After months of intensive design, building, and testing, the three Vehicle-to-Everything (V2X) Accelerator sites in Arizona, Texas, and Utah have reached a defining moment. To unlock funding for the next phase of the $60-million federal program, they must demonstrate to USDOT that their life-saving technology is ready for prime time.

The critical moment is called an Operational Readiness Demonstration (ORD), where each site must demonstrate that its V2X system performs safely, securely, and as designed. The Texas A&M Transportation Institute and Utah Department of Transportation conducted their ORDs on July 14 and August 11-12, respectively, while the Maricopa County Department of Transportation's ORD is planned for later this year.

Both ORDs showcased emergency-vehicle preemption, red-light violation warnings, and vulnerable-road-user safety. The Texas demonstration also featured curve-speed warnings and right-turn-on-red alerts, while Utah demonstrated transit signal priority and Traveler Information Messages. OEM vehicle participation showed that V2X infrastructure can communicate with OEM-integrated vehicles as well as aftermarket onboard units.

During the Texas demonstration, severe weather provided an unscripted stress test. The V2X system continued communicating real-time signal status, warning of potential red-light violations, and detecting vulnerable road users in low visibility conditions.

When completed, all three sites' ORD reports and other relevant documents will be posted here.

The ITS Professional Capacity Building Program, in collaboration with the National Operations Center of Excellence and Institute of Transportation Engineers, held the Finals of the 2026 Transportation Technology Tournament at the ITE Annual Meeting and Exhibition in Detroit, Michigan. Four student teams from Iowa State University, the University of Texas at Arlington, and South Carolina State University presented concepts applying ITS and transportation systems management and operations to safety challenges.

The Iowa State University team won for a connected-vehicle-based queue-warning concept that fuses real-time vehicle and sensor data to detect queue formation and warn approaching drivers, reducing secondary crashes on high-speed rural interstate highways.

The Heart of Iowa Regional Transit Agency Health Connector successfully completed the 24-month Operate and Evaluate Phase under the ITS JPO ITS4US Deployment Program on August 17. The Health Connector team is bringing intelligent transportation solutions to rural Iowans who need reliable access to healthcare.

The HIRTA team has made the middleware software code developed under the Health Connector project available through the ITS JPO CodeHub open-source software repository.

The ITS JPO AI Program highlighted several products and resources at the Rhode Island DOT AI Symposium and Peer Exchange, Intelligent Mobility: Artificial Intelligence Meets Real Transportation, on August 19 and 20, 2026. Sessions covered AI rapid prototypes for predictive incident-management analytics, AI governance and trustworthiness, Small Business Innovation Research results, organizational assessments, and the USDOT AI in Transportation Capability Maturity Model.

The official Cooperative Driving Automation Small-Scale Industry Prototype Broad Agency Announcement has posted on SAM.gov. Up to $5 million across all awardees and phases is available to support prototype development, testing, and deployment using connectivity and automation in an automotive OEM-supplied vehicle in partnership with a state or local agency. Proposals are due September 28, 2026.

The Intersection Safety Systems Prototyping BAA closed on July 20, 2026 and received many proposals. Up to $17 million across all awardees and phases is available to support prototype development, testing, and deployment under real-world conditions. Proposals are currently under review.

The program will accelerate development of full end-to-end prototype systems and components, including sensor fusion, AI-based decision-making, and conflict mitigation.

As artificial intelligence becomes increasingly central to transportation, multimodal public-sector agencies face unique and rapidly evolving challenges in technology acquisition. Attend the AI Procurement National Webinar on September 17, 2026, from 1 to 4 PM ET to build a common understanding of AI procurement issues, practices, and approaches. The event is open to public-sector leadership, management, and technical specialists across multimodal agencies.