Multimedia Services for Highway Infrastructure Management

Photographic logging systems used by highway agencies provide engineers with information in the analysis of traffic accidents, design improvements, and highway pavement management. However, there exist limitations for such systems in the areas of accessibility, search capability of the image library, and synchronization video data with traditional engineering site data. More important, there are situations in which multiple users may need to examine the video footage at the same time. This capability cannot be provided by current systems. The analog nature of the video signals also presents difficulties in integrating the visual information with other types of data. This paper introduces a type of multimedia service that can be applied in a state highway department environment for highway infrastructure management. This multimedia‐based information system utilizes state‐of‐the‐art technologies in digital video, high‐speed networking, and video server. This paper discusses the requirements of high‐speed networking systems and presents a new computer network that has the potential to become a dominant technology for the transmission of multimedia data. In addition, design concerns regarding the video server and its structure are also discussed. A data‐synchronization algorithm is also presented on how to dynamically display digital video frames with traditional engineering data sets that contain information such as as‐built data, pavement condition and performance, traffic safety, geometric features, and other infrastructure data.