STREAMS Integrated Intelligent Transport System is an enterprise traffic management system designed to operate in the Microsoft Windows environment. Like most

traffic management Traffic management is a key branch within logistics. It concerns the planning control and purchasing of transport services needed to physically move vehicles (for example aircraft, road vehicles, rolling stock and watercraft) and freight. Traffi ...

systems, STREAMS is an array of institutional, human, hardware, and software components designed to monitor, control, and manage traffic on streets and highways. Advanced traffic management systems come under the banner of ITS ( intelligent transport systems). ITS is the application of

information and communications technology Information and communications technology (ICT) is an extensional term for information technology (IT) that stresses the role of unified communications and the integration of telecommunications ( telephone lines and wireless signals) and computer ...

to transport operations in order to "reduce operating costs", "improve safety" and "maximize the capacity of existing infrastructure". STREAMS provides traffic signal management,

incident management An incident is an event that could lead to loss of, or disruption to, an organization's operations, services or functions. Incident management (IcM) is a term describing the activities of an organization to identify, analyze, and correct hazards ...

, motorway management, vehicle priority, traveler information, flood monitoring and parking guidance within a single integrated system is what the product says. STREAMS is developed by Transmax.

History

In 1969, the Department of Main Roads (

Queensland ) , nickname = Sunshine State , image_map = Queensland in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Queensland in Australia , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , establishe ...

) installed the first Intelligent Transport System in Australia (located at Surfers Paradise). This included 30 signalized intersections featuring centralized control and traffic responsive capabilities. In 1985, a second-generation traffic management system was installed in Cairns, Australia. This was known as the TRAC System, or Traffic Responsive Adaptive Control System. Progressive installation of the TRAC system followed at several more sites around Queensland including the capital city,

Brisbane Brisbane ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Queensland, and the third-most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of approximately 2.6 million. Brisbane lies at the centre of the South ...

. In 1988, a traffic management system was installed for the South East Freeway in Brisbane, Australia. The features included were ramp metering and graphical displays of traffic conditions. It also provided automatic incident detection. In 1992, a new integrated intelligent transport system development was commenced. The objectives were to lower ongoing costs while providing increased performance and opportunity for future ITS applications. The resulting system was STREAMS. In 2002, the division of

Department of Main Roads (Queensland) The Department of Main Roads was a department of the Government of Queensland responsible for planning, building and maintaining the state's major roads. It was merged with Queensland Transport to form the Department of Transport and Main Road ...

responsible for continuing development of STREAMS was privatized to form Transmax. The company remains 100% owned by the Queensland Government Department of Transport and Main Roads. In April 2007, Transmax in partnership with

VicRoads VicRoads is a government joint venture in the state of Victoria, Australia. In the state, it is responsible for driver licensing and vehicle registration. It is owned and operated through a joint venture between the Victorian government and a ...

implemented a coordinated ramp metering trial in

Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...

Victoria Victoria most commonly refers to: * Victoria (Australia), a state of the Commonwealth of Australia * Victoria, British Columbia, provincial capital of British Columbia, Canada * Victoria (mythology), Roman goddess of Victory * Victoria, Seychelle ...

on a 15 km section of the

Monash Freeway The Monash Freeway is a major urban freeway in Victoria, Australia, linking Melbourne's CBD to its south-eastern suburbs and beyond to the Gippsland region. It carries up to 180,000 vehicles per day and is one of Australia's busiest freeways ...

. Later that year, in December, VicRoads installed STREAMS to manage another six ramps. These developments were part of a much larger M1 Upgrade Project that continued over the next three years, eventually winning the 2010 National ITS Australia Award. The project to upgrade the 75-kilometre M1 Freeway, increased the capacity and safety of the Monash Freeway, the CityLink Tollway (Southern Link) and the West Gate Freeway utilising STREAMS as the Integrated Control System. In 2016, Transmax partnered with

Parsons Brinckerhoff WSP USA, formerly WSP, Parsons Brinckerhoff and Parsons Brinckerhoff, is a multinational engineering and design firm with approximately 14,000 employees. WSP stands for Williams Sale Partnership. The firm operates in the fields of strategic con ...

to trial STREAMS motorway management functionality for the

Utah Department of Transportation The Utah Department of Transportation (UDOT) is an agency of the state government of Utah, United States; it is usually referred to by its initials UDOT (pronounced "you-dot"). UDOT is charged with maintaining the more than of roadway that co ...

in the United States.

Software Architecture

STREAMS employs a

distributed computing A distributed system is a system whose components are located on different networked computers, which communicate and coordinate their actions by passing messages to one another from any system. Distributed computing is a field of computer sci ...

software architecture Software architecture is the fundamental structure of a software system and the discipline of creating such structures and systems. Each structure comprises software elements, relations among them, and properties of both elements and relations. ...

. Field hardware such as intersection controllers, video cameras and speed detectors are connected via field processors back to a central application server. Users connect to the application server via the

workstation A workstation is a special computer designed for technical or scientific applications. Intended primarily to be used by a single user, they are commonly connected to a local area network and run multi-user operating systems. The term ''workstat ...

software. Field communications are via Optical Fibre,

DSL Digital subscriber line (DSL; originally digital subscriber loop) is a family of technologies that are used to transmit digital data over telephone lines. In telecommunications marketing, the term DSL is widely understood to mean asymmetric dig ...

, or

Wireless Wireless communication (or just wireless, when the context allows) is the transfer of information between two or more points without the use of an electrical conductor, optical fiber or other continuous guided medium for the transfer. The most ...

connections. The software is built in distinct modules for each distinct area of traffic / transport control and monitoring. The

software communicates to the application server software via a publisher / subscriber model (i.e.

workstations A workstation is a special computer designed for technical or scientific applications. Intended primarily to be used by a single user, they are commonly connected to a local area network and run multi-user operating systems. The term ''worksta ...

subscribe to specifically requested streams of data which are published by the application server). The software architecture model is designed to support the software's claim of being an "integrated"

Advanced Traffic Management System The Advanced Traffic Management System (ATMS) field is a primary subfield within the Intelligent Transportation System (ITS) domain. The ATMS view is a top-down management perspective that integrates technology primarily to improve the flow of v ...

. This breaks away from the inter-operability model, which is multiple ITS systems working in parallel, each performing a discrete function. The

software is built around a central user interface called "STREAMS Explorer". Other specification / reporting applications can all be launched from STREAMS Explorer. The transport network data is set up via a GIS ( Geographic Information System). The GIS allows for a graphical user interface displaying

transport network A transport network, or transportation network, is a network or graph in geographic space, describing an infrastructure that permits and constrains movement or flow. Examples include but are not limited to road networks, railways, air routes ...

data overlaid on street maps and updating in real-time.

Adaptive Traffic Management

STREAMS implements adaptive traffic management through a feature called "Dynamic Plan Selection". Depending on the density of traffic (occupancy) and the dominant direction of traffic (for example, inbound, outbound, or bidirectional) on a road, nearby signalized intersections are operated using several predefined traffic plans. A user sets up the

signal timing Signal timing is the technique which traffic engineers use to distribute right-of-way at a signalized intersection. The process includes selecting appropriate values for timing, which are implemented in specialized traffic signal controllers. Sign ...

and picks the traffic density levels and direction that they apply to. Selecting the appropriate

is then automatic. When a time-based traffic plan schedule would be inappropriate because of varying traffic levels, STREAMS Dynamic Plan Selection can adapt to unexpected traffic levels as they arise. With help from the academic community, STREAMS Smart Motorways offers the coordinated ramp-metering algorithm suite ALINEA/HERO. The modular architecture of STREAMS allows Transmax to integrate new algorithms as they become available. STREAMS applies the computed metering rates using ramp signal controllers deployed at the roadside. Controlling multiple consecutive ramps, ideally the whole motorway, makes it possible to maintain a more consistent motorway flow and prevent flow breakdown. Using HERO, STREAMS is able to balance queues across multiple ramps and maximize motorway performance.

References

External links

Transmax

Department of Transport and Main Roads
Intelligent transportation systems

History

Software Architecture

Adaptive Traffic Management

See also

References

Further reading

External links