Electronic ticketing emerged from FHWA's Every Day Counts initiative to address critical workforce challenges documented in NCHRP Synthesis 450: between 2000 and 2010, state highway agencies experienced a 4.1% increase in lane miles managed while full-time staff decreased 9.68%. E-ticketing automated material delivery documentation, improving both safety and efficiency.

NCHRP Synthesis 545 (2019) documented early implementations. Research from Iowa State University, University of Kentucky, and University of Texas Arlington validated inspector time savings of 30-90 minutes per day on high-volume projects. By 2025, e-ticketing reached maturity with 43 states using the technology, documenting $30 million in annual inspector time savings across 4,313 active projects.

E-ticketing became the most successful EDC initiative, establishing robust contractor-to-DOT data pipelines for material delivery information. This success created the foundation for extending digital data exchange to construction equipment.

Without unified requirements development, we face fragmentation: construction teams discovering capabilities without implementation guidance, 40+ states making different requests to equipment manufacturers (resulting in no manufacturer response), disconnection from BIM and WZDx standards efforts, and duplicate specification development across states.

This pooled fund establishes the coordination mechanism to ensure states speak with one voice to equipment manufacturers while maximizing operational benefits of infrastructure already deployed for safety.

The pooled fund serves as the national coordination mechanism for connected construction equipment data, ensuring states maximize current capabilities while building toward future innovations. This will involve:

·         Aggregating and presenting unified requirements to equipment OEMs rather than fragmented state-by-state requests

·         Synthesizing emerging use cases as construction, materials, maintenance, and planning divisions discover applications for equipment data

·         Transferring knowledge across states through shared implementation guides, contract language, and specification approaches

·         Aligning equipment data standards with BIM for Infrastructure, WZDx, and other federal initiatives that would greatly benefit from robust modern contractor-to-DOT data pipelines

·         Supporting other digital initiatives that need the data exchange architecture ADCMS has established

Note: This pooled fund would seek coordination with TPF-5(480) "BIM for Infrastructure" and TPF-5(523) "BIM for Bridges and Structures." The BIM pooled funds focus on integrating data across planning, design, construction, and asset management lifecycle phases. This Connected Construction Data Alliance focuses specifically on establishing robust contractor-to-DOT data flows during construction that can feed BIM and other lifecycle systems. Rather than fragmenting construction data efforts, this pooled fund would seek alignment with BIM for Infrastructure on broader data exchange requirements.

Activities that advance coordinated requirements for connected construction equipment data will be prioritized and carried out by pooled fund participants. Meetings will serve as a forum to facilitate knowledge sharing and unified OEM engagement. Proposed activities include:

·         Develop consolidated OEM requirement packages. Survey participating states on emerging operational needs beyond safety. Document use cases from early adopting States. Present unified requirements to equipment manufacturers and telematics providers rather than fragmented individual state requests.

·         Establish equipment data exchange guidelines. Develop standard data guidelines building on AEMP 2.0 and related OEM efforts. Create information delivery specifications for contractor-to-DOT interchange and guidance from DOT usage across equipment utilization, material placement, production tracking, and quality assurance workflows. Ensure compatibility with BIM for Infrastructure and other lifecycle data systems.

·         Identify and execute capacity-building activities. Create implementation guides for states at different maturity levels. Develop contract language and specification templates. Document ROI from operational implementations to support business cases.

·         Enhance knowledge transfer and collaboration. Share successful use case implementations across construction, materials, maintenance, and planning divisions. Establish forums for practitioners to understand available data capabilities and applications. Transfer lessons learned to other initiatives requiring contractor-to-DOT data pipelines.

·         Deploy coordinated OEM engagement strategy. Conduct annual summits with major equipment manufacturers. Present consolidated state requirements and negotiate implementation requests. Coordinate with AEMP and other industry standards bodies to align requirements with existing standards development efforts.

·         Lessons learned. Identify challenges in current operational implementations and share solutions to help states move from safety-only to comprehensive operational usage.

·         Research priorities. Identify short-term and long-term needs for equipment data enhancements. Prioritize requirements that serve multiple state use cases and align with national initiatives like autonomous vehicle infrastructure preparation.

The Connected Construction Data Alliance is proposed as a five-year effort led by the Delaware Department of Transportation, with Cassidy Blowers serving as the lead agency contact. The recommended annual contribution is $20,000 per participating state. The target annual budget of $250,000 will support coordination activities, OEM engagement, academic research to identify and validate new use cases for connected equipment data, development of implementation guides and specification templates, and knowledge transfer across participating states. Iowa State University remains under contract through 2026 under the existing ADCMS program, providing continuity in research capabilities and ensuring the Alliance launches with established momentum. Contributions will be funded through State Planning and Research (SP&R) funds, with a waiver of the non-Federal funding match requested.