PROJECT DEFINITION
C.D.O.T. is currently working on several major ITS projects. The first of these is the Colorado Transportation Management System (CTMS), which is underway and encompasses a number of statewide ITS integration activities through a FY 1998 earmark. The CTMS builds on ITS systems and architecture developed in recent years during the state-funded Revised Model Deployment Initiative (RMDI). The second uses a FY 2000 earmark to support the I-25 Southeast Corridor Transportation Expansion (T-REX) project. The latter is a $1.5 billion program to provide capacity and transit improvements to I-25 from south Denver through the Denver Tech Center in the southern suburbs - the most heavily traveled interstate highway segment in Colorado. ITS activities for that project are only recently underway.

This project allows for the acceleration of ITS integration efforts at the Colorado Transportation Management Center (CTMC). The CTMC is the statewide traffic management and information dissemination center for the Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT). Enhancement of the existing center and pursuit of a new center have been identified as priority activities by the Colorado Transportation Commission.

This project will accelerate integration efforts at the CTMC with funding used (predominantly) in two areas - to design a completely new, stand-alone CTMC building and to procure and implement a new comprehensive ITS software package. The new software will provide integration between internal device modules and provide a platform for integration to other control centers in the region and across the state.

Although the first component of the CTMC Integration Project will be related to the new building, note that federal funding allocated for this project will NOT be used for construction of the facility. Colorado has programmed funding in FY 2004 state funds to provide for that construction. Although the specific site for the new CTMC has not yet been identified, that location will be known by early 2002, when work for this project will be in its early stages. The federally funded portion of this project devoted to the CTMC will be used to design the new building, the site and access to it, design the hardware, firmware and operating systems for the new facility and provide those components to the extent possible.

The second component of the project will identify, procure, and implement new statewide Advanced Traffic Management System (ATMS) and Advanced Traveler Information System (ATIS) software at the CTMC. Not only will the new software link the disparate ITS subsystems through a common set of command, control, and operating systems and user interfaces, but the software will provide the framework to allow the center-to-center (C2C) interfaces currently being studied by C.D.O.T. to occur sooner rather than later.

The Colorado Department of Transportation believes the software component of this project represents one of the more important ITS activities to occur in the history of the state's ITS program - even overshadowing the much larger CTMS project. C.D.O.T. has been attempting to construct a permanent CTMC since the very first ITS early deployment study was initiated in 1991. The "interim" CTMC was started by C.D.O.T. in 1994, and although the interim label has been dropped, the same undersized facility remains. C.D.O.T. believes this project is extremely timely - allowing the incorporation of ITS activities (state and local) into a fully integrated statewide system.

In addition, the opportunity to implement an ATMS/ATIS software package for the statewide system will allow the state to use ITS devices and systems to their fullest extent.