Greenville SC Southern Connector test for TransCore IAG reader

Last August one midday a large white Cadillac driven by two old ladies came cruising down the Southern Connector tollroad in Greenville South Carolina at about 75mph (120km/hr) and, without slowing, ran into a coin machine lane at the mainline East Plaza. The Caddy clipped the curb and spun crushing an equipment cabinet housing lane controllers and Mark IV reader equipment for three lanes.

The car then hit a toll booth so hard it was broken off its foundations and the shell was crushed.

Peter Femia, general manager at the tollroad says that if there'd been a toll collector manning the lane they likely would have been killed.

As it was, no one was seriously hurt.

The two old ladies in the Caddy were a bit shaken up, that's all.

The one at the wheel - she obviously wasn't actually driving her car - said she was prone to diabetic seizures...

Though people weren't hurt, a lot of the equipment was done for.

Rather than buy new Mark IV readers, the Connector's system integrators TransCore sold the Connector on their new Encompass 6 IAG multimodal readers as a replacement for the damaged Mark IV equipment. 

Femia says TransCore's price was right and there's been a lot of discussion in South Carolina of going dual-mode (IAG/SeGo) so it made sense to go for it.

Cross Island Parkway in Hilton Head might go dual mode, and the new I-73 tollroad up near the NC line, also. They are geographically placed on the divide between IAG and sticker tags.

The Greenville Southern Connector now has several months with one plaza (East) TransCore Encompass 6 IAG readers and the other (West Plaza) the original turn of the decade Mark IV IAG readers. 

They are only able to test it fully on their own population of Mark IV IAG transponders. They aren't members of the IAG so there is no interoperability at present with IAG tollers. And they aren't testing the reading of SeGo sticker tags. (SeGo tags are nearby on GA400 in Atlanta and increasing numbers come into the Carolinas from Florida and Texas.)

Nevertheless the experience with the new reader with their own IAG transponders has made Femia into a Encompass 6 enthusiast. He says the read rates are much higher: "We've seen a dramatic decrease in non-reads (with the Encompass 6.)"

Femia says the sensitivity of the Encompass 6 seems to be higher in that it picks up signals of near-end-of-life transponders that aren't picked up by the Mark IV IAG readers that they still have operating at their west plaza. (TransCore might like us to end the article at this point.)

It occurred to us that in fairness to Mark IV we should point out:

1. Mark IV has upgraded its equipment since the models installed on the Connector for the 2001 startup so two different generations are being compared

2. TransCore's staff are the systems maintenance contractors to the Connector so you have to think it likely the techs are working harder at tuning their own new Encompass 6 equipment at the East Plaza than their rivals' equipment at the West Plaza.

We asked Mark IV. CEO Martin Capper declined to make any comment, saying he's sticking to the spirit and the letter of the rules of the IAG recompete procurement that's underway in which the major contenders are thought to be Mark IV, TransCore and Kapsch.

TransCore has just put put a press release highlighting the Connector deployment headed up "TransCore Proves Alternative Equipment Choice for IAG-Protocol Reader." They too declined to comment further in conformity with IAG procurement rules.

But the TransCore press release says that the Encompass 6 reader has operated at the Connector tollroad "with an accuracy of 99.95 percent" and that it has "greatly reduced the (apparent) violation rates at the lanes in which they are installed as compared to lanes that operate with legacy equipment." Read: Mark IV.

TransCore say this is significant in that northeast toll authorities which use IAG protocol hardware "now have multiple manufacturing sources."

TransCore tout their Encompass 6 as "plug and play" and abbreviate that to 'PnP.'

They say:

"The Encompass IAG PNP reader system features include:
- Supports IAG reader functionality
- Plug and play installation
- Scalable up to eight lanes
- Individual processors for lane independence
- Dual communications ports for master/slave redundancy
- Ethernet and RS–232/422 communications
- Hot swappable dual redundant power supplies
- Connectivity for remote network monitoring
- One million tag buffer on each reader plus buffering on each reader emulator
- Mounts in existing reader cabinet or in available TransCore cabinet
- Encompass 6 functionality including:
- Dual IAG/Super eGo® protocol operation
- Ability to synchronize with multiple PNP Readers in multi-lane configurations using either wired or GPS-based wireless synchronization" (END QUOTES from  TransCore)

see earlier report May 2008 on Connector

http://www.tollroadsnews.com/node/3533

http://www.transcore.com/

http://www.e-zpassiag.com/

TERMINOLOGY: TransCore's Encompass 6 IAG reader is IAG in the sense that it handles IAG protocol transponders of the kind used all over the E-ZPass IAG area. However it is not IAG in the sense that it is not recognized officially at present by the IAG for use in the IAG system. Greenville Southern Connector can only deploy the Encompass 6 because they use IAG-specified equipment without belonging to the IAG, and without interoperability with it. Also the IAG has a sole source contract for transponders and readers with Mark IV and IAG rules preclude any IAG member toller from deploying the Encompass 6 reader.

NOTE: Rhode Island has since joined the IAG and implemented its E-ZPass, so an updated map would be headed "25 agencies in 14 states."

TOLLROADSnews 2009-03-31