ALSITE NEWS - Fall 2013 (Volume XLIII, Issue 3)

Let me begin by saying what an honor it has been to serve as your President this year! I am proud to be part of an organization that is actively serving our communities and our profession. My time on the Board of Directors has been challenging and rewarding, and I encourage anyone who has not had the privilege of serving to consider running for office in the future.

Be sure to join us for our upcoming Fall Meeting on October 17th at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville! The members of TSITE will be joining us, and we'd love to have a great turnout from our Section to welcome them. This joint meeting will provide thought provoking technical presentations, networking opportunities with other transportation professionals, and a chance to explore the museum!

As always, ALSITE continues to be active between meetings. Jeff Stephenson recently completed our website upgrade. Be sure to check it out at www.alsite.org! ALDOT has asked ALSITE to present four leadership classes to their young managers this fall. Dan Turner, Richard Caudle, Darrell Skipper, Becky White, and Jim Meads are heading up this effort, and classes will be taught throughout October and November. Please read Dr. Turner's article below for more information about this service project.

It is with heavy hearts that we mourn the passing of Barbara Raynor, wife of Harold Raynor, who lost her battle with cancer on September 8, 2013. Harold was instrumental in establishing our scholarship foundation which now bears his name. He and Barbara have attended many ALSITE meetings over the years and have been huge supporters of our scholarship program. The family has requested that donations be made to Harold M. Raynor ALSITE Scholarships, Inc. in her honor. Please consider remembering Barbara in this way!

On a happier note, I recently learned that I was selected to participate in LeadershipITE, a nine month leadership program sponsored by ITE. I am excited about this opportunity and look forward to representing ALSITE at the national level!

Becky Malenke, P.E.

ALSITE President

ALSITE Service Project

Dan Turner, P.E.

ALSITE has committed to a large service project for the Alabama Department of Transportation, extending a previous project offered in 2011 to 14 young ALDOT managers. The current project will conduct Leadership Development sessions for four groups of emerging young ALDOT managers. The workshop will use the International ITE Leadership Development materials prepared by Southern District ITE volunteers (including ALSITE senior leaders).

Each of the four groups will participate in two 2-day sessions covering 14 modules. The course content deals with commitment to a leadership path, character, and lifelong acquisition of leadership skills. ALSITE senior leaders who are organizing and facilitating the workshops include Richard Caudle, Darrell Skipper, Becky White, Jim Meads, and Dan Turner. In addition, ALSITE President Becky Malenke and ALSITE members Christy Cahalan and Chris Sellers will serve as facilitators. ALDOT is providing two senior managers as facilitators (Don Arkle and Vince Calametti) and three of the young mangers who completed the 2011 leadership workshop (Kaye Davis, Wade Henry, and Josh Kervin) as mentors and facilitators.

This cooperative effort between ALSITE and ALDOT will increase the total to 70 young ALDOT managers to complete the International ITE Leadership Development program through the assistance of ALSITE members. It is a true service project that contributes to ALDOT, our profession and our state.

2013 ALSITE-TSITE Joint Fall Meeting

The Joint ALSITE-TSITE 2013 Fall Meeting will be held Thursday October 17th at the U.S. Space and Rocket Center in Huntsville, AL. Please come join us in the Rocket City!

The Meeting Agenda and more information can be found on the ALSITE website at alsite.org

NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

ALSITE 2013 Annual Meeting Recap

Our Annual Meeting at the Beach Club was a huge success! We were honored to welcome two special guests: Hibbett Neel, ITE International Vice President, and Martin Bretherton, SDITE President. The meeting began with an interactive Professional Development Session on Incorporating Safety throughout the Project Development Process. This session was led by Becky White and Jim Meads and included group exercises and a panel discussion. The two Technical Sessions showcased presentations on Self Driving Cars, InSync Adaptive Traffic Signal Technology, Regions Park Gameday Traffic, Highway 280 Access Improvements, and an update on the new Airbus facilities in Mobile.

During our awards banquet, we celebrated our 40th Anniversary with a special cake and a video presentation put together by our officers. The video is currently available for viewing on our website. Awards were presented to the following deserving recipients:

Stacey Glass - Transportation Engineer of the Year
James Foster - Transportation Professional of the Year
Tim Barnett - Transportation Safety Award
Clark Bailey - Outstanding Young Member Award.

Two scholarships were also awarded at the banquet. Jamieson Matthews received the Charles E. Alexander Memorial Transportation Engineering Scholarship, and DoriAnn Clayton was awarded the Billy Jones Memorial Traffic Engineering Scholarship. New officers were elected for the 2014 calendar year as follows:

2014 ALSITE Officers

Greg Dawkins - President

Jeff Stephenson - Vice President

Rod Turochy - Secretary/Treasurer

Becky White - District Representative

Kevin Garmon - Affiliate Director

Darrell Vines - Assistant Affiliate Director.

Members and guests socialized at the annual Fast Eddie's Shrimp Boil, Officer's Reception, and Billy Jones Memorial Golf Tournament. Our Scholarship Auction, led by auctioneer Dan Turner, was successful as several thousand dollars were raised to fund future scholarships. Several new events made their debut during this meeting, including a Vendor Exhibit and a Group Bike Ride. Both were well received and will probably appear on future agendas.

The meeting concluded with our annual Traffic Bowl where the Baby Boomers, the Gen X-ers, and the Millennials competed for bragging rights. Congratulations to the Gen X-ers for ending the game with the highest score!

Obituary

Barbara Page Raynor

Barbara Page Raynor, a resident of Gulf Shores, AL, died at her beloved High Country Mountain House in Linville, NC on September 8, 2013 after an 18-month valiant battle with cancer. She was 69.

Barbara was born in Rockingham, NC the daughter of the late Lester Voyd Page and Pearl Deese Page, and was a 28-year resident of Gulf Shores. She previously resided in Charlotte, NC.

Survivors include husband and best buddy, Harold Raynor; brother Earle Page and sister-in-law Ellen Page, both of Raleigh, NC; and nieces Tamara P. Thomas of Charlotte and Victoria P. Clayton of Raleigh and their children.

She attended Rockingham High School and King's College in Charlotte majoring in accounting. Barbara worked for Sears in the regional accounting centers in Charlotte and Pensacola, FL retiring in 1986 after 20 years of service. She retired from Sears to fulfill a longtime dream to play golf any day the weather permitted.

Encouraged by Mary Williams, a close friend and coworker, Barbara fell in love with the game of golf in the late '70's. She was fortunate to have Charlotte's Myers Park Country Club golf pro Walter Reynolds as her first golf instructor. In 1987 she became a student of Joann Beddow a golf teaching professional with Jimmy Ballard's famed golf school at Pine Harbor in Pell City, AL.

Barbara evolved into an accomplished amateur golfer winning a number of club and team championships. She was a Founding Member of Craft Farms' Cotton Creek Club in Gulf Shores and previously a member of Carolina Golf and Country Club in Charlotte and Gulf Shores Golf Club in Gulf Shores.

She was very active in the Women's Alabama Golf Association participating in a number of annual state championships and served on numerous WAGA committees. In 1993 the WAGA membership elected Barbara treasurer and she served in this position until 1996. In 1997 she was appointed to the board of directors of the newly formed Women's Alabama Golf Association Scholarship Foundation Trust and served as treasurer of the Foundation from 1997 until 2002 when health issues forced her to resign.

Barbara was a founding member of the Cotton Creek Ladies Golf Association which was formed in 1988. She served as president of the CCLGA in '96, '97, '01 and '02. She was the Club Champion in '94, '98, '01 and '02. During her golfing career in Alabama she had 6 holes-in-one. For a number of years Barbara held the Ladies Low Scoring Record on Craft Farm's Cypress Bend golf course recording a one under par 71.

The family wishes to extend their deepest appreciation to the personnel at the Gulf Coast Cancer Center in Gulf Shores, AL in particular Dr. William C. Hixson and his staff; and the personnel at the Southern Cancer Center in Malbas, AL in particularDr. Theresa Liu-Dumlao and her staff; as well as the personnel at the S. B. Jones Regional Cancer Center in Boone, NC and in particular Dr. Anna L. Sobol and her staff for their compassionate physical and emotional support during Barbara's battle with cancer.

A private memorial service may be held at a later date. In lieu of flowers, the family suggests that donations in memory of Barbara be made to HMR ALSITE Scholarships Inc / Richard Caudle, Treasurer / 3644 Vann Rd - Suite 100 / Birmingham, AL 35235.

2013 GRITS Annual Meeting "N'awlins Style"

Jeff Stephenson, ALSITE Secretary/Treasurer

The 2013 GRITS Annual Meeting was held in New Orleans, LA on September 15-18. GRITS, which stands for Gulf Region Intelligent Transportation Society, was founded in 2009 as a chapter of the Intelligent Transportation Society of America (ITS America). Members consist of industry leaders and ITS advocates from Mississippi, Louisiana and Alabama that are committed to partnerships, education, and advancement of transportation throughout the region.

The meeting was attended by over 200 people, and included over 50 industry exhibitors. Alabama was well represented in the crowd, with attendees from ALDOT, universities, distributors, and consultants. The meeting featured many distinguished speakers, including an inspiring presentation from LT. General Russel L. Honoré, US Army (Ret), who many of you may know as the "Category 5 General" who led Task Force Katrina in the hurricane's aftermath.

Our own Chris Hilyer, Assistant Maintenance Engineer at ALDOT Sixth Division and one of the leaders of ITS advancement in the state, was the recipient of the 2013 "True GRIT" Award, which recognizes individuals and organizations for significant contributions made to the advancement of ITS in the gulf region. We are very proud of Chris for being selected as the winner of this well-deserved award.

One of my favorite parts of the GRITS Annual Meeting is the "State of the State" Technical Session, which consists of three presentations - one from each GRITS member state - providing an update on current and future ITS deployments in the state. It is always interesting to see what the other region states are currently doing and plan to do in the future with ITS applications.

GRITS was very generous in allowing Alabama Section ITE and Deep South ITE to exhibit in one of the booths in the exhibitor hall. There are several members of GRITS that are also members of ITE, and in recognizing that, we have started working closely with GRITS to cross-promote our organizations and their events and initiatives. Jeff Smith with Temple was the winner of a Google Nexus 7 that was raffled from a business card drawing at the ALSITE/DSITE booth.

To kickoff "GRITS U", a charge of the Academic Outreach Committee of GRITS, meeting attendees were encouraged to show school spirit on the final day of the conference by wearing their school colors. No doubt - there was plenty of purple and gold - but the "burnt orange and navy blue" and "crimson and white" held their own.

The 2014 GRITS Annual Meeting will be held on September 14-17, 2014 in Mobile, AL. The meeting will be a joint meeting with GRITS, ITS Florida, and ITS Georgia, and promises to be an event filled with opportunities to learn about ITS, network with others in the ITS industry, and have fun! For more information on the meeting, visit its3csummit.com

For more information about GRITS, visit gulfregionits.org.

Traffic Data, LLC.

Twenty five years ago, Darrell Vines opened a small business, Traffic Data, LLC, to provide quality and timely traffic data collection for traffic engineer's needs throughout the southeast. Though the company has grown over the last two and a half decades, they still strive to provide fast and reliable information to engineers, consultants and developers.

Darrell began the company as a side job (he owned a sporting goods store in Birmingham at the time). As the need for data collection services grew, so did Traffic Data. Eventually he closed the sporting goods store and data collection became his main focus. Today a work force of over 12 employees travels throughout the southeast as far west as Houston , TX - as far north as Erie, PA - and as far south as Miami, FL.

Traffic Data is located in the Birmingham suburb of Vestavia Hills, AL. Darrell has a reliable and experienced group of folks ready to travel and work for you!

Traffic Data, LLC

Founded: 1989
Owner: Darrell Vines
Employees: 12
Services: traffic counts, speed studies, parking lot surveys, classification counts, pedestrian surveys, game day traffic
Competitive pricing
Timely service
Twenty five years of experience

205-824-0125: office

205-824-0725 fax

205-960-5417 cell

[email protected]

www.trafficdatallc.com

Traffic Data, LLC is featured in this edition of ALSITE NEWS as a result of the most money raised by items they donated toward the Annual Scholarship Auction. Thanks to all of those that participated in the Annual Scholarship Auction.

2013 ALSITE NEWS Sponsors

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If you would like to become an ALSITE NEWS sponsor, please contact Clark Bailey by email, at [email protected], or by phone at 205.655.8855.

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