What We Know Now That We Wish We Knew Then About Intelligent Transportation Systems: A Retrospective on the 1992 Strategic Plan

From September 1991 until June 1992, a core writing team worked on what was the first intelligent transportation systems (ITS) strategic plan in the United States. This plan was entitled "A Strategic Plan for IVHS [Intelligent Vehicle Highway Systems] in the United States." It defined the ITS program at a national scale in a way that has been characterized as seminal. The plan, by most accounts, served as the blueprint for the early development of ITS in the United States and as the basis for subsequent plans produced by ITS America, the federal government, various states, and a number of private-sector organizations. Various aspects of ITS are explored retrospectively, contrasting views from 11 years ago, when the strategic plan was produced, with the current reality. Areas discussed include advanced traveler information systems, advanced transportation management systems, reliability, getting the ITS program off the ground in the early 1990s, strategic use of information, automated network management, electronic toll collection, congestion pricing, architecture, commercial vehicle operations, advanced public transportation systems, and regions. ITS is compared with the Interstate system, and a discussion covers both the upcoming reauthorization of the Transportation Efficiency Act for the 21st Century and the knowledge that has been gained through this retrospective about ITS-related issues on that reauthorization.