Carnegie Mellon University
Metro21: Smart Cities Institute  ›  Projects  ›  Safe Mobility

Safe Mobility

We envision a future for mobility that is safe, efficient, and reliable. Metro21 works mainly through its partner, Safety21, the US DOT National University Transportation Center for Safety; Raj Rakjumar serves as Director for both centers. Working with Safety21 and its 300+ deployment partners, Metro21 starts with existing transportation systems and works collaboratively with its partners to help them work in a way that improves mobility and safety – drivers, cyclists, pedestrians, and those with limited mobility options. Technologies such as sensors and cameras mean the traffic signal knows how many cars, cyclists, and pedestrians are waiting. Dashboard-mounted smartphones help buses do double duty by safely monitoring road conditions.  Artificial intelligence and computer algorithms turn all this data into real-time recommendations for traffic signal timing, road repair, snowplow routes and transit planning. Our current project is PennSTART and working towards building an autonomous vehicle corridor in SWPA; this project is being led by Safety21. 

Past and Current Projects Projects

CURRENT PROJECT: Building and Promoting an Autonomous Vehicle Corridor in Western Pennsylvania and Beyond

A mission of the Parties is to advance the Pennsylvania Safety Transportation and Research Track (PennSTART) project through the required systems engineering process and identify the appropriate members (public and private) necessary to leverage the financial and technical resources required to construct, operate and maintain the center.

Leveraging Existing Fiber-Optic Cables to Identify and Manage Urban Environmental Hazards

The pilot project, which builds on preliminary research in Pittsburgh, will target just one area of the city to test the approach. DAS will be calibrated with temporary conventional sensors and input from civic partners. Researchers said the challenges Pittsburgh offers could show proof of concept that the science would work in other areas.

More Efficient Transport of K-12 Students through Centralized Planning

The purpose of this project is to find efficiencies related to transporting K-12 students, whereby, the CMU team will facilitate route optimization and research-based innovative practices for transportation services for charter and nonpublic school students. This work will include comparing CMU’s proposed transportation services with the collection of transport services utilized by districts.

Holistic and Energy-efficient Rural County Mobility Platform (RAMP)

Funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, led by an interdisciplinary team including Metro21, and partnering with Waynesburg University & Greene County, the team aims to develop a testbed for an innovative mobility platform that can be replicated across the United States. The goal is to improve mobility in rural Southwestern Pennsylvania, with the potential to advance the fundamental knowledge of how energy-efficient, affordable mobility services can work in rural America, enabling them to be systematically planned, operated, and monitored, inherently merged with system-level modeling.

Guaranteed Basic Mobility

Transportation mobility is the single largest factor in a household achieving economic mobility. In other words, households that have a high degree of reliable, efficient transportation that they can afford and use have a higher probability of moving up the economic ladder. Transportation access, however, is not universally available and is certainly inequitable.

Completed Project - ARISE Planning Grant "POWER"

There is tremendous need for this project in rural ARC communities. Mobility services in rural areas are insufficient, inefficient, unaffordable, and inaccessible, with highly limited resources. Often, rural trips are made by solo driving in private vehicles with low fuel economy. Public transit or shared mobility options are rarely utilized. Those rural trips are likely to be expensive, long, with a single trip purpose, and thus energy inefficient. More importantly, because rural trips are extra burdensome to households both financially and physically, resources, facilities and communities are becoming more inaccessible to rural populations, which in turn worsens the mobility services, health care service, and rural economy. Thus, rural communities are considered disadvantaged communities as they suffer from a lack of transport options. To address this need, our POWER planning grant’s transportation study worked to better understand the mobility challenges in 24 Appalachian counties across OH, PA and WV and better inform implementation projects to address these issues and help improve the economic mobility of the region and its people. Initially, we aimed to identify potential transportation solutions to fill gaps for individuals seeking transportation to workforce training, jobs and/or healthcare. The data has since refined the work to focus on workforce training and jobs to help enable the economic viability and stability of residents. This project was completed in June 2025 and the team is currently applying for an ARC ARISE implementation grant.

Completed Projects

Demand-side Incentives to Mitigate Wait Times at Airport Security Checkpoints

This project developed an analytical model of screening operations at security checkpoints, motivated by problems faced at major airports. The model aims to provide decision-making support for screening operators, as well as strategic insights for the design of screening checkpoints.

Optimal Escort Dispatch for Airport Travelers with Reduced Mobility

An important component of airport landside operations involves providing assistance to passengers with reduced mobility. This project explores how to enable efficient escort dispatch to improve travelers' experiences and seamlessly create a smart airport.

CMU Researchers on the Future of Work in Cities, Ethics in Autonomous Vehicles

Tepper School of Business professors Tae Wan Kim and John Hooker research into the ethics of autonomous vehicles and the future of automation in the workplace.

Landslide Prediction and Analysis from Images

The beginning of 2018 was marked by unusually heavy rain falls which caused a lot of landslides in and around Pittsburgh. Fortunately, no person was insured, however, houses were destroyed and several roads had to be closed, some for months to be completely reconstructed. In this project, the team will develop and test an inexpensive early warning and post-event analysis system.

Hazelwood-Oakland Mobility Project

For this project, Metro21 and the Mobility Data Analytics Center (MAC) conducted extensive research on existing and potential intermodal transit options in the Hazelwood and Oakland a neighborhoods, and created models to determine which options would best meet the needs of residents and commuters over time. The team also conducted extensive stakeholder interviews to inform the mobility models and highlight pain points and challenges. The findings have been communicated to the stakeholders of Hazelwood Green in multiple meetings. The team’s mobility study will be incorporated into future recommendations for mobility options to better connect Hazelwood to/from Oakland.

Optimizing Snow Plowing Operations in Urban Road Networks

Working with the City of Pittsburgh's Department of Public Works, the team is creating a prototype in-vehicle mobile application that will provide turn-by-turn routing instructions to snow plow drivers.

Future of Work: Can Ridehailing Help the Disadvantaged get Work?

Led by Dr. Lee Branstetter, the goal of this research project is to examine the potential effects of ridehailing services on the mobility of Pittsburgh's least advantaged citizens.

Route 51 Corridor Transformation Study: Phase II

The Route 51 Corridor Transformation Study is a holistic urban design, environmental and transportation research project that will include: networked traffic signalization, economic development, land use, storm water, air quality and much more.

Surtrac 2.0

Working at the request of City of Pittsburgh DOMI to prepare the City for its planned expansion of the adaptive signal network, this project will upgrade the Surtrac Pittsburgh deployment to incorporate the latest technology advances (Surtrac 2.0).

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