Hourly Vehicle Traffic Data Associated with Industrial Activity on the North Slope of Alaska During Summers 2019–2020

This dataset contains hourly vehicle traffic counts in the Kuparuk and Milne Point oil fields on the North Slope of Alaska during summers 2019 and 2020. The oil field roads were generally closed to the public during the study period, so traffic was primarily associated with industrial activities. Data were collected using TRAFx vehicle traffic counters (TRAFx Research Ltd, Canmore, Alberta, Canada) that were placed at random locations throughout the Kuparuk and Milne Point road systems representing varying traffic conditions. We deployed 25 counters from 12–13 June to 11 August in 2019, and 24 counters from 8–9 June to 19 August in 2020. The locations of the counters were changed between 2019 and 2020 to increase the spatial coverage of data collection across the road system (Severson et al 2023). The counters were programmed to record the number of vehicles each hour based on changes in the nearby electro-magnetic field. We provide the hourly traffic counts, along with information about the counter settings, locations, deployment and collection dates, and additional comments.