Work Zone Data Working Group Charter

Latest updates as of 02-22-2022
Note: New changes are in bold.

PURPOSE

The Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC) Transportation Subcommittee (TSC) Work Zone Data Working Group (WZDWG) extends the United States Road Specification (USRS) to accommodate work zones. The WZDWG defines explicit, comprehensive, and consistent definitions of the features, attributes, and vocabulary needed to model work zone activity data.

AUTHORITIES

The WZDWG is chartered under the Transportation Subcommittee. The Transportation Subcommittee is chartered under the FGDC Steering Committee and supported by the FGDC Secretariat which is granted authority through the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Circular A-16, Executive Order 12906, E-Gov Act of 2002, and Geospatial Data Act of 2018. In addition, other OMB guidance or policies may apply, including Circulars A-11, A-119, or A- 130, the Digital Government Strategy, the Open Data Policy, the Evidence Act, and the Federal Data Strategy, as appropriate.

SCOPE

The WZDWG is accountable to and provides recommendations to the FGDC Transportation Subcommittee, which provides leadership and direction in the use and development of transportation geospatial data and information across federal geospatial programs and in conjunction with public and private sector partners/stakeholders. The scope of the WZDWG is to incorporate information on work zone activity in planning, real-time, and historical operational contexts. This effort builds on the operational data framework established through the United States Department of Transportation’s Work Zone Data Initiative (WZDI), and further advanced through the functional open-data sharing platform facilitated by the Work Zone Data Exchange (WZDx). The WZDWG will establish an independent, sustainable Work Zone Data governance organization that will eventually lead the work of maintaining the work zone data standard, soliciting representative involvement from the broad spectrum of work zone data stakeholders.

OBJECTIVES

The Work Zone Data Working Group shall:

1. Facilitate, promote, and develop a Work Zone Data Specification.
2. Ensure the Work Zone Data Specification is scalable and accommodates multiple missions by employing object-oriented development strategies.
3. Identify and promote best practices for creating, publishing, consuming, mapping, and analyzing work zone activity data and the Work Zone Data Specification.
4. Model the Work Zone Data Specification on the Road Event Extension of the United States Road Specification.
5. Employ an agile development strategy, and observe market influences, to ensure relevant content.
6. Use open development methods to foster community involvement and support.
7. Engage a diverse membership from all levels of government and industry.
8. Consider available resources and existing standards.
9. Establish vendor and application-independent standards.
10. Develop simple and easily adopted (accessible) standards.
11. Encourage, facilitate, promote, and establish an independent and sustainable Work Zone Data governance organization.

ACTIVITIES

Work Zone Data Working Group activities support the objectives presented above by:

1. Electing chair(s) to help lead the WZDWG.
2. Establishing WZDWG standard operating procedures.
3. Investigating an approach to establishing an independent Work Zone Data governance organization
   • Aspiring to have the specification managed by the deployment community in the long-term;
   • Identifying appropriate ITS Standards Development Organizations (SDOs) – including the possibility of a coalition of several SDOs – to take ownership of the WZDWG in the future;
   • Authoring a strategic plan for establishing a Work Zone Data governance organization;
   • Authoring an implementation plan for establishing a Work Zone Data governance organization.
4. Defining the features and attributes needed to model work zone events.
5. Defining an explicit, comprehensive, and consistent vocabulary related to work zone activity data.
6. Managing the FGDC standards adoption process.
7. Publishing the Work Zone Data Specification.
8. Frequently reviewing and updating the Work Zone Data Specification and related business rules to keep it relevant and useful.
   
9. Defining and tracking metrics associated with adoption and development, as well as setting goals when appropriate.

MEMBERSHIP

The WZDWG is open to federal, state, local, tribal, academic, and private agencies, organizations, and institutions. Members are expected to be active in the development and application of policies related to the creation, publication, consumption, mapping, and analysis of work zone activity data within their community. Each member organization should designate one representative as their primary point of contact and inform the WZDWG Chair.

CHAIR (AND CO-CHAIRS)

The WZDWG Chair shall be from a federal agency while co-chairs may be from state, local, tribal, academic, and/or private agencies, organizations, and institutions active in the development and application of policies related to the creation, publication, consumption, mapping, and analysis of road event information within their community.

SUBGROUPS

The WZDWG Chair and Co-chairs may establish subgroups to accomplish the objectives outlined in the planned activities, as needed.

PROCEDURES

1. Meetings of the WZDWG shall be held through an announcement by the WZDWG Chair and conducted at least semi-annually.
2. Meetings may be held virtually or in-person.
3. Agenda items will be coordinated with other WZDWG members and will be available at least several days in advance of proposed meeting dates.
4. This charter shall be reviewed and updated, as needed, on a regular basis.
5. For activities such as the adoption of new changes to the specification, decisions shall be based on a supermajority (greater than 75% of members in agreement) with a minimum voting requirement of representation from 4 data producers and 4 data users.
6. WZDWG Chair and Co-chairs may approve minor changes (e.g., grammatical updates) to the specification and periodically implement these minor updates to the specification on GitHub without the requirement of member voting and approval.
7. Editing rights to the WZDWG GitHub repository will be granted to appropriate co-chairs at the beginning of each specification update cycle.
8. Issues needing to be resolved will be referred promptly to the Transportation Subcommittee Chair for schedule and resolution.
9. The WZDWG co-chairs are responsible for overseeing subgroup activities and retain the right to veto changes to the subgroup charters.
10. The WZDWG may establish additional rules and procedures for conducting WZDWG-related business.

COORDINATION RESPONSIBILITIES

The WZDWG will employ the tools and mediums best suited to meet its responsibilities such as online webinars, teleconferences, national user forums, annual research initiatives, and cooperative venues, pursuant to the availability of resources. The WZDWG Chair or Co-chairs will coordinate working group activities with other working groups and subcommittees, FGDC coordination groups, and other appropriate parties that are relevant to accomplishing key activities and effectively growing the geospatial community.

REPORTS

The WZDWG shall develop an annual summary of accomplishments and planned activities, presenting this summary to the Transportation Subcommittee Chair for acceptance. The Transportation Subcommittee Chair may request the WZDWG to prepare special reports, white papers, technical papers, briefings and the like to address pertinent issues, cross-cutting activities, and/or urgent matters consistent with larger FGDC community needs. These requests may come from the FGDC Office of the Secretariat, FGDC Coordination Group, or FGDC member agencies. The WZDWG, through its Chair or Co-chairs, will submit content for the FGDC Annual Report each year, as requested by the FGDC Secretariat. The WZDWG will maintain information about its activities on the GeoPlatform Communities web site at https://www.geoplatform.gov/resources/communities/. A reference to the WZDWG Website shall be established on fgdc.gov

APPROVALS

This Charter will remain in effect until amended or replaced or until terminated by the Transportation Subcommittee Chair, the FGDC Steering Committee, or FGDC Coordination Group. The charter will be shared with the WZDWG community for review and feedback at least once per year. This Charter will be posted on the GeoPlatform Communities web site at https://www.geoplatform.gov/resources/communities/.

Voting Members

WZDWG membership is open to the community. Members are expected to be active in the development and application of policies related to the creation, publication, consumption, mapping, and analysis of road work zone activity data within their community. Voting members must be in a position where they are publishing or consuming work zone activity data. Only one vote per each voting organization will be accepted on each of the pull requests put forth for the WZDWG to review, and in the election of co-chairs of the WZDWG or its subgroups. In addition to attending two WZDWG meetings a year, voting members may volunteer for membership in specification development-related subgroups and attend monthly touch-base meetings to monitor progress and provide updates on subgroup activities. The ideal participant from each organization is a senior leader with direct or delegated decision making authority who is intimately familiar with their organization’s work zone-related data assets, needs, and challenges. They should have a deep level of technical acumen, commensurate with the level of specific data sets used by their organization. They will ideally be in a position to drive adoption (e.g., establishing data feeds or standards) within their organization.

Non-Voting Members

WZDWG membership is open to all. However, those organizations that are not deemed voting members are categorized as observers and will receive a general invitation to the WZDWG. These organizations will not be selected as WZDWG Co-Chair(s) and will not have voting rights. However, their feedback and inputs are documented as part of WZDWG summary reports.