The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) voted unanimously today to reallocate more than half of the 5.9GHz spectrum band—known as the “safety spectrum”—to unlicensed uses including WiFi.

The new rules adopted today make the lower 45 megahertz of the spectrum available for unlicensed uses. They require Intelligent Transportation System (ITS) licensees to stop using this portion of the spectrum within a year.

ATSSA President & CEO Stacy Tetschner called the action "a major blow to the roadway safety community and public safety in general."

Think you’ve got the goods to wow the judges at the New Products Rollout? Here’s your chance.

Applications are now open for members wanting to enter their innovations in the New Products Rollout at the 51^st Annual Convention & Traffic Expo. Products released after Jan. 1, 2020 to qualify. All new innovations will be accepted for the New Product Listing, but only 12 will be accepted for presentation to a panel of judges. The top three products will earn an Innovation Award that will be announced during the Convention, which will be held virtually in Feb 8-12 and 16-18.

“The New Products Rollout offers members the opportunity to get their creative ideas to roadway safety issues in front of thousands of people who take part in ATSSA’s Convention & Traffic Expo,” said ATSSA Director of Innovation & Technical Services Eric Perry. “The exposure provided by this event is unparalleled.”

ATSSA and the Automotive Safety Council (ASC) this week received the Collaborative Partnership of the Year Award from TU-Automotive during a virtual ceremony.

The award recognizes two or more companies that “have undertaken a meaningful, non-commercial partnership with the objective of advancing the development and/or adoption of automotive technology” for the period between Jan. 1, 2019 and Feb. 19, 2020.

ATSSA President & CEO Stacy Tetschner and ASC President Doug Campbell accepted the award on behalf of their respective associations.

The American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) notified ATSSA today of several new devices that recently received federal-aid eligibility letters from the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA). The devices, which are compliant with the Manual for Assessing Safety Hardware (MASH), are listed below. The majority on the list are offered by ATSSA member companies.

The devices are also listed online along with FHWA letters that provide information about crash tests that were conducted.

The Transportation Research Board (TRB) Roadside Safety Design Committee and the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) Technical Committee on Roadside Safety met Monday with a focus on implementation and updates for the Manual for Assessing Safety Hardware (MASH).

AASHTO announced that it is working on a scoping project intended to determine the effort it needs to invest to convert MASH into a set of performance specifications, said ATSSA Vice President of Member Services Donna Clark.

Clark, Director of Innovation & Technical Services Eric Perry, and Training Program Manager Jessica Scheyder took part in TRB’s virtual summer conference, which covers a broad range of topics and continues through Aug. 13.