Challenge

With the PIO project Linking YardAttributes with Contractors' DigitAal Tracking System (WAKANDA), the Agency for Roads and Traffic (AWV) of the Flemish government aims at linking the various tracking systems (WERF application, Digital Tracking System [DVS], traffic management system Vlaams Verkeerscentrum, etc. ) that AWV uses to monitor contractor performance, align construction sites and obtain real-time data, with the aim of obtaining enriched traffic information for the benefit of both the road manager (AWV itself) and the road user as well as the construction site contractor.

More specifically, AWV wants to be able to inform road users in time about road works, increase road safety by correct lane signals and announcements on text signs but also by sharing data with connected road users (e.g. by acting as a source for the MobiliData program), limit traffic disruption and allow traffic to flow smoothly in construction zones, provide information to all AWV employees (AWV as road manager and AWV as policy entity), monitor construction sites more qualitatively, and prepare the road network for automated vehicles.

The intended link is an autonomous live link between planned yards and real-time yards in progress. Besides the fact that there are no applications available on the market yet that autonomously (i.e. without human interaction) link scheduled construction sites to real-time construction sites in progress, an important challenge of the WAKANDA project is to motivate suppliers of digital monitoring systems to further develop their systems so that they can generate enriched traffic information and thus contribute to a smart road infrastructure.

The WAKANDA project is carried out in close connection with the PIO project NXTMobility Werven which also aims at the follow-up of yards, but at the local (administrative) level (the city of Antwerp) and from a technical (quality and reusability of data) rather than a managerial (availability and internal flow of data) need.