Traffic Safety Sensor Project

Leads

Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT), Bureau of Planning and Sustainability (BPS)

Sponsors

Mayor Ted Wheeler, Commissioner Chloe Eudaly

Designing safer streets for all users requires accurate information about how people use the streets, including where people typically walk, bike, and drive. How fast are people actually driving? Where are pedestrians typically crossing busy streets? This information is typically collected in snapshot surveys only which are labor-intensive and time-consuming processes. The infrequent data collected by those methods also does not give our engineers and safety experts the complete story about how our roads are being used.

The Traffic Safety Sensor Initiative will pilot new sensor technology deployed to street lights to gather the data needed for full insights into how people are traveling and where potential danger spots may be. The CityIQ nodes will be installed along three of Portland’s dangerous streets with high crash rates (SE 122nd Ave, SE Hawthorne Blvd, SE Division St) in spring 2018. Through this pilot, PBOT staff will learn how sensor information can be used to make recommendations for changes to our streets so that all road users can travel safely.

Project partners include AT&T, GE, and Intel and Portland General Electric (PGE).

For more information, please visit the project website:  https://www.portlandoregon.gov/transportation/76735