Katie Johnson

The January/February 2022 issue of Innovator, the Federal Highway Administration’s bimonthly newsletter, features the success stories of several No Boundaries member states.

Michigan’s State Transportation Innovation Council (STIC) was one of two to recently win a 2021 STIC Excellence Award for its “strong leadership, involvement by diverse groups, innovation in performance tracking, and promotion of innovation implementation.” Among Michigan’s many exciting initiatives is the MDOT Innovations dashboard. This public-facing tool shares details about new materials, methods and technologies being explored within the agency and features an interactive map showing where the innovations have been deployed across the state.

In addition, Texas, California and Colorado were each recognized for their highway construction workforce partnerships. These joint collaborations, which can include stakeholders from state and local agencies and private industries, aim to tackle the workforce shortage in new and innovative ways.

Sign up to get the next issue of Innovator delivered to your inbox.

Image source: FHWA

Recognizing pavement conditions and making real-time adjustments to seal coat shot rates helps transportation agencies get the most out of their preservation treatments.

To aid engineers in the field, Texas DOT developed an automated process that uses lidar data to assess changing pavement conditions and make informed and cost-effective decisions regarding application rates.

Read the report: Seal Coat Binder Rate Adjustments Using LiDAR Data, June 2021.

Image source: Arizona DOT

A recently enacted federal rule requires all organizations that provide entry-level commercial driver’s license (CDL) training to meet certain requirements by February 7, 2022.

To help transportation agencies comply, the Clear Roads pooled fund has developed free, downloadable CDL training materials for both instructor-led classroom and behind-the-wheel training.

Learn more and request the training materials from Clear Roads.

Image source: Nevada DOT

Wondering how the newly enacted Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) will affect your agency’s transportation performance management (TPM) processes?

Bring your questions and join panelists from the FHWA, AASHTO and state transportation agencies for a live discussion, “The IIJA and TPM: A Dialogue,” scheduled for Wednesday, December 15 from 10:30 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. Central.

The program will offer perspectives on the key issues presented by the $550 billion measure, as well as an open question-and-answer session to allow attendees to ask questions and share insights. The webinar is free to attend.

Learn more and register.

Image source: FHWA

Detecting road damage quickly is key to identifying top needs and allocating appropriate funding. However, manual pavement inspections can be time consuming and still yield incomplete results.

Research by the Safe-D University Transportation Center explored the feasibility of applying advanced computing techniques to more than 6,000 images taken by cameras mounted to vehicle dashboards, or dashcams, to recognize pavement distresses. By comparing the results with data collected manually at the same locations, researchers learned which types of distresses can be found reliably from dashcams, as well as possible avenues to improve accuracy.

Read the research brief: Detecting Pavement Distresses Using Crowdsourced Dashcam Camera Images, May 2021.

Image source: U.S. DOT

The Federal Highway Administration’s Build a Better Mousetrap program is an annual competition that challenges local and tribal transportation agencies to solve everyday problems.

The newly published 2021 booklet spotlights clever innovations that improve safety, save time and money, and increase efficiency for local communities nationwide.

Download the 2021 booklet and learn new ways to address old problems.

Image source: FHWA