WASHINGTON, May 18, 2006 /PRNewswire/ -- The Intelligent Transportation Society (ITS) of America awarded Raytheon Company top honors for its role in developing Minnesota's first toll road project.

The award for "Partnership Deployment" was presented to the Minnesota Department of Transportation, Wilbur Smith Associates and Raytheon for MnPASS during the opening session of ITS America's 2006 Annual Meeting & Exposition May 7 in Philadelphia.

MnPASS is a project that converted an 11-mile stretch of I-394 west of downtown Minneapolis from high occupancy vehicle lanes into pay-per-use, high occupancy toll (HOT) lanes. Hot lanes allow solo drivers to use an express lane previously reserved for carpools, buses, and motorcycles for a fee. The fee varies dynamically to keep traffic flowing and is displayed and charged electronically. Carpools, buses, and motorcycles continue to use the express lanes free of charge.

"The Best of the ITS Awards program was established to honor the most innovative, effective, and influential projects among the members of ITS America," said Neil Schuster, ITS America president and CEO. "This year's winners represent the best of the best in the ITS industry, and ITS America is proud to honor them at the annual meeting."

The MnPASS effort is the successful outcome of a public-private partnership between the Minnesota Department of Transportation and a contractor team led by Wilbur Smith Associates, with Raytheon serving as a major subcontractor.

Raytheon provided overall system design and engineering to MnPASS. The tailored solution included supplying roadside collection components and enforcement technology based on Raytheon's proven Electronic Toll Collection system. Raytheon's solution allowed the state of Minnesota to minimize the amount of infrastructure deployed on the roadway and lower the overall cost of the system. The Raytheon solution also allows for the lanes to be painted with stripes rather than erecting concrete dividers.

"Raytheon has more experience in all-electronic open road tolling than any other provider because of our ability to respond to our customer's needs," said Mike Prout, president of Raytheon's Highway Traffic Management Systems. "We have developed an expertise in integrating commercial off-the-shelf products, but we are not constrained by it. Here, our customer needed a special enforcement tool that would save them both time and money, so we created it. I'm glad our contributions could serve our customer well and earn them some recognition in the process."

Raytheon Company (NYSE: RTN), with 2005 sales of $21.9 billion, is an industry leader in defense and government electronics, space, information technology, technical services, and business and special mission aircraft. With headquarters in Waltham, Mass., Raytheon employs 80,000 people worldwide.

  Contact:
  Lynford Morton
  703.284.4446

SOURCE: Raytheon Company

CONTACT: Lynford Morton of Raytheon Company, +1-703-284-4446

Web site: http://www.raytheon.com/