The Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) is planning to adopt a new lane reservation system to minimize congestion while completing needed road and bridge repairs in the state.
PennDOT and the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission first presented the idea of a lane reservation system in 2016.
The department says the system is similar to making an online reservation at a restaurant. "If a work crew wants to reserve a lane on Interstate 76 near King of Prussia at 5 p.m. on a Thursday night, they are going to find that reservations are not available," PennDOT Highway Safety and Traffic Operations Chief Doug Tomlinson said in a blog post. "However, they will be able to make a reservation to perform needed road work during off-peak hours as defined in the system."
PennDOT will be using various data sources and tools to identify and deploy the most effective work zone configurations, the agency says. The goal of this approach is to help ensure the safety of the workers, reduce congestion on major roadways, and eliminate conflicts between other work zones in the area. The information from this system can be shared with others through a standard data feed and will help traffic management centers.
Funding for the project will come from PennDOT and a federal Advanced Transportation and Congestion Management Technologies Deployment (ATCMTD) grant.
The project is currently going through the final IT approval steps and is set to begin this September. Completion is expected by 2022.
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SOURCE: Pennsylvania DOT