Arterial Performance Measures with Media Access Control Readers

This study reports on the use of media access control (MAC) readers through the Bluetooth protocol by means of off-the-shelf equipment to measure arterial travel performance (segment travel time, average running speed, and origin–destination). First, the MAC reader technology was deployed at the same time that travel time runs by the traditional floating-car method were used to evaluate the general reliability and accuracy of the MAC technology. Second, the MAC reader technology was used to track before-and-after changes to signal timing along the corridor to measure the effectiveness of the adjustments, proving its real-world applicability while requiring far fewer resources than traditional data collection means. A comparison of the Bluetooth MAC address data with traditional Global Positioning System floating-car studies suggests that the larger data set from the Bluetooth data more effectively captures performance characteristics of the arterial. The research was conducted on a 2.5-mi suburban signalized arterial in Portland, Oregon, over 27 days. The paper concludes by discussing the system architecture for a permanent real-time deployment and other areas for future research. The real-time MAC reader information provides substantial opportunity to add new control and performance monitoring capability to other intelligent transportation system components, such as ramp metering, transit signal priority systems, and adaptive signal control.