi at PC-TRANS at (785) 864-5655.

Introducing DYNASMART-P

DYNASMART-P is one of two state-of-the-art dynamic traffic operations planning tools developed under the Federal Highway Administration’s Dynamic Traffic Assignment (DTA) research project. It is currently in beta besting.
DYNASMART-P supports transportation network planning and traffic operations decisions in ITS and non-ITS environments through the use of simulation-based dynamic traffic assignment. This tool combines: 1) dynamic network assignment (or demand) models, used primarily in conjunction with demand forecasting procedures for planning applications, and 2) traffic simulation (or supply) models, used primarily for traffic operational studies.
DYNASMART-P models flows in a traffic network resulting from the decisions of individual travelers seeking best paths over a given planning horizon. It overcomes many of the limitations of static tools used in current practice by increasing the types of alternative measures that may be represented and evaluated, and broadening the policy questions that planning agencies can address.
DYNASMART-P requires input data used by most traditional traffic assignment and simulation models representing networks and traffic flows. The input data vary with the network being analyzed and the level of detail required by the user. Complexity of the network could range from a linear freeway network to an integrated network with High-Occupancy Vehicle (HOV) lanes, High-Occupancy Toll (HOT) lanes, ramp metering, transit services, possibly incidents and signal controlled intersections on surface streets.
DYNASMART-P can produce a variety of results to assist users in performing detailed traffic analysis. The output report contains a wide range of measures of effectiveness commonly used by traffic engineers for analyses, such as volumes, speeds, travel times, delays, etc. DYNASMART-P also produces a vehicle trajectory file and the means to view simulation results and other characteristics through various graphics formats, both static and animated.
DYNASMART-P’s built-in features can be used to evaluate complex strategic and operational network planning decisions. They can also be used to produce more realistic traffic assignment results for planning analyses. The potential applications include:
--Assessing impacts of ITS and non-ITS technologies on the transportation network, such as dynamic message signs, ATIS-equipped vehicles, etc.
--Supporting decision-making for work zone planning and traffic management.
--Evaluating HOV lanes and HOT lanes.
--Evaluating different congestion pricing schemes.
--Planning for special events and emergency situations.
--Analyzing traffic assignment in traditional planning activities.
DYNASMART-P runs on Windows NT 4.0 (service pack 5) or higher. A minimum of 300 MB of the hard drive space 512 MB of RAM are needed to run the model, depending the size of the network and analysis time period.
DYNASMART-P has been tested with field data from the Knoxville Metropolitan Planning Commission. FHWA is currently conducting a beta test to ensure that the software matches user needs.
Anyone interested is welcome to participate in the beta testing. Contact Henry Lieu at: Henry.Lieu@fhwa.dot.gov for more information about DYNASMART-P or to inquire about participating in the beta testing.
Upon completion of the beta test, FHWA will refine DYNASMART-P and release it to the public.