Sinclair Knight Merz was the lead consultant for the development and deployment of the Advanced Traffic Management Systems (ATMS) project for the Auckland Motorway network. The team also included local consultant, Worley, and Carl Bro IBI, a Canadian/UK consortium, with considerable international experience in the application of advanced control technologies to traffic management.
This three year commission included planning and implementing a trial of ATMS on the northern motorway, as well as preparing a masterplan for introducing ATMS to the wider Auckland transport network.
ATMS have been implemented throughout the world to assist with the management of traffic and the optimisation of existing transportation infrastructures. The client has recognised a need for this type of system on its motorways and also plans to use ATMS to assist other projects.
Stage 1 of the project provided 26 CCTV installations and seven variable message signs all monitored and controlled from two central workstations. At present, operators manually set messages on signs based on traffic conditions as observed through the CCTV. A spread spectrum radio based WAN with a limited number of fibre optic links, and an ISDN central core forms the communications system which links the systems together. Future plans see the entire system being upgraded to a fibre optic based system.
The ensuing stage included the replacement and extension of the present lane control signal system on the Auckland Harbour Bridge, installation of more variable message signs, and most significantly, installation of vehicle detection stations and an automated event response control system.