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355-National and Continental Strategy for Digital Infrastructure to Integrate Automation into Transportation 

Date and Time: Wednesday, July 12, 2023: 1:30 PM - 5:00 PM
Location: Plaza B

Session Moderators and Organizers

MODERATORS
John Corbin, Transportation Automation Program Manager, Federal Highway Administration
Valerie Shuman, Principal, Shuman Consulting Group, LLC
Julie Lorenz, Principal Consultant, Burns & McDonnell - 1898 & Co.
Deepak Gopalakrishna, Vice President, ICF

ORGANIZERS
John Corbin
Transportation Automation Program Manager
USDOT Federal Highway Administration

Mark Mockett
Innovative Research General Engineer
USDOT Volpe Transportation Center

TRB Sponsoring Committees and Partners

TRB ITS Committee (ACP15)
TRB Regional TSMO Committee (ACP10)
TRB Committee on Information Systems and Technology (AED30)
ASCE CAV Impacts Committee
ITS America Smart Infrastructure Standing Advisory Committee
ITS America Digital Infrastructure Working Group

Session Description and Agenda

DESCRIPTION

The session will accelerate consensus on the substance and context of transportation digital infrastructure strategy and will encompass the holistic automation of transportation network infrastructure systems for people, goods, energy, information, and finance. An innovative session design will actively engage participants to define and prioritize critical issues to be addressed strategically within a national and continental transportation network topology. Issues will be tentatively aligned with an evolution framework that encompasses and integrates technological, institutional, and policy architectures. Outcomes will be integrated into sustained transportation digital infrastructure strategy implementation within an actively collaborating global community and an adaptable national business case.

AGENDA

GETTING STARTED

1. Session Welcome and Overview (10 minutes) – Moderator: John Corbin, USDOT FHWA
- Call to Order and Opening Remarks – Egan Smith, Acting Director, USDOT ITS Joint Program Office

VIEWING THE LANDSCAPE & SETTING THE TABLE

2. Panel: Overview and brief comparison of current initiatives as they relate to digital infrastructure to advance transportation automation (30 minutes)
Moderator: Valerie Shuman, Shuman Consulting Group, LLC
- USDOT Highly Automated Systems Safety Center of Excellence – Rob Heilman, Director
- ITS America – Kristin White, Chief Operating Officer
- American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials – King Gee, Director of Safety and Mobility (invited)
- European Union and European Commission - Gzim Ocakoglu, First Counsellor, Mobility & Transport (invited)
- United Kingdom Department for Transport – Gary Crockford, Connected Roads Policy Lead (invited)
- International Road Federation – Bin Ran, University of Wisconsin, Director of Connected Automated Transportation Program

3. Participants: Two-minute (maximum) “pop-up” updates from other national and international organizations as well as US state and local agencies. (30 minutes)

(QUICK STRETCH BREAK – POSSIBLE BREAKOUT TABLE AD HOC REDISTRIBUTION – 5 MINUTES)

CONTEXT FOR DIGITAL INFRASTRUCTURE ENABLING AND LEVERAGING AUTOMATION

4. Panel & Large Group Discussion: Examples of Business Case and Application Context for National Transportation Digital Infrastructure Strategy (60 minutes)
Moderator: Julie Lorenz, Burns & McDonnell - 1898 & Co.
- Supply Chain & Logistics Management Considerations of Transportation Digital Infrastructure - Katie Turnbull, Executive Director, Texas Transportation Institute
- National Roadway Digital Infrastructure for Military Mobility and Emergency Response – John Contestabile, Director of Public Safety Solutions, Skyline Technologies (invited)
- National Roadway-Automation Integration, Connectivity, & Electrification – David Knight, Chief Executive Officer, Terbine
- Digital Infrastructure Architectural Concepts for Integrating Automated Air Mobility – Shivanjli Sharma, Aerospace Research Engineer, NASA
- Roadway Digital Infrastructure and Building Information Modeling in Automation – Morgan Kessler, Highway Infrastructure Research Engineer, USDOT Federal Highway Administration

5. Participants: Breakout table discussions to recognize actions to further develop and communicate the business case & application context. (40 minutes)

PATHS FORWARD

6. Panel: Mechanisms to Evolve and Advance National Strategy (30 minutes)
Moderator: Deepak Gopalakrishna, ICF
- National Collaborative Strategic Research & Development of Transportation Digital Infrastructure – Victoria Sheehan, Executive Director, Transportation Research Board
- Evolving National Roadway Digital Infrastructure for Automation through Catalyzing Prototypes and Seed Corridors – Tracy Larkin Thomason, Director, Nevada Department of Transportation
- National Institutions for Sustained Collaboration in Advancing Digital Infrastructure and Automation –Martin Russ, Managing Director, AustriaTech

7. Pre-Adjournment Synopsis (5 minutes) – Deepak Gopalakrishna

8. Soft Adjournment to Debrief Stations

Session Objectives

A. Create a global community to advance and coordinate national and continental scale deployment of transportation digital infrastructure.
B. Conceptually define alternative institutional and procedural models and approaches to safely, sustainably, and equitably enable broad transportation automation at national and continental scale.
C. Advance understanding of national economic and security business case considerations and associated strategies to evolve political-industrial complexes.
D. Integrate the emerging US National Roadway Digital Infrastructure Strategy into a holistic prospective approach to civic and economic intelligent infrastructure.
E. Correlate transport vehicle-infrastructure cloud and connectivity capabilities to accelerated automation in manufacturing, agricultural, retail, and other economic functions.
F. Evolve the broader architectural principles to sustain development of national and continental roadway network digital infrastructure across technical, institutional, and policy facets of integration.