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September 2001
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE ITA's Safety Transmitters Help Protect Illinois Highway Workers(re-printed with permission from Safety Warning System, L.C.)The Illinois Department of Transportation is using Safety Warning System® transmitters to alert drivers as they approach road crews doing maintenance work. And officials are pleased enough with the results that they are incorporating the transmitter into the specifications for one piece of safety equipment. All but one of the department’s transmitters are placed on attenuators, large crash cushions positioned behind workers patching potholes or performing other maintenance work, according to Tim Peters, Illinois DOT equipment engineer. These attenuators can absorb the impact of a passenger vehicle, thus protecting the workers. Peters said the SWS® units, made by Innovative Technology of America (ITA), of Champaign, Illinois, transmit two messages: Work Zone Ahead and Highway Work Crew Ahead. In this particular application, either message appears to be equally effective, based on feedback from road crews. And the workers believe the transmitters are helping drivers slow down through work areas. "The crews have been generally positive" in accepting the technology, Peters said. "We have not gone out and measured the speed of vehicles, but the feeling from the workers we have talked to out in the field is that it does appear to have some effect. Anything we can do to make our work zones safer for our folks, we definitely want to do." Peters said he first became aware of the Safety Warning System when a representative from ITA was demonstrating a unit for another office within the department. At least two other individuals also had submitted comments to the agency suggesting that officials look into the technology. The Illinois DOT has been using SWS® -equipped attenuators for slightly over a year, and they are distributed fairly randomly throughout Illinois. "We are exploring the technology and putting enough of it out there that we can get some feedback from our people," Peters explained. When it comes to attenuators in Illinois, the department is satisfied enough with the performance of the Safety Warning transmitters that Peters has begun to incorporate the technology as a standard component for the devices. As equipment engineer, Peters is responsible for specifications and issues related to equipment used by the department’s field forces. "Our work zone protection manuals define for us what equipment or what traffic control we will use in work zones, depending on the conditions that exist," he said. "And an attenuator is fairly often a piece of equipment we use to protect our folks as well as the motoring public. We are making [the ITA Safety Transmitter] a standard part of new attenuators that we are purchasing." Joint purchasing arrangements with the state may help local governments acquire SWS®-enhanced equipment as well. As the budget allows, the department also will retrofit existing attenuator equipment with Safety Warning transmitters, Peters added. The DOT official said he recognizes that the technology is just in its early stages of acceptance, and he predicts a bright future for SWS®. "I know there is a lot of potential for using the system," Peters said. "It’s early in the deployment of this technology. You’ve got to get both sides out there; if you get a lot of the receivers, I think you’ll see more of the transmitters. We see it as an evolutionary thing. As this technology grows, the public will demand it." And has the ITA Safety Transmitter lived up to his own expectations? "I would say so, yes."  Innovative
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