The following Functional Areas are associated with the "Caltrans District Maintenance Dispatch" element.   Each functional area includes a brief description and a bulleted list of detailed functions.   The common icon provides a link to other systems in the region that include the same functional area.

 

MCM Maintenance Decision Support

Maintenance Decision Support Systems recommend courses of action based on current and forecast environmental and road conditions (filtered and fused for specific time horizons) and additional application specific information. Recommendations and dispatch

• The center shall provide the center personnel with tailored external information, including weather or road condition observations, forecasted weather information or road conditions, current usage of treatments and materials, available resources, equipment and vehicle availability, road network information, and source reliability information.
• The center shall tailor the decision support information to include filtering (selection from a large amount of external information), error reduction ('smoothing' the information), fusion (combination of disparate information to match the decision needs), and analysis (creating the decision).
• The center shall provide an interface to the center personnel to input control parameters for the decision support process and receive decisions or information presentation.

MCM Environmental Information Processing

Processes current and forecast weather data, road condition information, local environmental data, and uses internal models to develop specialized detailed forecasts of local weather and surface conditions. Disseminates road weather information to other a

• The center shall assimilate current and forecast road conditions and surface weather information using a combination of weather service provider information (such as the National Weather Service and value-added sector specific meteorological services) and local environmental sensor data.
• The center shall use the various data inputs of environmental sensors and road weather data to develop a view of current and predicted road weather and road conditions.
• The center shall disseminate current and forecasted road weather and road condition information to weather service providers (such as the National Weather Service and value-added sector specific meteorological services) as well as other agencies including traffic, emergency, and transit management, traveler information providers, rail operations centers, media, and other maintenance management centers.
• The center shall provide value-added sector specific meteorological services with information on basic road facility and treatment information that supports forecasts for road conditions.

MCM Data Collection

Collection and storage of maintenance and construction information. For use by operations personnel or data archives in the region.

• The center shall collect maintenance and construction data (such as field equipment status, infrastructure status, maintenance and construction activity data) gathered from roadway, traffic, and other maintenance and construction sources.
• The center shall receive and respond to requests from ITS Archives for either a catalog of the maintenance and construction data or for the data itself.
• The center shall be able to produce sample products of the data available.
• The center shall provide data to Asset Management to be used in updating the status of assets in the inventory.
• The center shall assign quality control metrics and meta-data to be stored along with the data.

MCM Environmental Information Collection

Remotely controls environmental sensors and assimilates collected data with other current and forecast road conditions and surface weather information from weather service providers and transportation operations.

• The center shall remotely control environmental sensors that measure road surface temperature, moisture, icing, salinity, and other measures.
• The center shall remotely control environmental sensors that measure weather conditions including temperature, wind, humidity, precipitation, and visibility.
• The center shall assimilate current and forecast road conditions and surface weather information using a combination of weather service provider information (such as the National Weather Service and value-added sector specific meteorological services), data from traffic, emergency, and transit management, traveler information providers, and environmental data collected from sensors deployed on and about the roadway as well as the fleet of maintenance and construction vehicles.
• The center shall provide weather and road condition information to weather service providers and center personnel.
• The center shall collect operational status for the roadside and vehicle-based environmental sensor equipment.
• The center shall collect fault data for the roadside and vehicle-based environmental sensor equipment for repair.

MCM Incident Management

Supports coordinated response to incidents - share incident notifications, manage incident response resources, and coordinate overall incident situation and response among allied response organizations.

• The center shall receive inputs from the Alerting and Advisory System concerning the possibility or occurrence of severe weather, terrorist activity, or other major emergency, including information provided by the Emergency Alert System.
• The center shall exchange incident and threat information with emergency management centers as well as traffic management centers; including notification of existence of incident and expected severity, location, time and nature of incident.
• The center shall coordinate planning for incidents with emergency management centers - including pre-planning activities for disaster response, evacuation, and recovery operations.
• The center shall exchange road network status assessment information with emergency management and traffic management centers including an assessment of damage sustained by the road network including location and extent of the damage, estimate of remaining capacity, required closures, alternate routes, necessary restrictions, and time frame for repair and recovery.
• The center shall receive information indicating the damage sustained by transportation assets, derived from aerial surveillance, field reports, inspections, tests, and analyses to support incident management.
• The center shall exchange alert information and status, including disaster inforamtion, the nature of the emergency and the logistics of the emergency, with emergency management centers.
• The center shall respond to requests from emergency management to provide maintenance and construction resources to implement response plans, assist in clean up, verify an incident, etc.
• The center shall provide work zone activities affecting the road network including the nature of the maintenance or construction activity, location, impact to the roadway, expected time(s) and duration of impact, anticipated delays, alternate routes, and suggested speed limits.

MCM Roadway Maintenance and Construction (User Defined)

Overall management and support for routine maintenance on the roadway or right-of-way. Includes maintenance requests from traffic or emergency elements, and responses to these elements. Includes input of weather information and coordination of activities

• The center shall maintain an interface with asset management systems to track the inventory, restrictions, repair needs and status updates of transportation assets (pavement, bridges, signs, etc.) including location, installation and materials information, vendor/contractor, current maintenance status, standard height, width, and weight restrictions.
• The center shall collect the status and fault data from roadside equipment, such as traffic, infrastructure, and environmental sensors, highway advisory radio and dynamic message signs, automated roadway treatment systems, barrier and safeguard systems, cameras, traffic signals and override equipment, ramp meters, beacons, security sensors and surveillance equipment, etc., and provide a cohesive view of equipment repair needs.
• The center shall collect the status and fault data from traffic management centers, including data for traffic, infrastructure, and environmental sensors, highway advisory radio and dynamic message signs, automated roadway treatment systems, barrier and safeguard systems, cameras, traffic signals and override equipment, ramp meters, beacons, security sensors and surveillance equipment, etc., and provide a cohesive view of equipment repair needs.
• The center shall remotely control and collect data from infrastructure monitoring sensors located along the roadway infrastructure or on maintenance and construction vehicles.
• The center shall collect current and forecast traffic and weather information from traffic management centers and weather service providers (such as the National Weather Service and value-added sector specific meteorological services).
• The center shall exchange information with administrative systems to support the planning and scheduling of maintenance activities.

MCM Vehicle Tracking

Remotely tracks the location of maintenance and construction vehicles and other equipment; presented to the center personnel.

• The center shall monitor the locations of all maintenance and construction vehicles and other equipment under its jurisdiction.
• The center shall present location data to center personnel for the fleet of maintenance and construction vehicles and other equipment.

MCM Winter Maintenance Management (User Defined)

Manages winter road maintenance, tracking and controlling snow plow operations, roadway treatment (e.g., salt spraying and other material applications) based on weather information. Includes coordination of maintenance status with other transportation and

• The center shall respond to requests from emergency management and traffic management centers for hazard removal, field equipment repair, and other winter roadway maintenance.
• The center shall exchange information with administrative systems to support the planning and scheduling of winter maintenance activities. This information includes: equipment and consumables resupply purchase request status, personnel qualifications including training and special certifications, environmental regulations and rules that may impact maintenance activities, and requests and project requirements from contract administration.
• The center shall provide status information about scheduled winter maintenance activities including anticipated closures and impact to the roadway, alternate routes, anticipated delays, closure times, and durations. The information is provided to other management centers such as traffic, emergency, transit, traveler information providers, other maintenance centers, and the media.
• The center shall collect current and forecast traffic and weather information from traffic management centers and weather service providers (such as the National Weather Service and value-added sector specific meteorological services).
• The center shall determine the need for roadway treatment based on current and forecasted weather information, current usage of treatments and materials, available resources, requests for action from other agencies, and recommendations from the Maintenance Decision Support system, specifically under winter conditions. This supports winter maintenance such as plowing, treating, anti-icing, etc.
• The center shall assess the current status of all winter maintenance activities, including actual work activities performed, current locations and operational conditions of vehicles, materials and equipment inventories, field equipment status, environmental information, etc.

MCM Work Activity Coordination

Disseminates work activity schedules to other agencies. Work schedules are coordinated, factoring in the needs and activities of other agencies and adjacent jurisdictions.

• The center shall provide work zone activities affecting the road network including the nature of the maintenance or construction activity, location, impact to the roadway, expected time(s) and duration of impact, anticipated delays, alternate routes, and suggested speed limits. This information may be augmented with images that provide a visual indication of current work zone status and traffic impacts.
• The center shall provide status information about scheduled maintenance and construction activities including anticipated closures and impact to the roadway, alternate routes, anticipated delays, closure times, and durations. The information is provided to other management centers such as traffic, emergency, transit, traveler information providers, other maintenance centers, multimodal transportation providers, rail operations, and the media.
• The center shall collect and respond to feedback concerning scheduled maintenance and construction activities with other management centers such as traffic, emergency, transit, and rail operations.
• The center shall collect and disseminate asset restriction information levied on transportation asset usage based on infrastructure design, surveys, tests, or analyses. This includes standard facility design height, width, and weight restrictions, special restrictions such as spring weight restrictions, and temporary facility restrictions that are imposed during maintenance and construction.
• The center shall exchange information with administrative systems to support the planning and scheduling of maintenance and construction activities. This information includes: equipment and consumables resupply purchase request status, personnel qualifications including training and special certifications, environmental regulations and rules that may impact maintenance activities, and requests and project requirements from contract administration.
• The center shall exchange rail schedules and work plans with rail operations centers.

MCM Work Zone Management

Remotely monitors and supports work zone activities, controlling traffic through portable dynamic message signs (DMS) and informing other groups of activity (e.g., traveler information systems, traffic management centers, other maintenance and constructio

• The center shall generate new work zone activity schedules for use by maintenance and construction vehicles, maintenance and construction operators, and for information coordination purposes.
• The center shall control the collection of work zone status information including video images from cameras located in or near the work zone.
• The center shall disseminate work zone information to other agencies and centers including traffic, transit, emergency management centers, other maintenance centers, traveler information providers, and the media.
• The center shall control traffic in work zones by providing remote control of dynamic message signs and highway advisory radio systems located in or near the work zone.
• The center shall exchange information with administrative systems to support the planning and scheduling of work zone activities. This information includes: equipment and consumables resupply purchase request status, personnel qualifications including training and special certifications, environmental regulations and rules that may impact maintenance activities, and requests and project requirements from contract administration.