Cities Need Accurate Bicycle Data.
We Make It Automatic.
How Smart Sensor Solutions helps municipal transportation departments meet quarterly ATR count requirements — on time, on budget, and audit-ready.
Every quarter, city transportation departments across North America face the same challenge: counting cyclists at dozens — sometimes nearly a hundred — locations, processing the data accurately, and delivering clean reports before the deadline.
Programs like the City of Boston’s Quarterly Bicycle Counts Program are a model for evidence-based urban planning. By continuously tracking bicycle and vehicle volumes at fixed locations across the city, planners can see what’s working, where infrastructure is needed, and how mobility patterns are shifting over time. The data doesn’t just inform decisions — it justifies investments worth millions of dollars in cycling infrastructure.
But running that program is operationally complex. It requires deploying equipment across 88+ count locations in a single quarter, coordinating around weather and road closures, processing 72-hour video datasets, classifying users by type, and delivering everything in both PDF and Excel within 14 days of collection. And it all has to be consistent with previous years’ methodology, because this is longitudinal data — comparability is everything.
Municipal bicycle counting programs require Automatic Traffic Recorder (ATR) systems capable of capturing volume data by road user classification — bicycles, scooters, motorcycles, cars, buses, and heavy trucks — across consecutive weekday periods, with machine-learning-assisted analysis and delivery within 14 days of collection.
This is exactly the problem that Smart Sensor Solutions’ PeCo automated counting system was built to solve.
The Real Operational Challenges Cities Face
Before understanding the solution, it’s worth naming the specific pain points that make quarterly bicycle counting programs difficult to run — and why traditional manual approaches fall short at scale.
Scale & Simultaneous Deployment
Fall counts can require over 110 cameras deployed simultaneously across a city. Coordinating logistics for this without a purpose-built system is expensive and error-prone.
Weather & Backup Scheduling
Target dates can be disrupted by rain, construction, or road closures. Programs require pre-agreed backup dates and rapid redeployment without losing the counting window.
Classification Accuracy
Data must distinguish between 7+ road user types — including non-motorized mobility devices and multi-axle trucks. Manual classification is slow and inconsistent.
Power at Remote Locations
Many count sites are on trails, greenways, or streets without access to grid power or reliable connectivity. Standard equipment simply won’t work.
14-Day Delivery Window
With 72 hours of raw video per location and dozens of sites, processing and delivering formatted reports in under two weeks requires serious automation infrastructure.
Longitudinal Consistency
Year-over-year comparability is essential. Methodology, classification definitions, and format must remain consistent across every quarterly cycle.
How Smart Sensor Solutions Addresses Each Challenge
Our PeCo Smart Counting system was designed from the ground up for the demands of outdoor, multi-site, government-grade data collection programs. Here’s how it maps to the requirements city programs specify.
Rapid Multi-Site Deployment
Our field-proven equipment is designed for fast, standardized installation. Whether a location needs one camera or two, our deployment process is consistent and repeatable — critical when placing equipment at 88 sites across a city in the same week. Each unit arrives pre-configured for the target location, reducing installation time and human error.
Machine Learning-Powered Classification
Municipal ATR contracts now specifically require machine learning as the primary method for video analysis. Our AI classifies road users into 7 categories — bicycles, e-scooters/mopeds, motorcycles, cars and light goods vehicles, buses, single-unit heavy trucks, and multi-unit heavy trucks — with high accuracy and consistency. Classification that would take trained analysts weeks is processed in hours.
Automated Reports in Required Formats
Our platform outputs summary tables collated by date, direction of travel, and AM/PM designation, with 15-minute interval counts for every road user class. Reports are delivered in both PDF and Microsoft Excel formats with peak-period analysis and percentage-of-total breakdowns — exactly matching what city transportation departments specify.
72-Hour Collection, 48-Hour Analysis Selection
Our systems run continuously from midnight to midnight across the three-day counting window. We support the city’s standard approach of selecting the optimal 48-hour period for analysis — factoring in weather events, anomalous traffic conditions, or equipment issues that may have affected specific days.
Built-In QA/QC & Error Disclosure
Our platform flags potential data quality issues — camera obstructions, equipment anomalies, unusual count patterns — and our team conducts a structured quality control review before any deliverable reaches the client. If equipment experiences a mechanical failure or placement issue, we notify the city immediately and coordinate redeployment on backup dates.
“The ability to have continuous volume data helps inform future planning decisions.”
— City of Boston Transportation Department
No Power? No Problem.
Many of the most important bicycle count locations — greenways, trail crossings, waterfront paths — have no access to grid electricity. Our solar-powered ATR deployment option eliminates this constraint entirely.
Each unit is a self-contained counting station: solar panels, battery backup, camera, connectivity module, and data logger — all mounted on a single pole. It runs continuously through 72-hour count windows with no external power or cabling required.
Does Your Vendor Check Every Box?
Municipal ATR programs evaluate vendors against strict minimum criteria. Here’s how Smart Sensor Solutions aligns with the requirements city transportation departments
- 5+ years of experience in traffic and bicycle count data collection for government programs
- Machine learning capability as the primary method for video-based road user classification
- Annual equipment calibration & certification with documentation available upon request
- Multi-camera location support for intersections and wide corridors requiring two units
- 14-day data delivery in both PDF and Microsoft Excel with city-specified naming conventions
- QA/QC review process before any data is submitted to the city
- Solar-powered off-grid deployment for trail and greenway locations without grid access
- Redeployment protocols for weather disruptions and equipment anomalies on backup dates
Why Continuous Data Is a City Planning Superpower
It’s tempting to think of bicycle counting as an administrative task — a compliance checkbox. But the cities that take their counting programs seriously understand what this data actually enables.
Longitudinal bicycle count data is the evidence base for infrastructure investment decisions. When a city installs a protected bike lane and ridership on that corridor increases 40% in the following two years, the quarterly count program is what proves it. When a neighbourhood advocates for safer cycling infrastructure, count data is what tells planners whether the demand is there to justify it.
The City of Boston’s program tracks 89 fixed locations across every neighbourhood — from Beacon Street to Dorchester Avenue to the Southwest Corridor Bicycle Path. Over time, this builds a picture of how cycling patterns respond to infrastructure changes, weather, transit disruptions, and demographic shifts. No other data source captures this with the same consistency and resolution.
Every quarterly dataset you collect is a building block in a long-term record that will inform cycling infrastructure decisions for decades. The vendor you choose today is shaping the quality of that record. Invest in accuracy — the planning decisions downstream depend on it.
Ready to Automate Your City’s Bicycle Counting Program?
Whether you’re preparing a bid response, scoping a new counting program, or looking to upgrade your current ATR methodology — we’re ready to talk.
