“Because the economics of trades are so important here we wanted to focus on improving the flow across the border,”
– Susan Anzolin, Executive Director, Institute for Border Logistics and Security
The Ambassador Bridge between Detroit and Windsor doesn’t just carry a lot of traffic. It carries more than a quarter of the approximately $700 billion of goods traded annually between the US and Canada via thousands of trucks that cross the border daily. That creates a lot of traffic along Huron Church Road – the main road in Windsor leading to and from the bridge. And, that in turn creates two challenges: moving goods (and people) efficiently while reducing the impact of all this traffic on the local community.
That’s why the Institute for Border Logistics and Security (IBLS) and the City of Windsor are working on a pilot project that uses Miovision TrafficLink along Huron Church Road: to gather the 24/7 traffic data they need to optimize the flow of traffic along this key corridor.
In the fall, the IBLS held an event that highlighted this project. Miovision’s VP, Product Management and Corporate Programs, Erin Skimson was there, outlining how smart signal technology can give traffic engineers the data they need to find small changes that can make a big difference.
While the pilot is just beginning, TrafficLink data showed that when Windsor simply synchronized the time of day at each signal, that small adjustment alone provided a 20 percent improvement in congestion. Read more about this pilot in The Windsor Star, CTVNews and The MediaPlex.
