CommuterLink up in Utah County

OREM -- Utah Highway Patrol Lt. Ken Peay remembered the old adage that "a picture is worth a thousand words" when talking Friday about the addition of CommuterLink cameras to a stretch of I-15 in Utah County.

The real question, however, is will those cameras save Utah County commuters any time?

According to John Njord, Utah Department of Transportation's executive director, the camera surveillance and technologies used by CommuterLink will help to monitor traffic flow and accidents from Point of the Mountain to Orem. It will not, however, completely solve Utah County's growing congestion problems.

"It looks like (congestion) is going to get a little bit worse before it gets better," Njord admitted at a press conference held Tuesday to announce CommuterLink's expansion into Utah County. "But the great thing about Intelligent Transportation System and CommuterLink is that we can improve and increase capacity without adding concrete."

A collaborated effort between UDOT, Mountainland Association of Governments and the Department of Public Safety, CommuterLink came to Utah County after local officials saw its success in Salt Lake County.

Since its induction there, CommuterLink has reduced highway delays in Salt Lake County by 36 percent -- thanks to Web-savvy commuters and public safety personnel who check CommuterLink's real-time camera footage at www.commuterlink.utah.gov.

"It allows our dispatchers to pinpoint the actual location of an incident on the interstate system," Peay said. "We know if it's on the left side. We know if it's on the right or if it's blocking a lane of traffic or if it's blocking the whole interstate system. We know approximately how many vehicles are involved. We even know what the weather is like at that time."

That collection of information, Peay said, will help safety personnel respond faster to accidents and other problems that slow traffic. The sooner those things are cleared from the roads, the sooner traffic gets moving, Njord said.

"Every minute they can save in cleanup is five minutes they can save in the commute," he said.

Njord estimates that CommuterLink will be fully installed throughout Utah County within five years. By that time, he said transportation officials hope to have decreased freeway delays by 30 percent, freeway crashes by 20 percent and increase peak-hour freeway speed by 15 percent. Within the next few months, UDOT will also finish construction of a traffic control center at its Region 3 headquarters in Orem.

Utah County Commissioner Steve White applauds those goals and recognizes the benefit of bringing CommuterLink into Utah County. However, he expressed doubt that a series of cameras and electronic message signs will make a big difference for frustrated commuters.

"This is a nice PR opportunity for UDOT to say that we have everything that Salt Lake has, except we don't have roads," White said. "This is nice, but it's only going to help on the law enforcement side."

White pointed out that there is no Utah County interstate project in UDOT's five-year plan and no money in the budget to finance additional roads. Moreover, the congestion on I-15 is often better than gridlocked side streets that CommuterLink hopes to divert commuters onto.

Orem City Councilman Doug Forsyth proposed his own solution, suggesting that "the way to solve the problem on the freeway in Utah County is to have the 2014 Olympic Games in Provo, instead of Salt Lake."

"Believe me the money would be found," he quipped, referring to extensive highway improvements made prior to the Salt Lake Winter Games in 2002 that managed to find funding despite budget limitations.

Njord takes such criticism in stride. He realizes that CommuterLink will only make a dent in a deep traffic problem that will only get worse in Utah County over the next few years.

"I've often been told that we can't build our way out of congestion," Njord said. "But you know what I say? We can't hope our way out of congestion either."

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