ERTICO-ITS Europe has announced the winners of the European ITS Hall of Fame Awards for 2016, which will be presented and celebrated during the 23rd ITS World Congress in Melbourne, Australia, on October 10-14. There are three categories of Award and each of the three regions that jointly organize the Congresses make one election to each category.
The Lifetime Achievement Award will go to Professor Eric Sampson (left), who has had a major impact on ITS development and deployment in his various roles, first at the UK Department for Transport (DfT), as one of the founders of ERTICO, as a visiting Professor at four universities, and as the ‘guardian of the content’ of the ITS European and World Congresses. He has actively worked in developing academic-industrial collaboration and increasing contribution of science and technology to transport policy-making. Sampson’s transport career spans 45 years in the public sector. In the UK he persuaded ministers to trial electronic tolling systems, created the UK Guide on In-vehicle systems (now the European Code of Practice), helped found ITS (UK), and launched the open ticketing standard now being introduced across Europe by the Smart Ticketing Alliance.
The Industry Award has been won by the Association of French Toll Motorway Operators (ASFA), which is the professional organization for road concessionaries and operating companies in the country. One of the founding members of ERTICO-ITS Europe, it contains 23 members operating more than 5,625 miles (9,053km) of toll motorway network. The association’s members have implemented advanced technology across a wide range of applications, including automatic incident, real-time traffic information services, alert, automatic emergency call, and nationwide full interoperable ETC system. ASFA members are actively participating in several European projects, including: Ecomove for improved eco driving; and the CESARE, REETS projects for full deployment of a European Electronic Toll Service. Members are also currently participating in the MedTis, Arc Atlantic, and EIP+ projects that are aiming to deploy harmonized ITS services in Europe. ASFA companies are designing the motorways of the future, which will welcome autonomous vehicles and enable Mobility as a Service (MaaS).
The Local Government Award will go to the City of Olsztyn in Poland (pictured above), which has 175,000 inhabitants, and although it is not considered a big city, it has been facing several issues in term of traffic and public transport. Olsztyn has successfully implemented a full ITS solution for its citizens and public transport users. The implementation for public transport includes the installation of passenger information boards, and the deployment of more than 35 stationary ticket machine and 150 mobile ticket machines, as well as the introduction of a city payment card. The city has also opened its own traffic management center, including two video walls and 10 operator stations that are connected to more than 500 traffic cameras at key intersections and more than 600 cameras on the public bus system.
