The Traffic Operations Toolkit: Address congestion, closures, and more with real-time and historical data

Road conditions can change rapidly. A fallen tree or flooded bridge might force cars to detour onto adjacent streets. Lane closures during road work can create bumper to bumper traffic. A crash may block lanes and require immediate response.

For agencies managing many miles of roadway and moving thousands (or even tens of thousands) of vehicles hourly, keeping traffic flowing smoothly and safely can be difficult enough during typical conditions. So, disruptions – planned, unplanned, or recurring – can quickly stall traffic or create unsafe conditions for everyone on the road. And the longer it takes for Traffic Operators, Engineers, and Planners to respond to disruptions, the worse conditions may get.

That’s why Traffic Operations teams are turning to transportation data to achieve smoother closures and detours, faster incident detection and emergency response, and proactive communication.

In the past, operators have had limited visibility into their road networks. While some major thoroughfares and intersections may have permanent sensors installed that can help operators spot unusual conditions, many roadways lack these sensors, forcing operators to send staff into the field for a first-hand look at conditions or wait on complaints from road users or reports from incident responders before they’re aware of an issue.

But today, access to transportation big data enables operators to monitor what’s happening on their entire road network in real time and investigate historical traffic patterns in minutes to get ahead of future disruptions, contextualize what’s happening now, or learn from past disruptions.

In this report, we’ll explore how you can leverage the latest advancements in transportation data for:

• Daily roadway operational performance and congestion mitigation
• Construction management and lane closure/detour planning
• Special events management
• Evacuation scenarios
• Effective incident response
• Clear communication with the public (e.g., on travel times, closures, detours)

1. Address Congestions and Speeding on Key Routes

Vehicle registrations are on the rise¹ and despite a brief lull during COVID, congestion is back with a vengeance across the U.S. This makes identifying and addressing bottlenecks a persistent challenge for operators. How do you mitigate slowdowns before cars become gridlocked and stop congestion from recurring?

Meanwhile, fatal crashes reached a 16-year high in 2023, with nearly a third of them involving speeding — and the situation hasn’t improved much since.² How can operations teams address speeding before the next crash and ensure improvements remain effective?

Analyzing real-time and historical traffic data is key to answering all these questions. Solutions like StreetLight’s Traffic Monitor product can help alert you to atypical volumes and speeds happening right now across your road network and compare current conditions to historical baselines to contextualize their severity.

Because congestion and speeding may have many causes, analyzing historical traffic patterns is key to diagnosing the ‘why’ behind persistent hazards and identifying effective solutions. Here are just a few examples:

• Are commuting patterns a main cause of congestion?
  • Analyze vehicle volumes, speeds, and travel times by time of day, day of week, and direction to see if there are consistent peaks and dips.
    
• Does congestion ebb and flow during the year?
  • Compare seasonal traffic trends to understand how tourism, recreation, academic calendars, or other events may impact traffic.
    
• Could other routes help alleviate slowdowns on your most congested corridors?
  • Investigate where traffic spills over during congestion to inform effective detours and communicate them to the public.
    
• Are drivers complying with detour routes?
  • Investigate atypical volumes to understand which alternate routes drivers are actually taking and how it’s impacting congestion.
    
• Do specific destinations drive the bulk of traffic?
  • Analyze common origins and destinations to determine where transit routes or multimodal infrastructure can help reduce the number of vehicles on the road.
    
• Where are the speeding hotspots in your road network?
  • Analyze average vehicle speeds to see where driving patterns don’t align with posted speed limits and evaluate potential solutions like speed feedback signs or temporary road diets.

Data in Action: Identifying recurring bottlenecks in Downtown LA

Los Angeles, California is notorious for traffic congestion due to multiple factors, including commuters crowding freeways during rush hours and major events at venues like SoFi Stadium or the Hollywood Bowl. This creates recurring bottlenecks throughout the city that can cause driver frustration, slow down emergency response, and delay goods from reaching their destination.

Using its Traffic Monitor product, StreetLight went back in time to investigate historical vehicle speeds and quickly zero in on the most severely congested corridors. Using Wednesday, July 23, 2025 as an example of typical weekday traffic, StreetLight then used the timeline feature to see how vehicle speeds change throughout the Downtown LA road network over the course of the day.

Actionable takeaways:

• Morning slowdowns are common on key routes, but evening congestion is more severe and begins as early as 3pm.
  
• By 5pm, congestion doesn’t just impact major corridors but also spills over to local roads throughout downtown.
  
• Northbound traffic is especially congested in the evening on corridors like the Santa Ana and Santa Monica Freeways as commuters return home to the suburbs.

🎞️ Watch the full analysis here.

2. Keep Traffic Flowing During Construction and Events

Road construction and special events are among the most predictable causes of traffic disruptions — and among the most costly and frustrating, too. But by learning from past projects and monitoring current conditions, you can minimize disruptions — and the complaints that come with them.

There are many ways to use historical traffic data to prepare for upcoming construction and events:

• Need to close one or more lanes?
  • Review historical vehicle volumes by time of day and day of week to identify optimal closure windows and understand how a partial vs. full closure may impact nearby roads.
    
• Closing an entire road?
  • Choose the right detours based on historical routing patterns and capacity on alternate roadways.
    
• Want to ensure safe work zones?
  • Analyze historical vehicle speeds and queuing patterns to meet CFR requirements and determine where safety measures like barriers or variable message signs could mitigate risks.
    
• Planning traffic management for an upcoming event?
  • Review traffic patterns on past event dates and times to see if adjusting signal timings near venues or deploying resources like signage or traffic controllers could help.
    
• Looking to streamline future event planning and operations?
  • Evaluate traffic management outcomes on previous event dates to identify effective strategies and create repeatable event traffic management playbooks.

Real-time data can also help you ensure safe, flowing traffic during construction and events, and highlight opportunities to quickly deploy congestion mitigation or safety interventions:

• Queues forming ahead of work zones?
  • Measure queue lengths to meet federal regulations for work zone performance³ and determine where queue warning signage or other end-of-queue crash prevention measures may be needed.
    
• Event egress causing gridlock?
  • Identify and communicate where the bottlenecks are to improve travel experiences and see where adjusting signal timings or deploying traffic controllers could help.
    
• Travel times increasing considerably during ongoing road work?
  • See how current travel times compare to recent fluctuations to determine whether you need to adjust road work windows, implement congestion mitigation measures, or notify the public.
    
• Road work having minimal impacts on traffic flow?
  • Review fluctuations over the course of the day and week to see if road work windows could be safely expanded to complete the project faster.

Data in Action: Improving football fan experiences at Northwest Stadium

Northwest Stadium, the 70k-seat home of the Washington Commanders, has a congestion problem. The 2024 NFL Voice of the Fan survey reported that game day experiences at the stadium were among the lowest rated in the league, with only 15% of attendees finding it easy to arrive and depart from the stadium.

To shed light on where, when, and why game day congestion occurs, StreetLight used its Traffic Monitor product to compare two game days where road conditions differed:

Traffic patterns shift during a blowout vs. close game

December 1, 2024 – Sure Win

As the game’s end neared, it was clear the Commanders would defeat the Titans. Some fans left the stadium early, resulting in fewer vehicles exiting at once and less congestion on I-95.

• DELAYS: Up to 30 minutes
• QUEUING: Up to 48% of the route queued

December 22, 2024 – Close Game

Commanders pull off a win against the Eagles on the final play of the game. Many fans stayed in their seats until these final exciting moments, resulting in a surge of exiting vehicles on I-95 and a huge peak in travel time.

• DELAYS: Up to 52 minutes
• QUEUING: Up to 76% of the route queued

These insights can help operators prepare for a variety of scenarios and evaluate potential improvements.

Additionally, operators can monitor real-time conditions on these key routes on game days to spot whether temporary interventions are needed and communicate current travel times and incidents with the public.

🎞️ See what else you can do with the Queuing feature in this video.

Get more data-driven event management strategies in our Traffic Intelligence for Mega-Events eBook

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Data in Action: Minimizing construction impacts in Des Moines, Iowa

To resolve operational issues at the I-35/80 interchange in Des Moines, Iowa DOT needed to add lanes, install a new interchange, and widen multiple ramps. But this project area sees the highest traffic volumes in the state alongside high incident rates, and overlapped with other construction projects happening during the same time frame.

To minimize disruptions, Iowa DOT used StreetLight’s Traffic Monitor during construction to answer questions like:

• When are vehicle volumes low enough to accommodate lane closures?
• Can the local street network handle additional traffic during closures?
• Are people avoiding this section of the interstate?
• What other routes are people taking? Are detours working?
• Which ramps are being used while ramp closures are in place?
• How do work zone crashes impact the transportation system?

Traffic Monitor’s real-time insights enabled Iowa operators to plan effective lane closures and detours and share up-to-date information on delays, volumes, and speeds with first responders, city officials, and businesses that are impacted by the project.

See how Virginia measures the impact of seasonal tourism

Download Case Study

3. Respond Faster to Unplanned Disruptions

To detect and address incidents like crashes, objects in the road, broken traffic lights, inclement weather, and more, agencies typically either need sensors installed wherever the incident occurs or staff in the field to report on conditions. But neither sensors nor staff can be present on all roadways at
all times due to high installation costs, dangers to staff, weather conditions, and other limitations. That
means incident detection and response is often subject to inevitable delays, further compounding congestion and safety.

But today, real-time transportation data can help fill these coverage gaps, enabling operators to detect incidents just moments after they occur and rapidly deploy the necessary resources to address them. Likewise, with information in their hands more quickly, officials can communicate clearly with
the public in a timely manner, updating drivers on travel time delays, temporary closures and detours, and more.

Plus, by comparing real-time conditions to historical baselines, operators can quickly contextualize the severity of an incident. But even with this wealth of data, keeping an eye on what’s happening across your entire road network at all times would be a colossal task. How do you quickly sift through current
conditions on your roads and zero in on issues that may need your attention?

Tools like the Real-Time Incident Feed in StreetLight’s Traffic Monitor product can help alert operators to atypical conditions, their severity, and potential causes. Traffic Monitor’s Real-Time Incident Feed displays up-to-date information on:

• Full and partial road closures
• Ongoing road works
• Crashes

This helps shed light on not only where atypical traffic patterns are occurring but why and how severe their impacts are so you can prioritize effective solutions where they’re needed.

Data in Action: Improving Future Evacuations with Data from Hurricane Ian

Extreme weather can be volatile, with forecasts shifting quickly. When Hurricane Ian changed course 24 hours before its expected landfall in September 2022, its unpredictable trajectory complicated traffic management efforts for Florida officials.

StreetLight investigated what happened on evacuation routes 48, 24, and 8 hours before the storm’s landfall to understand where travel demand surged and what operators can learn for future evacuation scenarios.

Our Traffic Monitor analysis revealed that:

• 48 hours before landfall, traffic conditions were relatively normal, with no peaks observed in vehicle volumes in either city.
• 24 hours before landfall, a surge in vehicle volumes hits key routes out of Fort Myers, especially Palm Beach Blvd, where volumes are 2-3x higher than usual. Around the same time, vehicle volumes are also 2-3x higher than normal on routes entering Fort Lauderdale.
• 8 hours before landfall, vehicle volumes drop off dramatically, indicating evacuation procedures had completely stopped by this time.

Before the next evacuation scenario, planners can use historical insights like these to understand:

• Did people comply with evacuation instructions? Why or why not?
• What routes did evacuees use? Were they the ones they were supposed to use?
• When did people start and stop evacuating?
• When did vehicle volumes peak, and how long were the traffic delays?
• What best practices can I take away from these outcomes to inform future scenario planning?

During an evacuation, operators can also use real-time data to monitor how evacuations are going and coordinate rapid response to keep people safe:

• When should the evacuation process begin to get everyone out safely?
• Are people complying with evacuation orders and routing instructions?
• Are there any crashes or other incidents stalling traffic on key routes?
• Where should resources be deployed to support more efficient evacuations?
• What do I need to communicate to the public during this critical time frame?

🎞️ Watch the full analysis here.

Data in Action: Understanding the ripple effects of a holiday crash in Colorado

On July 3rd, 2025, a fatal crash closed I-70 just as a surge of visitors was traveling to the Colorado Rocky Mountains for the Fourth of July weekend. As responders worked to address the situation and evacuate stuck vehicles from the roadway, the traffic impacts were being felt throughout the nearby road network and would linger long after the incident.

Real-time data can help operators limit the duration and severity of closures during similar incidents and understand their ripple effects across the road network to inform temporary detours and other traffic control measures.

StreetLight used its Traffic Monitor product to understand what happened before, during, and after the crash, which occurred around 1 p.m.:

• That morning, traffic volumes were higher than typical as holiday travelers hit the road.
• After the crash, traffic came to a standstill for miles behind the crash location.
• Ramps leading up to the crash were clogged as vehicles attempted to escape the traffic jam.
• To avoid the impacted section of I-70, travelers rerouted onto US Hwy 6 and US-40, clogging these highways as well.
• Even after lanes on I-70 were fully reopened, the build-up of previously stranded vehicles and drivers reentering the interstate combined to create major congestion issues lasting for 4 more hours.

These ripple effects would be difficult to spot without real-time data on the entire road network. While major roadways like I-70 may have sensors installed, smaller detour routes often do not, making it difficult to understand and address impacts on these roadways.

Understanding the full scope of an incident’s impact on the road network can help officials minimize future dangers and disruptions by:

• Identifying where additional resources may be needed
• Establishing the best detour routes
• Communicating proactively with the public