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An overview of European efforts to increase disabled access to public transport, by David Crawford

Moxa has unveiled the VPort 364 series, a four-channel industrial video encoder featuring the bandwidth-efficient H.264 video compression algorithm. Using the company's innovative DynaStream functionality for streaming optimisation, the VPort 364 is ideal for harsh industrial surveillance environments thanks to a wide operating temperature, built-in fibre Ethernet ports, IP30 form factor protection and industrial certifications. In addition to MJPEG, the VPort 364 supports H.264 technology to ensure high da

Radiodetection, a specialist in the design and development of cable and pipe locators, has launched a new range of precision locators.

Chris Cheever and Chris Thomas of Fontinalis Partners discuss the funding outlook for the ITS industry – where the money’s going to come from, and what needs to happen to facilitate change

A study of the German local public passenger transport market, initiated by Göppel Bus and carried out by Consultatio Venture, revealed unsurprising results that would apply to just about any operation in this sector throughout the world: the pressure on costs and capacity peaks pose the greatest problems for local public passenger transport operations.

Mentor Engineering has released its online passenger information system, Mentor MyRide. Developed for transit agencies, it provides passengers with various means of accessing real-time bus location, status and schedule information online using a desktop computer, smart phone or regular mobile phone.

The LockIT LC optical fibre adapter lock has joined Siemon's LockIT line of secure network connectivity. This new, tamper-proof adapter lock protects against unauthorised access to unused LC ports and can be used to secure nearly any LC optical fibre-based network infrastructure. The system is designed to provide physical layer security without adding complexity or impacting overall functionality and density.

TRL has announced the Transyt 14.0.2 maintenance release which is free of charge to existing Transyt 14 customers. For both the UK and all the other many countries where SCOOT is installed, Transyt 14 now has the ability to import SCOOT flow data and assign this to Transyt model links. TRL has already provided Australian or SCATS-based terminology in the software but following on from a recent validation tour of Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Sydney, TRL has released further functionality for its Austral

The cost, environmental and other benefits of the bus trailer concept are obvious. Used in several areas of Germany, as well as Austria, Switzerland, and Luxembourg, vehicle sizes can be adapted to passenger demand. The Ruebenacker group, a public transport provider in the Black Forest region of Germany, is one of more than 20 bus operators in the country that have deployed bus trailers, also referred to as bus trains. The company owns 81 buses and transports nearly six million passengers a year in the Blac

Pelco has expanded its Sarix camera range to include two new mini dome cameras, the IM-E series environmental and the IM-V series vandal-resistant fixed mini dome cameras. The company says these two cameras raise the bar for megapixel mini dome performance by delivering auto focus on every camera, low light performance down to 0.03 lux, up to 1.3 megapixel resolution and a built-in camera sabotage analytic.

Telogis's Fleet 8 Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) GPS fleet management system, announced for the European market, now incorporates dynamic traffic data to allow fleet managers to make the most informed real-time routing and allocation decisions based on current conditions in the field. It also monitors and alerts to driver behaviours, such as speeding, to improve employee and asset safety. Additional new components include multiple vehicle histories, street-side/birds-eye view imaging, and a reconciliation mod

Stemmer Imaging is launching a sophisticated vehicle classification system that allows both the class of the vehicle, such as motorcycle, car, taxi, light van, bus or truck, to be identified as well as the vehicle make, model and colour and can be linked with ANPR systems. It utilises the Manto pattern recognition tool, which is part of the company's Common Vision Blox hardware-independent machine vision toolkit. Potential applications for the systems include congestion charge monitoring and other road toll

In 2007 in Atlanta, Georgia, it took over four hours to open the road after a major commercial vehicle incident. Not any more. Four years ago the Texas Transportation Institute (TTI) cited Atlanta, Georgia as the third-most congested city in the United States. Each traveller in metro Atlanta lost an incredible 57 hours a year to traffic delays, wasting 40 gallons of fuel while sitting in traffic. In 2007, it took nearly four and a half hours to open travel lanes after an average tractor-trailer incident. Th

AMG Systems has launched the 5800/5900 series of hybrid products, which are available both as standalone and as rackmount.

MEL Secure Systems has announced the immediate availability of a new generation of wireless outdoor bridges. Using the latest MiMo (Multiple in/Multiple out) technology with transmission rates of up to 300Mbps, the company says it provides significantly improved performance over traditional bridges with the bandwidth required for streaming HD video and data in a wide range of security and IT applications. The device uses the latest IEEE 802.11n 5GHz technology to give a range of up to 10km (6.2 miles). The

Aftek, which is headquartered in Mumbai, India, has announced that it is now offering various transportation services under one complete framework, known as Aftek Transportation Framework (ATF). Designed for scalability and future growth, the main components of ATF are depot manager, bus tracking system, passenger information system, automatic fare collection, smartcard management and driver console unit. Being highly configurable, these components can be integrated easily with third-party devices and can a

At the beginning of August, 2011, Carole Coune took up her new role as Secretary General of the International Transport Forum at the OECD. Here, she tells ITS International of the challenges and opportunities the global sector faces. Transport is a growth industry. Despite the current financial crisis, the trend for transport is pointing upwards. Demand is mainly driven by global economic integration, a growing world population and rising incomes in emerging economies. As we head toward nine billion humans

U-blox has announced the extension of its LISA wireless module family to include two new members, the LISA-H100 for the USA and the LISA-H110 for Europe and Asia. The UMTS/HSDPA data modems are dedicated to telematics and telemetry applications that typically require only data and not the full 3G bandwidth. The modems are backwards-compatible with 2G (GPRS/EDGE) networks. Applications include automatic meter reading, point of sales terminals, remote monitoring and control, asset tracking, fleet management a

A new traffic signal pole specifically designed to provide low-level access has been introduced by Siemens.

The 2011 Urban Mobility Report from the Texas Transportation Institute highlights the dangers of continued underinvestment in transportation infrastructure but also offers some hope in terms of possible solutions