US: CTA to Pilot Automated ROW Intrusion Detection System

The Chicago Transit Board has approved a 60,000 USD funding award to STV for the development of a new pilot project testing the use of camera-based capabilities to detect intrusions on the right-of-way at two rail stations.

The system, which will be developed under the CTA Innovation Studio, will send any information on potential intrusions straight to the CTA Control Centre, where it will be dealt with as and when it occurs.

Cameras will capture footage in real-time, after which footage will be sent to a device designed to analyse and identify potential right-of-way intrusions, with data being held for long-term analysis after any initial action is taken.

The CTA has stated that it receives roughly 2,000 reports of right-of-way intrusions per year, with the most commonly cited reason for doing so being riders retrieving dropped mobile phones.

STV’s pilot programme is slated to run for 12 months, with regular performance reviews set to focus on the measuring of accurate intrusion detections, response times, and the amount of false alarms received by the control centre. Further monitoring will track the percentage of time the system is in operation, as well as the overall decrease in right-of-way incidents as a result of its implementation.

CTA Acting President Nora Leerhsen, said:

We are excited to continue to move forward with this important new Innovation Studio initiative.

We are always focused on identifying new ways to make our system better and safer for our riders and I believe we should take every available opportunity to leverage available technologies to achieve that goal.

CTA’S Innovation Studio has been specifically designed to allow the operator to pilot new solutions and technologies for a plethora of issues, with its launch in 2024 seeing the release of three problem statements on the topics of safety, internal process improvements, and customer experience to the public in order to attract proposals from private companies interested in providing new solutions.

The chosen company providing work for the CTA on this new pilot programme is STV, a full-service engineering and consulting firm with previous experience working with the CTA having worked on designs of a new maintenance facility for the operator.

Kitts Christov, Senior Vice President at STV, said:

STV is honored to collaborate with our long-standing partners at CTA to develop a state-of-the-art pilot program focused on improving safety for our local community.

Our technical experts are using software created by Derq, an award-winning AI and predictive analytics platform, to monitor Right-of-Way intrusion detection with real-time data and deliver a modern digital solution that will make our infrastructure safer, smarter and more connected.

The 60,000 USD provided to STV will cover the cost of hardware, installation, software customisation and overall integration of the system, as well as the ensuing testing at the two separate rail stations.