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Fleet Management: A GPS-GIS integrated approach
The effectiveness and success of the GPS-GIS integrated systems for fleet management is evident from the cleaning-up operation taken up at 'Ground Zero' after the World Trade Center disaster on the 11th of September 2001. After the devastation, the city of New York was faced with the overwhelming task of removing more than 1.8 million tons of debris from the site. The continuing search for human remains and processing the debris as evidence further complicated the clean-up effort. A GPS-GIS solution was sought for the management problem due to the extensive scope of the project with costs that threatened to overwhelm existing resources. Criticom International Corporation of Minneapolis, Minnesota used a broadband communications network, a camera monitoring and time-lapse recording system, a GPS-based vehicle tracking system and Internet services to access various GIS databases for achieving the task. Debris hauling was started under a paper-ticket system, which was quickly replaced by installation of GPS receivers on 235 trucks that were used to carry the debris to various locations. The tamper-proof GPS receivers were designed to send alarms to the control center in case of signal loss, trailer disconnection, tampering, deviation from pre-determined routes and ensured safety and prompt delivery and dispatch. The real-time information from the receivers was used to develop an electronic system that had features of record-keeping, tracking-data storage and billing and other details about each truck, the driver, the debris type carried and destination. The GIS-based maps on the computer screen at the control station displayed real-time positioning that made it possible to plan intervals at which trucks were ready to load, dump and return for reloading. This prevented long queuing of trucks at the site and helped prevent traffic bottlenecks there. The data of truck-time spent in queues, total travel time and loading time stored in the GIS database could be used to substantiate claims and resolve disputes and helped to improve the efficiency of the operation. The GPS-GIS system had an important feature called 'geofencing' that prevented deviations from the given dispatch routes. The system used the exact defined routes and location of tunnels in the GIS to sense the proximity of a tunnel and automatically lowered tracking levels for the period when the particular truck was near and in the tunnel to prevent loss of signal.
This was the first time GPS technology was used in a disaster recovery setting and it gave remarkable results. The integration with GIS provided enhanced security and efficient management of operations by more than tripling the number of loads per truck per shift over the initial paper-ticket system. The removal project that was estimated at $ 7 billion by city officials was achieved in just $ 750 million. The task was completed in an amazing duration of just 8 months and the audit data and other information were kept online for the trucking companies even after the system was closed (Menard and Knieff, 2002).
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