The Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT) will receive more than $551,000 to install thermal imaging cameras on public transit vehicles, the agency said Wednesday.
MDOT was awarded a $551,732 grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) as part of the Advanced Transportation Technology and Innovation (ATTAIN) program. The grant will be used to install the cameras to improve the detection of vulnerable road users, like pedestrians and bicyclists, in a variety of lighting conditions and operating environments. Officials said the cameras will be installed on up to 60 transit vehicles in four rural and urban public transit agencies.
“We are very pleased to have received this grant from our federal partners to improve safety, which ultimately could be a game-changer for public transit agencies across the country,” Jean Ruestman, MDOT Office of Passenger Transportation administrator, said. “While some high-end automobiles have thermal cameras, no transit vehicles currently have this technology, so my staff worked hard in researching this technology, making contacts and applying for this grant to make it a reality.”
The transit agencies – Blue Water Area Transit, the City of Alma, Community Action Agency of South Central Michigan, and the Regional Transit Authority of Southeast Michigan (RTA) – will first test out the functionality on transit vehicles ranging from vans to large motorcoaches.
“The City of Alma and our City of St. Louis, City of Ithaca and Pine River Township Authority (SLIPR) partners are excited to join MDOT in implementing thermal camera systems in our buses and vans. As a college town and a multimodal community with pedestrians, bicyclists and an ever-growing population of electric bicycles, unleashing this new technology will help prevent pedestrian/vehicle conflicts and save lives,” Brett Baublitz, Alma Transit Center transportation director said.
Crashes between vulnerable road users and transit vehicles is a safety concern, officials said. Bus-to-person collisions account for 15 percent of the fatalities between 2008 and 2017. The FTA issued a Safety Advisory in September 2023 recommending that transit provides consider strategies to reduce collisions between buses and pedestrians, bicyclists, and micromobility users.