E-TOLL TURNAROUND California says OK to MFS on ATCAS bridges

E-TOLL TURNAROUND

California says OK to MFS on ATCAS bridges

After the embarrassment of being dubbed by officials and the media as the guys who couldn’t get electronic tolling to work on California’s bridges MFS Network Technologies has got its passing grade and the notice to proceed. “We’re off the bleeding edge at last,” said Kevin Moersch, CEO. “We are extremely pleased we have moved past these first phases of testing and can continue forward with system deployment.”

A news release from Caltrans, that has contracted with MFS to install complex e-toll systems on its nine major bridges (7 of which are in the San Francisco Bay area, with one each in the port areas of Los Angeles and San Diego) quotes director James van Loben Sels: “The prototype system tested on the Carquinez bridge has complied with contract specifications and we are confident in moving forward.” Costing $29m the contract called ATCAS (Advanced Toll Collection and Accounting System) involves installing vehicle classification, vehicle-to-roadside communications, video-enforcement, new host plaza computers and an accounting system for 75 toll lanes which process the movement of about 900,000 vehicles daily. It is one of the world’s major toll systems in terms of traffic volume and includes the San Francisco-Oakland Bay bridge, which vies with the Geo Washington in NY as the world’s busiest.

There was a fuss last Oct-Nov when a Caltrans engineer posted on the web a report that MFS had failed tests (being done on 4 toll lanes of the Carquinez bridge). It said MFS had been sent a letter from Caltrans declaring it in breech of its contract. The web report was unauthorized and an exaggeration, but it flagged real problems MFS was having meeting Caltrans’ specs. The local media had a field day saying the high-tech system had “flunked” etc, as if nothing worked. Politicians called for inquiries. (see TR#9, Nov 96 p6)

The vehicle-to-roadside communications using familiar Texas Instruments Title 21 transponders and readers always worked fine, fully meeting Caltrans requirements with an accuracy rate of 99.99%, according to MFS and Caltrans. The major problem was with the automatic vehicle classification (AVC) subsystem which uses treadles, light curtains and a laser profiler to interpret and classify vehicles into one of 17 categories to determine the proper toll charge for each transaction. 17 categories! This achieved a 99.8% accuracy rate for autos, pickup trucks, and small vans, which represent over 94% of the average daily traffic volumes, but it had trouble differentiating two-axle vehicles with dual tires, such as large trucks, vans and campers, as well as some motorcycles, buses and motor homes — groups that represented 5% of the traffic, but accounted for 85% of errors. Overall the AVC subsystem overall performed at 99.1% accuracy.

To correct the dual tire misclassifications MFS developed a new segmented treadle, and it installed a higher light curtain, and tweaked the profiler. There were also shortcomings in the violation detection subsystem (VDS) which automatically captures and reads images of the license plates of violator vehicles. In the fall 1996 tests this achieved an overall "readability" rate level of 97.4 % against a target of 99%. MFS junked the CRS system it had installed and replaced it with a Hughes TMS license plate reader system, which it says works better.

In the second set of tests this spring MFS was found to be “in constructive compliance” according to an official. This is contractese for “OK according to our mutual agreement about what the contract requires.” The new classification system met an accuracy rate of 99.98% but apparently not the originally specified 99.995%. The violation system is required to automatically capture and read 80% of license plates with an accuracy of 99%. We don’t have any more of the new test results.

Bar adjustment: “We cleared the bar,” said an MFS official, even though he admitted the bar was lowered very slightly. MFS hopes to open the first dedicated e-toll lanes to cars this July and to complete work on all 12 toll lanes at the Carquinez for all vehicle categories by October. Similar e-toll systems will, according to the new schedule, be working on the SF-Oakland Bay, Antioch, Benicia-Martinez and Richmond-San Rafael bridges by May 98 and on the remaining San Mateo-Hayward, Dumbarton, Vincent Thomas (LA) and Coronado (San Diego) bridges by end 98.

Sub-contractor to MFS providing customer service will be Lockheed Martin IMS which will be setting up e-toll accounts under the FasTrak label from 4 customer service centers. An initial 200,000 e-tags from Texas Instruments are part of the contract. MFS says it will only “about break even” on the project because of the major modifications and extra work required after the first failures, but according to CEO Moersch the system integrator has come out of the experience stronger and more competitive. Another item: legislation is now being sponsored to simplify the toll classes, so this 17-class vehicle discrimination won’t be needed much longer. (Contact Caltrans Jeff Weiss 510 286 5543, MFS Erin McGuire 402 233 7648 www.etcleader.com)