Highlights of the SHRP 2 Reliability and Capacity Program

Neil Pedersen

TRB

Four Focus Areas

• Safety: fielding the largest-ever naturalistic driving study to reduce crashes and save lives through understanding driver behavior

• Renewal: making rapid, innovative construction possible for “ordinary” projects

• Reliability: providing management and technical tools to reduce congestion through operations

• Capacity: systematizing collaborative decision making to achieve better, faster project decisions

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Reliability Focus Area Objective

“To provide reliable travel times by preventing and reducing non-recurring

congestion”

i.e., reduce the variability of travel time through reducing the underlying causes

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Strategic Implementation of Reliability Products

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Reliability Research Themes

• Traffic Incident Management Training

• Organizing for Reliability

• Reliability Analysis Tools

• Knowledge Transfer System

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TIM Training (L12)

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Coordinated Training for Traffic Incident Responders and Managers

PROBLEM: Traffic incidents cause nearly half of nonrecurring congestion and pose safety hazards to both motorists and responders. Restoring traffic flow sooner requires improved incident response practices. SOLUTION: Establish a continuing mechanism by which responders can acquire a common set of core competencies that enable quick and safe incident clearance.

Institutional Architectures to Improve System Operations and Management (L06)

• Report and Guidebook to help agencies organize their own processes to successfully execute operations programs that improve travel time reliability.

• Systems Operations & Management Capability Improvement Workshops (L06)

– Business Processes

– Systems/ Technology

– Performance Measurement

– Culture

– Organization/Staffing

– Partnerships

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Guide to Integrating Business Process to Improve Reliability (L01/L34)

Integrating Business Processes to Improve Reliability (L01)

• Guidebook (and e tool) for structured approach to analyzing key processes and gaps to improve reliability

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Reliability Analysis Tools (L02/L05/L07/L08)

L02: Travel Time Reliability & Mobility Monitoring Programs - Prepare guidebook and validate reliability monitoring methods L05: Incorporating Reliability Performance Measures into the Transportation Planning & Programming Processes - Ensure consideration of reliability in planning & programming activities L07: Costs and Effectiveness of Highway Design Features - Identify & evaluate costs/effectiveness of design features L08: Incorporating Non-Recurrent Congestion Factors in HCM - Develop technical relationships to enable inclusion in HCM

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L38 Pilots

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OBJECTIVE: Have local agencies test in a singly and/or integrated manner and provide feedback on five related projects concerning data collection, analysis and decision making involving planning or programming

Data Collection Analysis Decision

L02: Reliability Monitoring System

L05: Reliability in Planning and Programming

L07: Effects of Designs L08: Highway Capacity methods C11: Benefit-Cost Analysis

A Framework for Improving Travel Time Reliability Knowledge Transfer System (L17/L13A)

PRODUCTS: Comprehensive online resource known as a Knowledge Transfer System (KTS) that serves those involved in systems operations and management. The KTS includes Business Case Primer which provides tools to identify “who, what, when, and how” to communicate the business case for transportation systems operation and management most effectively. BENEFIT/VALUE: As systems management and operations becomes a more critical to organizations, this makes the latest information, techniques, and approaches readily available to practitioners and policymakers alike. STATUS: The Phase 1 KTS website with a searchable database of SHRP 2 Reliability products can be accessed at http://demo5.pbid.com/.

PHASE I KTS WEBSITE ENHANCED/MANAGED KTS STAFFED COE Glossary/FAQs

SHRP2 Reliability Products with syntheses

SHRP2 Gap Reports Identify gaps and new research topics

Events/News Calendar, Events Calendar, News and Recent publications with weekly updates

Customized document data base and search engine Expanded searchable data base Creation of new material s (tacit

knowledge)

Business case resources Enhanced marketing and outreach Active marketing/ outreach

“Current practices archive” Managed current practices interchange

Practice communities forums Managed/moderated forums by topic

Subscription-based email “push” Subscription push by topic

Social Network connections and feeds

SHRP2 Implementation pilot dialogue by project

Links to Partners (associations websites

Private sector resource page (RFPs, business cards)

ROF resource page Support of ROF management

Support of National Op Academy

Development of webinars, training

Staff support for AASHTO SSOM

L17 Evolutionary Approach

Regional Operations Forums for Advancing Systems Operations, Management, and Reliability (L36)

PRODUCT: This project develops a new curriculum for regional training (or regional operations forums) that allows senior managers and program leaders at public agencies to build expertise in the emerging highway operations field.

–The curriculum is designed to benefit leaders and practitioners from transportation systems operations and management (SO&M), as well as participants whose expertise is outside the SO&M field. –Topics such as the principles of building capability within organizations, performance measurement, goods movement,

workforce development, and building a business case for SO&M are covered in depth.

Five Regional Operations Forums will be conducted at different locations across the country: AZ, NH, WI, WA, and TN

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Capacity Focus Area

• Charge from Congress: “Develop approaches and tools for systematically integrating environmental, economic, and community requirements into the analysis, planning, and design of new highway capacity.”

• Highway expansion projects were too often being delayed or were not able to obtain the necessary approvals in the planning and environmental review process.

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Research Approach

1. Compile lessons learned from case studies of successful delivery of 23 large and complex capacity expansion projects from across the United States

2. Develop methods to integrate transportation, environmental, community, and economic planning

3. Develop methods for addressing issues that were not being adequately addressed in the transportation planning and project development process

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Development of TCAPP

• Document the decision points in a process that follows the steps used in successful capacity expansion projects

• Organize information on lessons learned from these successful projects around the decision points in the process and make all this information available via a web portal

• The web portal was named “Transportation for Communities - Advancing Projects through Partnerships,” and is referred to as “TCAPP.”

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Key Elements of TCAPP

• Knowledge transfer tool to assist transportation professionals throughout the entire planning and project development process up to NEPA and permitting approvals

• Information to assist practitioners in

– gaining and maintaining stakeholder support

– working successfully across agency boundaries

– avoiding delays caused by re-do loops or lapses in support

• Collaboration assessment tool

• Project expediting assessment tool

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Other Capacity Products

1. Performance measurement 2. Analysis of economic benefits of projects 3. The relationship between operational

improvements and the need for additional capacity

4. Joint transportation and environmental planning 5. Improvements to travel demand analysis tools 6. Community visioning, smart growth, greenhouse

gas emissions issues 7. Dealing with public-private partnership (P3)

projects 8. Addressing freight issues 9. Means to the expedite planning and project

delivery process

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New Travel Models (C10)

• PRODUCT: This new model and software package dynamically evaluates the interplay of traveler behavior and transportation network conditions, including mode options. Activity-based travel demand models are linked to micro-simulation models with feedback loops.

• BENEFIT/VALUE: With more realistic estimates of travel demand—and how it changes when mode choices are available— agencies can make more informed decisions about adding highway and transit capacity, improving traffic operations, introducing priced roads, and improving traveler information.

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Questions?

• Contact Information

– Neil Pedersen, Deputy Director, SHRP 2, TRB

– E-mail: npedersen@nas.edu

– Telephone: 202-334-1426

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