Harris County, TX

Harris County, TX (CountyO) is an unincorporated area within the Houston metropolitan region and includes approximately 900 signalized intersections. In the past, the signalized intersection infrastructure made use of numerous vendors’ controllers and local software with no centralized system for control.

Econolite Systems, Inc. (ESI) was retained to install a centralized system, supply and install new local controller firmware, and provide a tool that assists with the maintenance of the County’s infrastructure. As part of this project, ESI was responsible for completing a detailed inventory of each cabinet, including controller type, software, and version; 1C module; detection type; MMU; and other traffic control-related field assets. After the majority of the intersections came online with the new traffic control equipment, ESI installed the Centracs Signal Performance Measures (SPM) module so that Harris County could centrally control, proactively monitor traffic signal performance, and dynamically adjust intersection operating activities.

The project included the installation of Econolite’s EOS traffic controller firmware on approximately 800 existing 2070 controllers from multiple manufacturers. As part of this project, ESI was responsible for all testing, burn-in, and field installation. Additionally, the County will be updating its communications for those signals not already connected through the use of cellular communications.

As each signal is brought online, the signal infrastructure inventory information was imported into ESI’s Centracs Maintenance Management System (MMS) to track all assets deployed. Both Centracs and MMS have been customized for the County’s use, based on a set of detailed project-specific requirements. ESI has connected more than 600 intersections to the Econolite Centracs SPM module for performance monitoring and enhanced operations.