Tech research hits Ohio's highways - Axios

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Illustration of a hand guiding a computer mouse on a highway-themed mouse pad.

Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios

A vehicle crashes on a highway, automatically alerting first responders to its location and severity.

As emergency crews mobilize, the speed limit near the scene is lowered to help ward off secondary crashes.

Why it matters: This potential scenario is an example of how Ohio can get smarter about responding to crashes — and hopefully preventing them.

The Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT) received a $2 million federal grant through the bipartisan infrastructure bill to research new highway safety technology, potentially saving many lives.
Transportation officials use extensive data to inform traffic engineering, but unpredictable factors like distracted driving and weather complicate that planning. Using new technology to make real-time adjustments is more efficient.

What they're saying: "We're seeing this rapid transformation in transportation, using technology to solve problems that engineering alone can't solve," ODOT spokesperson Breanna Badanes tells Axios.

Harnessing these advancements would be "another tool in our toolbox" toward maintaining safe roadways, she says.

State of play: One grant-funded project seeks to alert officials and first responders whenever an airbag is deployed.

Another hopes to process highway data to predict areas where a crash is most likely to occur.
The state could then warn drivers via overhead message signs to stay alert and proactively place emergency crews in hazardous areas.

The intrigue: Select highways, including Route 670 east from downtown, already feature "variable speed limits" that can be adjusted on the fly.

State lawmakers have the authority to expand this system to other highways across Ohio, but have not yet done so.

By the numbers: There were 265,000 crashes recorded across Ohio last year, per the state highway patrol, with thousands reported on well-traveled highways like Routes 270, 70, and 71.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the greatest concentration of crashes happen during high-volume times of day — when real-time safety warnings could reach the most number of drivers.

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