Augment Roadside Units with More Traditional ITS Technologies to Support Connected Vehicle Applications
Connected Vehicle Pilot Sites in New York City, Wyoming, and Tampa Led to Lessons Learned Regarding Roadside Unit Procurement, Design, Installation, and Testing.
Wyoming, United States
Tampa, Florida, United States
New York City, New York, United States
Connected Vehicle Deployment Technical Assistance: Roadside Unit (RSU) Lessons Learned and Best Practices
Summary Information
In September of 2015, USDOT selected New York City Department of Transportation (NYCDOT), Wyoming Department of Transportation (WYDOT) and Tampa Hillsborough Expressway Authority (THEA) as the recipients of a combined $42 million in federal funding to pilot next-generation infrastructure and vehicle technology under the Connected Vehicle Pilot Deployment Program.
A roadside unit (RSU) is a wireless communications transceiver that exchanges data with onboard units in vehicles, supporting the vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) applications. This report summarized lessons learned and best practices for RSUs as experienced by the United States Department of Transportation’s Connected Vehicle (CV) Pilot sites in New York City, Wyoming, and Tampa.
The lessons learned and best practices were organized under four categories (procurement, design, installation, and testing) and included the following:
- Conduct thorough technical scans to better understand vendor capacity, depth, and resources. Conducting thorough technical scans, including real-world testing, is essential to assess vendor capability, capacity, and readiness, since suppliers may lack sufficient resources and demonstrations alone do not reflect actual deployment conditions.
- Consider the full cost of ownership across the entire service life of RSU. CV deployments typically require substantially greater effort, resources, and integration work than conventional equipment, especially for early adopters facing frequent vendor updates.
- Augment CV solutions with more traditional ITS technologies. Traditional ITS devices (cameras, LiDAR, etc.) may be useful in supporting CV applications.
- Ensure that RSUs have sufficient computing power. Deployers should have a good understanding of the load requirements on their CV devices and ensure that their hardware is not underpowered.
- Design RSUs to continue broadcasting through jamming activities. Jamming devices intentionally block, jam, or interfere with communications and may prevent RSUs from operating.
- Develop installation checklists and procedures to prevent installers from leaving a site until RSU connectivity is confirmed. This can help minimize the need for follow-up visits and unnecessary delays.
- Consider the location of existing ITS devices and line of sight for antennas when selecting sites for RSU installation. Co-locate CV equipment to take advantage of existing roadside infrastructure, power, and communications. Locations should be free of interference from trees, bridges, overpasses, and other structures.
- Consider cost sharing and the total cost of ownership. RSUs running multiple software applications may be able to replace single-purpose equipment used by various stakeholder agencies (e.g., vehicle counters, transit signal priority selectors, Wi-Fi hot spots, etc.), resulting in cost savings over the entire RSU service life.
- Account for the time needed for large-scale purchases, allocating enough time for the procurement cycle. Lengthy negotiations and slow progress issuing vendor contracts may cause delays.
- Split procurement into multiple phases to minimize risks. A prototype phase and a production phase can allow for adjustments before scaling.
- Allow several months to obtain a Federal Communications Commission (FCC) permit. The CV Pilot sites initially spent more time on FCC filing than originally expected.
