Rush-hour commuters could get wired to the roadway -- with real-time traffic information available via the Internet, pagers and cellular phones -- if a $40 million plan for an "intelligent transportation system" goes forward.
``You could literally check the highways before you go out," said Karen Lenehan, spokeswoman for the Ohio Department of Transportation.
The department, the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority and Cuyahoga County want to copy cities such as Atlanta and Houston that have extensive "intelligent transportation systems" that help emergency personnel and drivers deal with accidents or delays.
``You can't keep widening highways to address congestion," Ms. Lenehan said. "This is a softer approach to make traffic flow better."
Closed-circuit TV cameras along highways would relay pictures of traffic over the Internet, flashing message boards on highways would warn of coming delays or accidents, and traffic updates could be delivered via a special radio station or by electronic mail, pager or cellular phone. Even buses and trains would be equipped with location sensors to improve scheduling and transfers.
``It's such a neat thing that could happen for the city of Cleveland and the surrounding areas, but it's also an expensive thing," Ms. Lenehan said.
About $18 million of the $40 million is earmarked for a new downtown building that would consolidate about 190 RTA transit police and dispatch employees and Cuyahoga County's 30-person emergency management division. The county division handles the dispatch of 911 emergency phone calls.
The new center might not be up and running for four to five years, but the RTA and the county are planning now to construct or buy a building to house the employees and communications equipment.
The RTA will ask for $22 million for the transportation system from the state Transportation Review Advisory Council, which controls federal dollars for major transportation projects. If the plan for the computerized system goes forward, it could help improve the response time and coordination of emergency officials when there's an accident, said Murray Withrow, manager of the county's emergency services.
``If you get a live picture of an accident, you can almost begin a preliminary assessment of how you should enter a scene," Mr. Withrow said.
Ms. Lenehan said the technology could have prevented thousands of rush- hour commuters from getting stuck in two-hour traffic jam in March when a tanker truck leaked hydrochloric acid on the East Shoreway.
``People were getting on the highway not knowing there was an accident two miles ahead," she said.
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