Video Cameras in Access Link Paratransit Vehicles

2014NJDOT Research Project Manager Giri Venkiteela. Performing Organization Code:CAIT/RutgersPDFTech ReportFHWA-NJ-2015-004Paratransit vehiclesParatransit servicesVideo camerasSurveysQuestionnairesLiability insuranceTransit Video SystemBusCamerasParatransitNew JerseyNew Jersey. Dept. of Transportation. Bureau of ResearchSzary, PatrickKaplan, AndyLubin, AndreaTobin, BrianManzella, MikeRutgers University. Center for Advanced Infrastructure and TransportationAlan M. Voorhees Transportation CenterUnited States. Federal Highway AdministrationNew Jersey. Dept. of Transportation. Bureau of ResearchUnited States. Dept. of Transportation. Office of the Assistant Secretary for Research and TechnologyVenkiteela, GiriNTL-PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION-ParatransitUS Transportation CollectionNew Jersey Transit (NJ TRANSIT), under purview of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) paratransit requirement, operates a fleet of 360 Access Link vehicles. The current Access Link paratransit fleet uses a short segment video monitoring system. This system captures 20-second video clips generated upon G-force or manual triggers. Since implementation in the Access Link fleet, there have been significant changes to the technologies available and to contract cost structures of vendors. In addition, newer technologies on the market\u2014especially continuous video monitoring systems\u2014provide a greater amount of information and features than the currently installed systems. The research team conducted a national survey of transportation providers and found that 86 percent of the survey respondents use a continuous video monitoring system. Nearly all operators with a continuous video monitoring system reported satisfaction with their respective system, regardless of vendor. Continuous video monitoring system users cited many occurrences of their system capturing events and sequences that would not be triggered with a short segment system, including actions that lead up to an event. This additional footage greatly aided event investigation, incident resolution, and employee training efforts. Many benefits are difficult to quantify in dollars saved due to their relationship to employee safety, oversight, customer relations, etc. Therefore the benefits quantified focused on the reduction in liability and insurance claims. Overall, a continuous recording system provides additional features and captures significantly more events. This creates a potential for additional savings, which may be greater than increased costs of the more expensive system. Based on the results of the research, NJ TRANSIT could expect that: 1) without a system they would incur a liability/claim cost of $706,644 per year, 2) current segmented recording installation they incur a liability/claim cost of $293,519 per year, and 3) replacing their segmented system with a continuous recording installation \u201ccould\u201d further reduce their liability/claim cost to $145,335 per year. This data is speculative and is statistically sensitive to claim trends and extreme claims resulting in large one-time payouts that vary significantly from the average claim cost. However there are many additional tangible benefits associated with the additional information collected by a continuous system