A Key Industry Faces a Challenge

For many years, one of the biggest challenges facing truck drivers, fleet managers and owner-operators has been parking. Long-haul truck drivers struggling to find safe parking significantly reduces national freight productivity. More importantly, searching while fatigued and parking in unauthorized spots puts truck drivers and other motorists at risk.

A Technology-Based, Regional Solution

In 2016, eight members of the Mid America Association of State Transportation Officials came together to improve commercial freight safety and efficiency in the Midwest. The collaboration with the Federal Highway Administration, which provided TIGER grant funding to help launch the project, involves Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio and Wisconsin.

Their vision: Help commercial truckers make safer, more efficient parking decisions through a user-focused information service.

Project Goals

– Improve safety
– Provide timely, reliable information to drivers and dispatchers
– Ensure harmonious and consistent operations between states
– Maximize usage of existing parking
– Add value to the trucking industry
– Implement the system in a sustainable way
– Allow state-specific flexibility

8 States, 1 System

Designing and implementing a regional technology initiative required reconciling different, sometimes conflicting, agency technical preferences and requirements, including:

– Procurement
– Data collection method
– Data collection technology
– Operations & maintenance
– Data analytics & sharing
– Information dissemination

States had the flexibility to choose technologies they would use, so long as they satisfied the project’s requirements. States committed to their own budgets and schedules that supported those of the overall project. The Mid-America Freight Coalition was brought on board to serve as the project’s data warehouse and to assess performance after launch.

Keys To Success

Planning, design and deployment followed a systems engineering process. Up-front efforts ensured stakeholder needs were met in a manner that could be efficiently implemented and operated by each state. MAASTO TPIMS provides important lessons for successfully developing and delivering complex, multi-jurisdictional technology projects while respecting and integrating individual agency needs.

– Communicate early and often
– Focus on outcomes
– Link goals and performance
– Define roles clearly

Partner States

The MAASTO Regional TPIMS partnership includes eight of the 10 states that comprise the Mid America Association of State Transportation Officials (MAASTO).

Advisors

The following organizations will serve as industry stakeholders throughout TPIMS concept development and preliminary design, and will assist with trucking industry coordination.