ITS and economic growth: investment, stakeholders, and relations Chapter | 8 99
the network that expose the same characteristics (road types, socio-economic
features of the region, etc.). Then, it will be possible to deploy the same ITS
services for each road group and use representative parts to test and pilot the
deployment of each ITS model.
The last stage of the investment concerns the deployment of services and the
integration with existing infrastructure and services, the operation of the new
ITS services, and their long-term maintenance. In order to guarantee proper
deployment and sustainable operation of ITS services, it is necessary to de-
fine a clear implementation plan for the investment. The plan must comprise a
process for the systematic feasibility evaluation of any ITS solution and must
be supported by a group of organizations that will allow overcoming potential
obstacles and barriers that may rise during the ITS implementation and setup.
The benefit-cost analysis is a tool that can be useful for studying the feasi-
bility of any ITS solution. Based on this analysis, and given that the investment
plan is approved it would be useful to form an international board of experts
that will coordinate the plan development, will resolve any financial and orga-
nizational difficulties, will monitor the development of ITS infrastructure and
guarantee compliance to existing standards. The international character of the
board will add to the plan implementation, especially when the original plan
and the design of the system architecture step on existing good practices and
successful investments on ITS. Since success in a country does not necessarily
imply success in all other countries it is important to stand on best practices and
also consider the results of the socio-economic analysis from the first stage.
This will allow a better adaptation to the country’s special requirements and
its socio-economic standards. In a similar manner, ITS projects that failed in a
country may succeed in another country, so the various technological, socioeco-
nomic, and financial aspects that determine the best deployment options for ITS
services have to be considered in order to turn them to successful projects. and
deployment options. Surveys that collect and analyze such background infor-
mation are useful tools in this direction.
In order to better plan an ITS investment, it is important to study the aspects
that may affect the final result. This includes the interoperability of the devel-
oped ITS services, their ability to be expanded or replace one another (inter-
changeability) and the ability to seamlessly connect all services in a common
infrastructure. A successful ITS investment plan must adequately address the
following issues that may delay the design and implementation process:
• Define the communication protocols and the various technology standards
that will cover all aspects of the project.
• Run pilot projects on prototype installation that will early highlight risks and
caveats and will allow testing the ITS performance.
• Select a unified infrastructure for installing the model ITS and all its subsys-
tems.
• Properly define the organizational structure and the responsibilities of the
staff during the development of the system.