2nd Incident Management Summit

Welcome to the second Incident Management Summit.  All the information from the first summit held last year in Amsterdam is accessible through the button under the main menu to the left. In addition another button has been added to show the current trends and thinking within this domain. This is where you will find more detailed information on the way ahead.

Registration is now open and you can register on line from the registration button under the main menu or click here to go direct to the registration form. If you wish to take part in sponsoring this event then we can offer you a wide range of ways from; a poster campaign and exhibiting to demonstrating your solutions. In conjunction with Geoconnexion international  magazine we can offer you favourable rates for advertising. Go to the sponsor page under the main menu or click here to go direct to register an interest in sponsorship.

We have listed over fifty relevant standards that can make the communication between chain members easier and more efficient. Some of these standards will be demonstrated at the summit.  The need for a reference model containing a framework and a vocabulary for incident management is growing stronger and one that is required work on now. One major international standard that is due to be published at the end of the year is ISO 19149   Geographic information — Rights expression language for geographic information — GeoREL.

The use of ubiquitous computing in geographic information is often obstructed by legal concerns about the rights of the holders and owners of data and other intellectual property resources. It can be the case, that once data or other resource is released into any unconstrained and unprotected environment, the value of the holding is decreased because the underlying data theoretically becomes available from other sources. The multimedia industry has taken the lead in solving this problem by creating a general model for digital rights protection, in which a language was developed in order that instances of those rights might be documented, a rights expression language, specifically in ISO/IEC 21000-5, the ISO REL that used in conjunction with Digital Rights Management (DRM) systems can protect the value of data and still allow it to be distributed subject to a system of licensing, trust and enforcement.

This International Standard extends the ISO REL to encompass the concerns of holders of geographic data and service resources to equally ensure their protection. This allows the geographic information market to operate with minimal constraints derived from need for the protection of intellectual property.

Incident management was developed in the United States where high traffic volumes in the urban areas made this necessary. From there it was first adopted in the Netherlands and from there in other locations in Europe [Thesis Leuven]. In the United States there is no uniform national approach. The way incident response or management is implemented depends on the local situation. In many regions a single communication system is used for communication between authorities involved. This is the ALERT system (Advanced Law Enforcement and Response Technology). Interestingly authorities in the United States also look at Europe to see how incident response and management is organised. One aspect is different between Europe and the United States. In the US incident management is organised on a regional level whereas in Europe a national or even European standardisation of procedures and standards is advocated.

Daily traffic Incident Management along the main roads and waterways is a major task for ministries and chain members such as police, fire department and ambulance services. Besides improved safety for road users and emergency workers, Incident Management has a direct, positive impact on traffic mobility. To carry out the Incident Management process in an effective and efficient way, the need for (spatial) information and supporting information is a high priority. This need has grown because reducing mobility problems is high on the political agenda.

To support the process of Incident Management, the need for mobile, context-aware (spatial) information and supporting information systems will be a paradigm shift. Adapting to changes in the environment is at the heart of context-aware computing where it is envisaged that, by adding context, systems could:

• provide more relevant and useful location and task-specific feedback by using, say, the user’s current location, the time of day, and the user’s electronic personal diary,
• make user interaction more natural and personalised, thus increasing the richness of communication, and
• be more dynamic by adapting to the continuously changing situation of the user. For example, real-time location and status information of an inspector makes logistics and co-ordination activities much more effective.

The introduction of mobile, context-aware information systems can reduce the time interval between the detection of the incident and the flow of traffic which is therefore re-established in a significant way.  In return, this has a direct, positive effect on the reduction of traffic congestion. The strategy to meet this challenge is built on the principles of uniform working models, open standards, server-based computing and central data hosting and maintenance.

In practice, it is the responsibility of the police, fire brigade, ambulance services, Department of Public Works, recovery services and repair services to co-operate in handling incidents safely and efficiently. Priorities are: the emergency worker’s own safety, traffic safety, adequate treatment of casualties, flow of traffic, damage reduction (environmental, cargo, vehicle and social) and, depending on the gravity of accidents, the possibility of answering the question of guilt by investigating the incident scene.

Some 13% of traffic congestion is the result of incidents such as crashes and vehicles shedding their loads. The majority of this traffic congestion is caused by accidents with cars. While relatively few incidents involve trucks, these incidents can cause immediate, large-scale traffic congestion that catches public attention. All these problems contribute significantly to the economic damage that Europe suffers each year from traffic congestion. A traffic jam also creates an unsafe traffic situation and in many cases collisions occur in the tail of a jam. This entails the risk of further material damage as well as injury. Therefore, there is sufficient reason to limit, as far as possible, the length and duration of such congestion.

In general, the aim of Incident Management is to ensure the safe and rapid handling of incidents so that the traffic flow restrictions caused by an incident are lifted as quickly as possible. Good victim assistance and the safety of both emergency service workers and other road users are important considerations.