Snow and ice can easily accumulate on the lenses of signal lights and block light to the drivers of vehicles or locomotive engineers. Snow-clogged signal lights can decrease the performance of signalized intersections and railroads and may result in collisions in inclement weather conditions. The TRB IDEA (Innovations Deserving Exploratory Analysis) Program's NCHRP IDEA Final Report for Project 190: Self-de-icing LED Signals for Railroads and Highway Intersections aims at developing and demonstrating a n...

Transportation agencies are seeking ways to deploy safety applications at targeted intersections for long-term monitoring of traffic flow. The TRB IDEA (Innovations Deserving Exploratory Analysis) Program's NCHRP IDEA Final Report for Project 217: A Real-Time Proactive Intersection Safety Monitoring and Visualization System Based on Radar Sensor Data details the development of a proactive intersection safety monitoring and visualization system that can be implemented at any kind of intersection for any t...

The majority of traffic count portable data collections is done by road tube. While the hardware unit costs for road tubes are low, installation requires workers to kneel in the middle of the road sujecting them to potential harm. The TRB IDEA (Innovations Deserving Exploratory Analysis) Program's NCHRP IDEA Final Report for Project 216: A Portable Single Lane Traffic Counting Device details a visually based counting and classification device that is able to achieve expected results.

Construction is considered a hazardous industry responsible for a large portion of fatal and non-fatal work-related injuries. Despite efforts by the construction industry, many fatalities and injuries are still occurring, for one reason, because of dynamic and complex construction site conditions. The TRB IDEA (Innovations Deserving Exploratory Analysis) Program's  NCHRP IDEA Final Report for Project 206: Rule-Based Automated Safety Monitoring  System for Work Zone Safety  details a r...

Traditional shoreline protection structures like seawalls do not dissipate wave energy. They reflect waves creating more turbulent conditions which make sites and their surroundings more susceptible to damage. Moreover, they typically do not provide a hospitable environment for biodiversity. The TRB IDEA (Innovations Deserving Exploratory Analysis) Program's  NCHRP IDEA Final Report for Project 213:  SEAHIVE - Sustainable Estuarine and Marine Revetment  details the engineered marine and es...

The mechanical properties of shape memory alloys (SMAs) have made them one of the most desirable smart materials applied in bridges. The supereleastic effect (SE) is particularly advantageous for dissipating seismic energy and protecting bridges in earthquake-prone regions. The TRB IDEA (Innovations Deserving Exploratory Analysis) Program's  NCHRP IDEA Final Report for Project 210:  Material Characteristics of Cu-Based Superelastic Alloys for Applications in Bridge Columns to Improve Seismic Pe...

Fatigue cracking is one of the dominant distress types that a pavement structure experiences throughout its service life. The TRB IDEA (Innovations Deserving Exploratory Analysis) Program's NCHRP IDEA Final Report for Project 218: Development of Three Point Bending Cylinder (3PBC) Asphalt Mixture Fatigue Test System developed a new test method called the "three-point bending cylinder (3PBC) test." The primary benefit of this test method is that sample preparation and testing times are shorter than typica...

Bridges can have deep subsurface concrete damage and it can be difficult to measure and analyze the damage. The TRB IDEA (Innovations Deserving Exploratory Analysis) Program's NCHRP IDEA Final Report for Project 205-A: Bio-Inspired "MRI" of Concrete Bridges using Waveform-Based Ultrasonic Tomography details the development of an innovative measurement and data processing approach of waveform-based ultrasonic tomography to generate tomographic images of sub-surface defects in structural concrete using a s...

Prioritized improving pedestrian facility inventory, particularly concerning crosswalks and sidewalks, is an important action item in state departments of transportation Strategic Highway Safety Plans. However, such information is not widely available at the state level. The TRB IDEA (Innovations Deserving Exploratory Analysis) Program's Highway IDEA Final Report 209: An Automated System for Pedestrian Facility Data Collection from Aerial Images details the development of an innovative system using convo...

A disproportionally high number of serious vehicle crashes (25% of fatal crashes) occur on horizontal curves, even though curves represent only a fraction of the roadway network (5% of U.S. highway miles). The TRB Highway Innovations Deserving Exploratory Analysis (IDEA) Program's An Enhanced Network-Level Curve Safety Assessment and Monitoring Using Mobile Devices seeks to develop an enhanced method to collect and extract in-service curve characteristics, acquire Ball Bank Indicator (BBI) values using s...