I've always bought tubes for my mechanical tube counters from Jamar Technologies. About five years ago I tried, unsuccessfully, to find a manufacturer so I could cut out paying a middle man. Thanks to google, I've been able to track down new suppliers. I got quotes for EPDM tubing that meets the spec of the tubes Jamar supplies (60 +/- 5 Durometer Black EPDM Tubing - ASTM D 2000 3BA620 A14 C12 F17 G21). I tracked down prices for regular tube (.187" inside diameter x .600" outside diameter) and mini-tube (.187" ID x .365" OD). The minimum order size was only 100 feet with each of the suppliers. Here's what I found -
As a bonus, Hanna Rubber will deliver the tubes in 50 or 60 foot lengths so we won't have to do any cutting ourselves. Caveat emptor - I don't have first hand knowledge of working with Hanna Rubber yet, although Chad Myre has been very responsive. I'll let you know if I have problems with their tubes when I order them this spring.
We use a mix of regular tubes and mini-tubes, but have been using more and more mini-tubes. Washington County has used mini-tube exclusively for many years and I just found out Mn/DOT is going exclusively with mini-tubes. In the long run, we'll probably keep a few heavy tubes around just for doing gravel roads.
I've posted our new price list at www.trafficdatainc.com. Unlike most data collection firms, we post our price list for the whole world to see (it's valid for the seven county area around Minneapolis and St. Paul in Minnesota - quotes will be provided for projects outside of this area). I've found my clients appreciate using our standard prices in their proposals. That way they don't have to call me for an individual quote every time they put together a traffic study proposal - its a win-win for both of us.
I'm going to be stopping in at my regular client's to handout hardcopies and explain the price list. We've changed our structure in three notable ways -
Please check out www.CountingCars.com.
You no longer need to wade through hundreds of pdf files on Mn/DOT’s Traffic
Volumes Webpage (http://www.dot.state.mn.us/traffic/data/html/volumes.html)
to find the daily traffic volume on a road. We’ve put all of
their data on a free, searchable google map platform. If you like the
website, please tell your colleagues. If you have any problems with CountingCars, please tell me and
we’ll work to resolve them.
Thanks to Bob Klingel of DKS Systems and Tim Lawrence who helped make this dream of mine a reality. Also, thanks to Gene Hicks at Mn/DOT for your assistance. I've been thinking about this for a couple of years and we finally did it.
CountingCars is still a work in progress. I hope to work with DOT's around the country to add their data. My goal is to make CountingCars the one stop shop for historic Average Daily Traffic volume data. We're also going to add a sponsor section to the website. Contact me if you're interested.
Guys from Iteris and Brown Traffic (Michael Wieck, Mark Fayta, & Tony Juettner) stopped by my office a few weeks ago to show me their new traffic counting product - Abacus. I sent Michael a video clip from my Miovision recording system to see if the Abacus could do an automated turning movement count. They tested it and said the video camera had too much motion, but they hope to revise their system within a couple of months to handle "wiggly" video. Right now they need a fixed camera. A third player could be Aldis Corp who claims to be able to do turning movement counts with their camera system, but they won't return my inquiries.
I like the Miovision system, but the economics don't work very well for me here in Minnesota. They charge per hour of video being processed. I am not a big user, so they charge me about $25/hour. $25/hour doesn't compete well with me sending out people if I am being hired for a few hour count. It is also a stiff price if I want to do a 48-hour turning movement count (which I think the traffic engineering industry needs to gravitate towards).
Iteris is trying to develop a more traditional traffic counting model (like Jamar, Peek, etc.) where you buy the hardware and software up front. Then you own the system and can charge what you want for whatever duration count you want.
Iteris could be real competition for Miovision if the Abacus can process video from a temporary, non-fixed video camera. Michael told me the Abacus can process four intersections at a time (post processing in the shop) and they have a $30,000 price point for the system (this doesn't include the video camera system you'll have to put out in the field). At Miovision's $25/hour price, the Abacus would save me money after I process 1200 hours of turning movements. Not bad.
Neither the Miovision system nor Abacus are silver bullets for me in this down economy (all things being equal I'd rather pay my people who have been with me 5+ years instead of a computer in a different country), but I believe doing turning movment counts by hand will be largely replaced by computerized systems within a few years. The business case will eventually force me to use technology over manual labor.
I'll be talking about my experiences with Miovision's automated turning movement count system at NCITE's May luncheon next Wednesday. I am going to set up my video tripod camera system for people to see what it looks like and I'll discuss the pros/cons of the system. If you are in the Twin Cities area, I hope you'll make it to the luncheon. Here are the details - luncehon flyer.
When I was an intern (quite a while ago) I was put in charge of inspecting and measuring quantities on several street lighting projects. I measured about four miles of installed cable. The contractor questioned my quantity saying it was low and that I was shorting him. I met him early the next day expecting a long day of spot checking. The first thing I did was lay out my 25 foot tape measure and check to make sure my measuring wheel was accurate. I asked him to do the same. His wheel said the 25 foot tape measure was 28 eight feet long. We did the math and his quantities were off by the 28/25 ratio. Case closed.
Are you sure the traffic data you are getting is accurate? We test all of our counters every three months with a Jamar traffic counter tester in addition to visually verifying our counts every time we setup in the field. The traffic counter tester blows a prescribed number of air pulses so we can test the accuracy of our air switches (volumes as well as speed and classification data). We also do a manual test on our Jamar manual count boards - punching in a prescribed number on each button. It seems logical to me that you need some way to ensure your counters are working properly.
One of our public sector clients has twenty tube counters of their own. They just had us go through our test regimen for them. Seven of their twenty counters have at least one bad air switch. I am guessing the intern putting the counters out last year didn't think to question the accuracy of the counters. I wonder how much bad data they collected.
We are working on a counting project in Waverly, Iowa for Snyder & Associates this week. Part of their motivation for hiring us was to see the Miovision camera system in action. I drove down Monday afternoon to set up the camera system to perform a 7 am to 6 pm turning movement count on Tuesday (we also have a crew of four people doing manual counts all week in addition to a few pneumatic tube counts).
I was a little nervous going into the project because we currently have just one video camera system. It worked great for an eight hour count a few weeks ago, but the engineer in me knew I was tempting fate by not having redundancy. Of course the system didn't work when I started setting it up at about 6 pm. To Miovision's credit, Curtis was in the office for some tech support. Our quick field checks didn't get us anywhere, I went to the hardware store to get a few more tools, and called Curtis on his cell phone at 7:15 from my hotel room. We figured out power wasn't getting to the camera. Either the camera or one of the power connections was broken in transit. In the process of testing I irreparably ripped apart a cable connection (I didn't having soldering equipment on me).
Tony at Snyder & Associates has been very understanding and is ok with us doing the counts manually instead of with the Miovision equipment. Ultimately, they just need the data. I was able to get one of my guys down to Waverly in about 5 hours from calling him and we'll finish the project on time.
Miovision is having me send them the camera and the whole cabeling system. They'll either fix it or send me a new setup.
The last time I felt like this, I was a teenager fishing with my dad and the motor died. It took us about an hour to row back. He got it fixed, but that motor died on him one more time. Dad bought a new motor instead of getting it fixed again. He told me he didn't trust the old motor and he didn't want to row anymore.
