Work Zone Coordination Software Tool

Faced with growing number of work zones, the challenge for transportation agencies is to effectively manage the impacts of work zones for alleviating congestion and maintaining the safety of motorists and workers without disrupting project schedules. Coordinating work zone activities and improving communication among agencies have already been practiced by various state DOTs and transportation agencies. A review of the current work zone coordination practice by other states revealed that there are no universal DOT policies that address how agencies should coordinate or consolidate projects. In addition, only a few states utilize computer tools specific to regional or corridor based work zone coordination. The state DOTs mostly coordinate significant and long-term projects. However, the majority of roadway projects include minor repair, roadway maintenance, bridge maintenance, surveying, landscape and utility work that require relatively short term work zones. The presented Work Zone Coordination Software (WCS) tool was developed for providing the NJDOT with an easy-to-use tool to evaluate the feasibility and effectiveness of coordinating short and long term work zones and measure the benefits of various combinations of projects relative to each other and the status quo. This on-line tool is implemented with a web-based user interface. It integrates all scheduled and active construction projects, identifies conflicts between work zone projects and estimates the benefits of conflict mitigation. The WCS tool currently works with the NJ work zone database by automatically importing it to provide up-to-date information to its users. However, the tool is built on a flexible framework that allows the integration of any work zone database, provided that it includes all the required information.