Spanish multinational systems integrator SICE has announced it will deliver the control system for part of Australia’s largest transport infrastructure project, WestConnex.
CPB Dragados Samsung joint venture has awarded SICE a contract for the design, supply, installation and commissioning of the company’s Sidera operation management control system (OMCS) for the WestConnex New M5 in Sydney.
The new route will provide high quality motorway connections from western Sydney to Sydney Airport and Port Botany, supporting the city’s forecast growth in population and employment along these corridors.
By easing traffic congestion, WestConnex will improve travel time reliability for the 100,000 motorists that use this key route every day. The Sidera platform will manage the New M5, which involves approximately 5.5 miles (9km) of new twin motorway tunnels, doubling the capacity along the M5 East corridor and improving access to Sydney Airport and Port Botany. The New M5 project also involves widening and realigning the existing M5 East at Kingsgrove, constructing a new interchange in St Peters, and upgrading local roads in St Peters, Alexandria and Mascot.
Sice has already been awarded the contract to deliver the Sidera OMCS platform for the WestConnex M4 East (Stage 1b), and is currently developing the OMCS design. Both the New M5 and M4 East OMCS will be capable of being integrated into a single consistent control system, WestConnex OMCS (WOMCS) in the future. The WOMCS will be designed and built to control operations across the entire WestConnex project area. For the New M5 (Stage 2), Sice will be responsible for the design of:
OMCS hardware and software;
C2C interface between Sidera and the transport management centre (TMC);
Communication network;
PLC (Power-Line Communication) network;
Vehicle detection;
Variable message signs (VMS);
Lane usage and tunnel message signs;
Variable speed limit signs;
CCTV system (DVMS and cameras);
Boom gates;
Overheight vehicle detection systems.
The project is expected to be completed in early 2020.
SICE has recently been awarded the contract to maintain the control, surveillance and automatic vehicle counting system for the Portuguese highway concessionaire, Viaexpresso Estradas de Madeira. The contract includes both the maintenance of the control center and all the ITS systems for the 42.8 miles (69km) of roads and 44 tunnels belonging to the concession on the island of Madeira. SICE has been performing these functions for Viaexpresso since 2008, when the company deployed its SIDERA software platform to control the concession’s highway network.
The maintenance contract covers the surveillance system, consisting of 345 fixed cameras, and 235 automatic incident detection (AID) analyzers, plus the field equipment comprising 241 SOS posts, 61 public address systems, 18 automatic vehicle counting points, fire detection via Fibrolaser, 209 traffic lights, 132 variable message signs (VMS), 71 pollution and visibility detectors, and 37 flux detectors. SICE will also be responsible for all the communication networks and the ITS power supply, generators, uninterruptible power supply systems and weather stations.
