Hello and welcome to today's webinar. I would now like to introduce today's moderator, Jessica Capuano. You may begin. Hello and welcome to the talking operations webinar on maintenance management for signal systems. My name is Jessica Capuano and I will give a brief introduction. This is the fourth in a series of development courses offered by national transportation operations coalition. To access the recordings, you can visit the webinar archives page. I'll type the url into the chat box shortly. Please be advised that our webinar is being recorded. The webinar will last approximately 90 minutes. We will have one instructor and it will be more interactive. There will be several audience polls. If you think of a question, you can type it into the chat area on the left side of your screen. Send your question to everyone, rather than just the presenters. The presenter will address the questions during the last part of the webinar. A transportation will be posted in the next week. Attendees will be notified of the availability of the closed captioning and the documentation by e-mail. We encourage others in your office to access the recording online. The presentation is viewable in the file download box on the left side of your screen. Chick on the name of the file, and save to your computer. At this time, I'd like to introduce the instructor, Mr. David Ellis. Mr. Ellis formerly spent 10 years with the NYS DOT in signal maintenance. Maintenance jurisdiction encompassed 7 counties and had over 700 signals and traffic control devices. He currently provides traffic, engineering services to municipal and private entities. David, please start when you are ready. Thank you, Jessica, and welcome. The intended course will go as follows. We shall review the performance of an effective program which will emphasize the need for training and development given the technological advancement and increasing demands. We shall also be investigating the major components of an effective maintenance management program and view the benefits, which are review, performance -- and assess their sick cancel in funding, justification and overall agency accountability. The course background, let's review or look at some of the trends. Given our national economic health or lack thereof, the mandate -- there is an intense focus on management and operations. -- very little there for physical expansion. Fueling the above -- given the above, it would be nice to implement more plaques systems, and if that wasn't enough, we are faced with a scarcity of staff and limited financial sources to attract the same. -- delivery of the end product, in our case, maintenance, by increased application of performance management and support. Let's review some of the maintenance operations and provide some common ground as we progress through this discussion. Some requirements of the maintenance management operations are response maintenance, which is defined as remedial action in the event of a traffic signal or system failure. Causes are accidents, vandalism, and power fluctuations. Some basic requirements of the response maintenance requirements are an adequately trained staff for trouble-shooting, ample inventory for the anticipated tasks, and equally important is the documentation of design and intended operation. Specifically, timing sheets. Also, there has to be a reliable notification and tracking system, whether manual or computer paid. Moving on to another significant aspect of our operations maintenance, preventative maintenance. A scheduled inspection and review of traffic signal equipment and their operation is intended to identify worn or defective components prior to failure. A summary of scheduled action is designed to provide remedy prior to failure of the system. At this time, we have a polling question. Okay. I can see that the vast majority would incorporate preventive maintenance strategy. 87%. And then move -- okay, thank you. The documented benefits of this are reduced exposure to liability, the primary motivation for the implementation of the program. Reduced frequency and severity of malfunctions and failures and greater efficiency in the use of agency resources. Preventative maintenance requirements can be summarized as the need for trained staff equipped with proper testing equipment, but not limited to conflict monitor and LED testing. Although it may not be practical to undertake evaluation of every piece of equipment in the field, it is an option. The big issue here, and the major concern here is documentation. -- it's difficult to do without adequate documentation of what was done and what did it. And looking at our requirements, the standard checklist approach should not be confused with a sound practice. -- purely observing whether a component is functioning is not enough. It's not something that is adopted in other infrastructure management programs. For example, a bridge. Bridges typically undergo significant investigation as to their condition prior to being signed off on at this time, we have the second of our polling questions. Looking at the results here, it appears that the vast majority of the PM programs, close to 65% of us do not -- can we close that? Relevant operational thresholds that typically are provided by the manufacturer. And it should provide verification where possible, where that information is available. Again, preparing of sampling may be the most viable approach. This is a list of maintenance classifications. Applicable higher end in the mechanical industry. Reactive maintenance, which we are all familiar with, fix when broken. Preventative maintenance, is related to life cycle. Predictive maintenance is based upon the condition of the component and the threshold of operation. And proactive maintenance may be a little beyond our capabilities at this time. It's a chance to manipulate conditions of operation in relation to component life. We underplay response maintenance as part of our daily lives. Preventative and predictive maintenance are attainable with the cooperative effort of our partner -- analytical research. We as an industry need to push harder if the information is not available. In researching for the traffic signal life cycle, it became apparent that -- I want to say life cycles were not available to us, and in the case of manufacturers, they have been -- either they were reluctant or they didn't have life cycle information available. They're getting better and more responsive to the threshold, thresholds of operation. At least we're getting somewhere, Medicaid some progress, but maybe it's an option for us to push for this information. The third polling question, Jessica. Within our industry, the best we can hope for is to -- maybe that is the best we can do. I sincerely, I don't believe that. I believe that the capability exists to provide true preventive maintenance by the application of life cycle information and also combined with the conditions of operation, threshold conditions of operation. Another aspect or component of the maintenance operations is design modifications. You are all familiar with that, hardware and software upgrades, changes in geometric and other characters. Design modifications are critical to the process. Documentation request and approval, documentation of actual modification, and what we're asked to do sometimes is for the necessarily possible. Not necessarily what is done in the field. You need to document what is done in the field. And a documentation of maintenance requirements requested from -- result from modification. The implementation of new equipment will complicate that. Another aspect of maintenance operations is LED maintenance. This is a big issue right now. ITE specifications for circular, arrow, and pedestrian LED indicators inclusive of light intensity across the specific temperature ranges. In addition, Caltrans, Minnesota, and New York state have developed their own. The fourth polling question. How many people or agencies are deploying or using the functional certifications to evaluate LED operations? I guess the companion question would be to ask how many people are actually doing that in the field. 70, maybe 75%. And moving on, ITS. ITS maintenance requirements. Technically, the traffic signals are known as ITS. We're looking at an increase of video detection of monitoring, a vast increase in telecommunication requirements for real time reporting. Proliferation of Faber optative and spread spectrum systems, and increased use of wareless detection, which is relatively new. Maintenance -- emerging maintenance requirements. -- for the past couple of years, connected vehicle, formerly VII initiative. It provides connectivity between vehicles and our infrastructure. Potential benefits, real time traffic signal operations are traffic signal timing adjustments, advanced preemption capabilities, real time traffic volume data and real time evaluation of systems performance. We have seen this in the industry and the automobile -- definitely, this is a trend that we are seeing. We need to be looking at the maintenance requirements associated with this. On the backdrop of existing and emerging technology, it is obvious that this is not a simple thing anymore. It's not just the traffic signal and the maintenance environment we came into when we started. The emphasis is thousand on computer network technology, telecommunications technology, systems analysis and systems engineering. Categories needed are administrators, engineers, field supervisors, and mechanics and technicians. Equal importance the required for each of these categories. And it appears they just do it by who gets paid the most. The administrators and decision makers need to have an understanding of the transportation infrastructure in general and an understanding of effective maintenance practices in particular. Engineers kind of caught in between. They have to have the ability to interpret, first of all, and implement the provided mandates and directives. This requires an intimate understanding of knowledge and capabilities within the industry as well as associated maintenance requirements and restrictions. Field staff require training and development and instruction in the implementation and maintenance of increasingly sophisticated systems of this indicates the available educational resources. ITE, TRB, FHWA, and NTOC. David, sorry for the interruption, but we're getting some comments that folks are having a little bit of trouble hearing you. It's a little muffled. Okay. I apologize for that. Is this any better? I think it is. If people can chat in whether or not it's better, we'll do a little bit of a test here. If you could read off you're next slide, and we'll -- I apologize for that. I have the flu, so I'm needing to -- It looks like it's much better. Thank you so much, David, sorry for the interruption again. Not at all. Yes. Again, training and educational resources are indicated here, obviously this is not an exhaustive list, but it is a good starting point. Maintenance management may be defined as a systematic approach of the day-to-day maintenance activities for the purpose of improved efficiency in the allotment of available resources. Keep in mind we need to look at maintenance management as a continuous process, not a one-time deal. In the development of maintenance management -- written in 2009, for the FHWA, and I would advise all listens to available themselves of the document. It provides an interesting approach to setting up a category of agency operation. Starting with high activity, including adequate staffing. But limited financial resources. The main characteristic is there is a lot of irons in the fire due to the fact that staff is ready available. They have to keep themselves occupied. They tend to be pulling in different directions. There seems to be a lack of cohesion in goals. It's due to the fact that goals and objectives are not clearly defined. The second one, infrastructure rich with limited staffing. Typically in an urban setting, a relatively small distribution of installations affecting corridored. Well managed with limited resources, these are agencies that are maximizing their available resources. Poorly managed with limited resources, in my opinion, this is an undesirable situation, and state agencies, highly dispersed installations. It should be noted not all state agencies fall into this category, and state agencies can be -- high activity, one, two, three, our four. Successful archetypes. Success in any of these categories except for poorly managed, which is undesirable are such. Strong concept of basic service, clear evaluation of objectives, close coordination of design operations, and a good understanding of performance measures. Also a commitment to staff development. We review the components of basic service. Infrastructure reliability, minimized and balanced congestion activity, smooth flow, indicating that from one section of the agency's geographic dispersement, there is a difference in operational characteristics, or if there is, it's smooth or imperceptible. Predictable and consistent operation, which is as much a factor of the maintenance operations, and broad handed timing solutions. Looking at timing changes that they are minimized for smooth flow. Although with the current available of software and hardware, this does not seem to be as much of a problem as it was. [Captioners transitioning] Dependency is to adopt -- for the agencies to adopt all solutions. And not to rely on their own in violation of their own problems and solutions and resources. The performance of migration, a review or assessment of objectives, requirements and constraints. A review of the response, hardware response and complaint, and a couple of expectations, which they consider in an urban setting, on a rule setting. Maintenance strategies, operations strategies. All of these go into defining who we are as an agency, and how to perform. Maintenance strategies require an assessment of staff and competency levels. Again, based on the individual agency, an evaluation of specialized tools and equipment, to look at our inventory and look at the geographic disbursement of our installations. Maintenance management components. Again, accurate documentation, secure, robust storage, efficient and reliable retrieving systems, and relevant summation of information. The question arises, -- manual assistance. All of these are achieved under a manual system, but are a bit more involved and complicated. But, the next polling question basically asks, of the agencies here, how many do have a computerized system or a manual system? Or maybe not. I have to wait. It looks like we have an even split between manual and computerized. And there are some individuals and agencies that have none. Or that don't know how they manage. Okay. 51% have computerized or automated, and 44% have manual. So, let's [ Pause ]. This again is a listing of the research preparation for the traffic signal and maintenance handbook of 2007. It is interesting that it provides a lot of them, or if not all of them, [ Indiscernible ] -- I apologize. Hopefully that is better. It was very difficult to test for any of these systems. There was not a specific computation, and they don't understand the reason why. The benefits of an effective traffic signal maintenance management program include efficiency in planning and scheduling, up-to-date policy and resources and establishing and evaluating performance measures. I am reluctant right now, and I was reluctant in the preparation of this to get into the details of computerized systems because of time. Time would not permit. Performance measures. There is a lot of documentation that I would advise [ Indiscernible ]. The definition of performance mesh or is -- of performance measures, quantifiable, specific range without ambiguity. And they should provide a means of measures for two versions of the product. Examples are specific maintenance operations, response calls for installations, response time per call, and response call cost for installation. The development and the provision of the performance measures for computerized systems lend themselves very well to the development of this, but it can be done manually. But, at the great expense of resources and staffing. Here is another document which outlines the maintenance management agency asset management and accountability. The requirements are that there is a specified identification of performance goals and measures, and insurance programs, projects that are delivered in the most effective and available way and informed decision-making based on information and analytic tools. Also, the monitoring of actual performance cost and the use of this feedback for improving future decisions and identification and evaluation of a wide variety of options for achieving performance goals and multiple assets as well as management. I am sorry about the volume. It is getting low again. Hopefully this is better. In review and summary, it seems as if I expect and hope that people got the gist of the presentation. In review, to demonstrate the importance of an effective main program. You can mind that we are doing the best that we can with what we got, but in my opinion, we can be doing more. Maybe the industry will need to be pushing harder for information, and also component operational thresholds. I do not have the solution for that, but maybe we can initiate some discussion, hopefully. We can look into the issue. We should recognize the need for specialized staffing, training and development in light of the emerging advancements in technology. It is pretty obvious with what we have now, and what is forecasted for the very near future. The identification of key components of the maintenance management program. I would say the most important factor is to evaluate who we are and where we are, and also look at our objectives and constraints. As we proceed. Performance maintenance specific to traffic signaling, those are available from computerized maintenance management systems. And it should be used, basically to justify any requirements in funding. In review, looking back on the objectives of the 2007 report card, I know that the 2011 submission is in now. The objectives of the report card were to assess and bring attention to the traffic signal maintenance management and operations. Also to provide a tool for identifying areas requiring improvement. And most importantly, to advocate for additional resources. I am tempted to say that maybe instead of asking for additional resources, I am not sure that that is -- that we are living up to our potential in that regard. Results of the 2007 report card, these should be familiar to everybody. We did a pretty good job in maintenance and maintenance management. Chuck monitoring -- traffic monitoring needs a lot of improvement. Operations, signal operations, that required some improvement. But again, in the area of maintenance management, we did pretty good. Overall, there is room for improvement. Call to action. The 2007 -- 2011 traffic single operations is available. I believe it was the end of November last year. I believe it was extended to December. I'm not sure if there was any further extension. And participants benefit by assisting in identification of strengths and opportunities within the agency. And also provide a benchmark for performance. It increases national awareness of the need for improved traffic signal operation, and increases the local awareness or agency awareness for the need of improved operations. In closing, remember the traffic signal maintenance management is a continuous process. I apologized -- apologize most since early for the volume. It appears as if I need an upgrade in my equipment. But, at this time, I would like to take questions. Hopefully I can get through that. That would be great, thanks so much, David. Again, I am really sorry. I'm doing the best I can here. I understand. The first question came in from Michael, and it is, what is the process and purpose of sampling? It is to utilize your available resources. Again, in some instances, like in LED, there is some equipment on the market for that. Typically, you have to remove or take the component out of service, tested, which is physically bench testing it. That is not practical, efficient or productive. Sampling, obviously there is a detailed documentation of the type of or print of equipment component, also the data for installation. And if possible, it should be readily available. The batch number from where the component sets. Does that answer the question? Thank you. Our next question is, what is an example of sampling methods? Again, a sample is the use of [ Pause ] basically in all of the industries, even within the engineering industry, it is the mathematical or scientific approach to looking at the population for a number of components that you have in the field, arriving at the optimum sample size, which is definitely less than the standalone population. And based on your testing of the sample size, determine what is going on in the field. Do you have a problem or don't you have a problem? Again, the big issue there is adequate documentation. It has been used in manufacturing processes. You name it, it has been used there. [ Pause ] The next question is, what do you mean by a functional specification to evaluate LED operations? The specification by [ Indiscernible ] covers entity of light across a variety of environmental conditions, temperature, humidity, etc. To adequately and properly test the LED output, there should be some baseline or some range or threshold of operations or output. I hope that answers the question. Okay, and we have a two-part question next. The question is, what and performance measures do you suggest we use? And then there was a comment that had agreed with that question. And they have mentioned that they were participants on the traffic signal report card, and the FHWA recommended that they have some sort of way to evaluating performance but did not recommend any method or have a baseline set in place. And I understand the position of the report card. Baseline conditions, I am reluctant to say, but it is agency dependent. You know, we can have guidelines, national guidelines. But national guidelines -- the valuation of your individual agency capacity, especially with the legal implications. You know, years ago, not so long ago, the adopted standard was a two hour response time. So, basically any reported no function. A two hour response time, not only is it not feasible, it is not possible. So if you are going to adopt that and have that as a written policy within your agency, then, you know, you are opening yourself up to a lot of litigation. Yes, litigation. So, I agree with the components and being prepared on the report card information. But to provide baselines without undervaluation of individual agencies is not [ Indiscernible ] at all. Okay, another question is, what are agencies typical goals for responses to emergency maintenance notification? Typically, I guess the question is specific to response time. It is two hours. But again, you know, that does not take into account geographic dispersion, the availability of staffing, it is -- again, for me, that is kind of dangerous. It is a dangerous approach. But to answer the question, two hours. Unless it has been changed. Okay, thank you. Another question is, does sampling involve taking the item out of service and conduct in bench testing -- and conducting bench testing? Yes. I would say so. For effective testing, I mean, as I said, for LED testing, there are and field testers. But to me, the most efficient and effective means of testing that particular component would be to remove it from operation. And bench test it. The testing of conflict management in the fields, I guess that is a matter of opinion. It can be done, and there are testers available for that. The removal of the component from operations in the field is a primary motivation for adopting sampling techniques. I will not tell you every component or to replace every component. I hope that answers the question there. And it looks like we have one more that just came in. Someone had said, most of their failures are due to components. Whether it is BIU, power supplies, fiber optic modems. They tested the components, but those components rarely fails. What do you suggest? Is the question available here so that I can read it? Yes, it is from a while -- it is from Lisle. Okay, sorry, is that it? Okay, most of our failures are due to components. We tested the confident monitors, but those components rarely fail. What do you suggest? If I am understanding the question, you're not testing the BIU, power supply and fiber optic modems. It sounds as if you don't have a testing procedure for those components. Those are the ones that are failing. It comes back to the initial premise that I had. To effectively take preventative maintenance, we need some indication of the lifecycle or life expectancy of the component. And also, we need some idea of the operational threshold, whether it be a range or specific value. For that particular component. In the absence of the ability to test, I am without specific -- I really don't have a question for you at this time. I would definitely recommend it if you are testing the conflict monitors, etc., to continue. And as I said, maybe we as an industry need to be pushing for more information from the manufacturer. Whether it be lifecycle, expectancy, or component thresholds. Operational thresholds. Do you want me to read the next one? Sure. I would understand sampling to be selecting a representative sample of something to be measured and extrapolated. There is a condition based upon the whole population of that sample. Yes, definitely. It is a little bit more involved, but that is the basic premise. The selection of a small sample -- I should not say small, because it depends on the overall population. But, the testing of a sample to be representative of the whole. Would sampling LEDs be a better way to test LEDs rather than replacing LED both? I would say that sampling would be a more efficient way or undertaking. The life expectancy of -- I am not sure. The last time I checked, it was around five years, starting basically at 10 years. It depends on the protection to replace a component after five years, if you can get 10 years out of it. At least this way, it provides some indication or would provide some indication of the condition of operations in the field and a decision for the maintenance. [ Pause ] One more just came in. And then we will take questions off-line beyond that, if everybody doesn't find. Let's see, it says, we do not -- nondestructive or signal poles every five years. Do you suggest anything different? Oh, okay. [ Pause ] The purpose would be the testing of traffic signal poles, in my experience is not falling into the actual traffic signal maintenance which is the specific design of structural groups within our agency. Again, I can't speak for other agencies, but it seems to me that that would be the best place or the best place to have the personnel to undertake those procedures. To answer your question specifically, nor don't have any suggestions in that regard. Okay. And at this time, to wrap up this webcast, I will be giving you some information on the natural that -- national transportation coalition, or NTOC. Before you do that, I again would like to apologize for situation involving. As I said, initially, -- I would like to apologize for the situation in volume. As I said, initially, I would hope that this would serve as a purpose of finishing some discussion or thought so that we can progress. Thank you.