mobility measurement in urban transportation (mmut) fhwa

A technical memorandum to

Mobility Measurement in Urban Transportation (MMUT)

FHWA Pooled Fund Study

Submitted by the

TEXAS A&M TRANSPORTATION INSTITUTE

Author:

Gretchen Stoeltje

December 2016

TECHNICAL MEMORANDUM

Practices for Prioritizing Operational Improvements with Capacity Projects

Task 4 ‐ Synthesis Development (Synthesis #1 of 3)

(FY 2017)

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

In an era of constrained transportation funding sources, population growth, and environmental

fragility, transportation providers are looking at ways of meeting transportation demand other

than by expanding roadway capacity. One such area of focus is operational improvements,

projects that can help to maximize the performance of the existing transportation system (1).

This technical memorandum discusses the methods, tools, formulas, or policies that some

practitioners use to allow operational improvements to compete with capacity and other

projects in the project prioritization and selection process.

KEY POINTS

The following are the key highlights of this synthesis:

Developing a regional vision and a set of goals can help align transportation projects with

overall regional development and guide the project selection process.

Scoring projects according to a shared set of regionally defined performance measures can

help to quantify the value of projects and provide an objective system of comparison.

Performance measures that can help decision makers weigh operational improvement

projects against capacity expansion projects include:

o Return on investment.

o Geographic distribution of benefits throughout a region.

Tools that visualize the performance measurement and prioritization process can provide

transparency of the process and accessibility to users.

INTRODUCTION

According to the Federal Highway Administration, transportation planning has traditionally not

incorporated system management and operations solutions, even though those solutions

address at least 60 percent of the causes of roadway congestion. Inadequate capacity is only

the cause of 40 percent of congestion. Traffic incidents, for instance, are responsible for

25 percent of congestion. Implementing more efficient incident clearance practices could have

a dramatic effect on congestion. Increasing management and operational improvement

strategies could also result in (1):

Safer travel: Freeway ramp metering reduces crashes by 15–50 percent.

More free time: Traffic signal retiming decreases delay on roads by 13–94 percent.

Transit signal priority reduces transit delay by 30–40 percent.

Cleaner air and less wasted fuel: Georgia’s traffic incident management program

reduced annual fuel consumption by 6.83 million gallons/year.

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Cost‐effective solutions: Typical benefit‐cost ratios for traffic signal

retiming/optimization are 17:1 to 62:1, for work zone management systems benefit‐cost

ratios are 2:1 to 42:1, and for bus rapid transit benefit‐cost ratios are 2:1 to 10:1.

Improved Livability: Management and operations strategies such as enhanced transit

service, traveler information, and traffic incident management promote safe, reliable,

economical, and balanced transportation choices while addressing regional mobility

needs.

OPERATIONAL IMPROVEMENT STRATEGIES

Though the agency experiences and processes reviewed for this memorandum do not name or

group these strategies in exactly the same way, the following is a representative list of

strategies in use today by the entities reviewed:

Access management.

Advanced parking management systems.

Congestion pricing.

Dynamic shoulder lanes.

Freeway and intersection geometric design changes.

Freeway entrance ramp metering.

Freight management.

Hard shoulder running.

Incident management.

Integrated Corridor Management.

Lane specific signaling.

Managed Lanes.

Reversible lanes.

Road weather management.

Short auxiliary lane additions.

Special event management.

Traffic Management Centers.

Traffic signal coordination.

Traffic signal modifications to ease merging and exiting traffic.

Transit signal priority.

Travel demand management.

Traveler information systems (variable message signs, dynamic signing, dynamic speed

signs).

Work zone management.

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INCLUDING OPERATIONAL IMPROVEMENT STRATEGIES INTO PROJECT SELECTION AND

PRIORITIZATION PROCESSES

Different entities structure their processes differently according to the nature and character of

their respective regions. However, the reviewed entities do have in common a systematic

approach, typically beginning with a big picture, region‐wide, long‐term, and general vision that

includes more areas of public interest than transportation. That vision is usually supported by

more specific goals, and progress toward it measured by a set of performance measures

designed to embody the values of the regional goals. Transportation projects are categorized by

project type and evaluated against the performance measures. Once scored, projects are

ranked and assigned a score.

Where entities tend to differ in their processes is how they distinguish operational

improvement projects from other project types, and where they plug them into the evaluation

process. Below are four case studies describing the processes of the following transportation

agencies:

Metropolitan Council of the Twin Cities (Minneapolis, MN).

Puget Sound Regional Council (PSRC) (Seattle, WA).

Metropolitan Transportation Commission (San Francisco, CA).

San Diego Council of Governments (SANDAG) (San Diego, CA).

Case Study: Metropolitan Council of the Twin Cities (Minneapolis, MN)

Through the process of updating their 2030 Transportation Policy Plan, the Metropolitan

Council of the Twin Cities in Minnesota, the region’s metropolitan planning organization,

conducted a needs analysis on the region’s principal arterials and “A” minor arterials to

determine what would be necessary to accommodate the coming growth to the region.

The analysis produced a number of conclusions reflecting the reality that, using today’s design

assumptions for principal arterials, the region will never have the financial ability to meet the

projected transportation demand with major highway expansion projects. Instead, the region

should focus investment on lower‐cost/high‐benefit projects that provide alternatives to

congestion, rather than attempting to reduce it solely with new capacity projects (2).

These conclusions led to the development of a new project selection process that allows for the

programming of operational improvements and expansion projects. The process consists of

four different strategies, beginning with lower‐cost projects that preserve and improve existing

infrastructure, to high‐cost projects for expanding capacity. Programmers begin by matching

needs with active traffic management (ATM) solutions first, then move on in an iterative

fashion, through the other sets of solutions, typically reserving new capacity solutions, in

particular managed lane projects like MnPASS, for select corridors where there are significant

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congestion and safety issues along with the need for transit advantages (3, 4). MnDOT’s four

different strategies follow:

1. Active Traffic Management. Operational improvements to help manage the effects of

congestion, including:

Variable message signs (traveler information systems).

Freeway ramp metering.

Dynamic signing.

Dynamic shoulder lanes.

Reversible lanes.

Dynamic speed signs.

Lane specific signaling.

2. Spot mobility improvements. Lower cost, high‐benefit projects that improve traffic flow and

provide bottleneck relief at spot locations. These projects include:

Freeway and intersection geometric design changes.

Short auxiliary lane additions.

Traffic signal modifications to ease merging and exiting traffic.

3. Priced managed lanes. Priced managed lane projects provide a predictable, congestion‐free

travel option for transit users, those who ride in carpools, or those who are willing to pay. In

the Twin Cities, this system is called MnPASS, which currently operates on I‐394 and I‐35W.

4. Strategic capacity enhancements.

New interchanges.

Non‐priced managed lanes.

Limited general‐purpose lanes that may be needed to address corridor congestion

and/or provide lane continuity for existing facility or to complete an unfinished segment

of the Metropolitan Highway System (4).

Case Study: The Puget Sound Regional Council (Seattle, WA)

The PSRC’s Vision 2040 plan is a strategy for accommodating the region’s expected growth by

2040, calling for an integrated, long‐range approach to maintaining a healthy region. Vision

2040 provides broad policy direction and includes a comprehensive growth strategy that

focuses on growth in metropolitan areas of the region. Transportation 2040 (T2040) is the

region’s long range transportation plan that supports the goals outlined in Vision 2040 and

provides guidance on implementation of the transportation policy component of VISION 2040.

Adopted in 2010 and updated in 2014, T2040 clarifies that transportation investment needs far

exceed current revenues. To address this situation, the plan provides a financial strategy and

also calls for a framework, Transportation 2040 Prioritization, to ensure the prioritization of

transportation projects that most effectively implement the policy direction included in VISION

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2040. Transportation 2040 Prioritization was completed as a major component of the 2014

update and is now in use (5).

Having recently begun a number of large‐scale projects in the region, and recognizing the need

for lower‐cost solutions to manage system performance, PSRC expects to place more emphasis

on operational improvement projects that improve efficiency, rather than ones that expand

capacity. PSRC operational improvement strategies include:

1. Integrated Corridor Management.

2. Active Traffic Management (ATM) techniques such as hard shoulder running, adaptive

signal control, transit signal priority.

3. Traffic Management Centers.

4. Monitoring and detection devices such as closed circuit television cameras.

5. Traveler information services, including real time transit arrival information and remote

transit traveler support.

These operational strategies are folded into one of Transportation 2040 Prioritization’s four

categories of transportation investment types:

Regional system expansion.

Local projects.

Programmatic.

State of good repair.

Projects in the Regional System Expansion category include investments in highways, arterials,

transit, and bicycle/pedestrian facilities. Investments in transit and ferry capital costs fall into

this category as well. These projects, which consist of both capacity expansion and operational

improvement projects, are evaluated against nine prioritization measures developed in VISION

2040, and given a numerical score that reflects how well it supports the measures. Each

measure is worth a maximum of 10 points, meaning that the highest score a project can

achieve is 90 (6).

Once projects are scored, they are grouped into one of four categories of infrastructure type

and their scores ranked in a Scorecard Report. Both capacity expansion projects and

operational improvement projects are placed into these categories, which include:

Arterials.

Bicycle/pedestrian.

Highways.

Transit.

The scorecard report shows benefit scores for each of the nine measures, project costs, and

whether they are in the approved, candidate, or unprogrammed section of Transportation

2040. Regional System Expansion projects are also evaluated on the basis of the geographic

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distribution of their costs and benefits throughout the region. See Figure 1 for an example

scorecard.

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Figure 1: Scorecard from PSRC’s Transportation 2040 Prioritization Showing the Project Type, Location, Performance with Nine

Performance Measures, Overall Score, and Status (Planned or Not Programmed) for Projects in the Arterials Category (7).

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Case Study: Metropolitan Transportation Commission (San Francisco, CA)

Plan Bay Area 2040 is the long‐range transportation plan of the Metropolitan Transportation

Commission (MTC), the Bay Area’s metropolitan planning organization. Slated for adoption in

2017, Plan Bay Area 2040 acknowledges that simply adding additional roadway capacity as a

solution to the region’s increased congestion is no longer an option as it may have been a few

decades ago, both because of the increased cost of capacity expansion projects and the aged

condition of the system. The plan therefore provides for a range of project types that include

expansion, efficiency, and state of good repair. Projects that are not yet fully funded and

competing for discretionary funds are grouped into six investment strategies, all of which are

evaluated by the same metrics (8).

One of those investment strategies is “Investment Strategy Four: Boost Freeway and Transit

Efficiency.” Noting that “it is no longer possible to build our way out of congestion,” Investment

Strategy Four supports operational improvements that are incorporated into several initiatives

and several congestion pricing projects: the Transit Performance Initiative, the Columbus Day

Initiative, Muni Forward, San Francisco and Treasure Island Cordon Pricing program, and the

Express Lane Network (See Table 1 [9]).

TABLE 1: Sample MTC Projects with Operational Improvement Components

Initiative or Project Operational Improvement Strategy

Transit Performance

Initiative

Supportive infrastructure to achieve performance

improvements including bus stop consolidation,

roadway modifications, light rail transit signal priority

improvements, transit signal priorities

Incentives to reward agencies that achieve

improvement in ridership and service productivity

Columbus Day Initiative Incident management

Traffic signal coordination

Ramp metering

Dynamic shoulder lanes

Muni Forward Transit signal priority

Express Lane Network 270 miles of connected express (managed) lanes added to

several segments of highway and bridges in the bay Area

San Francisco Congestion

Pricing

Demonstration projects on Treasure Island and downtown San

Francisco

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These projects, along with all other projects under review, are first put through a cost/benefit

analysis that evaluates the dollar value of a project. Next, each project is measured, on a 5

point scale of −1 to +1, against a set of 13 performance targets. Evaluated together, the cost

benefit value and the target score show the overall value of projects as measured against the

goals of Plan Bay Area 2040 (10). See Figures 2 and 3.

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Figure 2. Cost‐Benefit Analysis and Target Assessment for MTC’s Proposed Congestion Pricing Project for San Francisco, as

Displayed in Plan Bay Area 2040’s Interactive Project Dashboard (10).

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Figure 3. Visualization of How MTC’s Projects Compare with Each Other When Plotted by Cost/Benefit and Target Assessment.

(When a project is selected on the left, the bubbles representing that project in the scatter plot chart to the right remain highlighted

while all others go grey in Plan Bay Area 2040’s interactive tool) (10).

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After this analysis, projects are subject to a prioritization process:

First, projects are ranked as high‐performing, medium‐performing, and low‐performing

projects.

Next, high‐performing projects are generally moved into the development stage.

medium‐performing projects move into an investment tradeoffs process. If they are

found to have high tradeoff benefit, they are moved into the development stage as well.

low‐performing projects for which a compelling case can be made also move into the

investment tradeoff process. If found to be sufficiently compelling, those projects also

move into development.

Finally, projects that moved into development in the prior step are programmed into

the Plan Bay Area 2040 investment strategy. All other projects are not included in the

plan (11). See Figure 4.

Figure 4. Flow Chart of MTC’s Project Prioritization Process, from Plan Bay Area 2040 (11).

Case Study: San Diego Association of Governments (San Diego, CA)

SANDAG adopted its most recent regional plan, San Diego Forward: The Regional Plan, in

October 2015. The Regional Plan is a three‐part comprehensive plan designed to guide planning

and development for the area from now through 2050. It integrates the Regional

Transportation Plan, its Sustainable Communities Strategy, and the Regional Comprehensive

Plan into one document to track and integrate the region’s future growth and transportation

investments.

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Anticipating dramatic population growth in the next 35 years, the SANDAG region prioritized

the preservation of their open space, parks, protected habitat and farmlands to guide them in

their plan development. The SANDAG plan, therefore, emphasizes dense development in

existing communities, matched with increased transportation options, rather than outward

expansion into undeveloped land with new, low‐density communities requiring new

infrastructure.

The guiding principle supporting the transportation options that the plan proposes is a

reduction in drive‐alone vehicle‐miles of travel. Toward that end, the plan emphasizes the

expansion of public transit and active transportation (biking and walking), as well as

reconfiguring existing highways to promote public transit, carpooling, and other alternatives to

driving alone. Of the 21 percent of future investments dedicated to highways, 75 percent of

that (or 15 percent of total investments) will go toward adding managed lanes and connectors

that support transit (rapid services), carpooling, vanpooling, and expanded use of zero‐emission

and alternative‐fuel vehicles.

Project selection for the Regional Plan began by identifying all projects needed to serve the

region during the planning period ending in 2050. This list of all transit, highway, goods

movement, bicycle and pedestrian projects, both committed and uncommitted, and requiring

more funding than was assumed would be available for this period, comprised the

Unconstrained Transportation Network. These projects included capacity expansion and

operational improvement projects, among others.

Next, all projects were evaluated according to the criteria developed to support the Regional

Plan’s vision and goals, last updated with public input in 2013. These goals provide the first

level of organization for the project evaluation criteria:

1. Innovative mobility and planning.

2. Healthy environment and communities.

3. Vibrant economy.

SANDAG then grouped its transportation projects into six modal categories. To begin the

evaluation process, the goals were all three applied to each modal category in the plan. The

modal categories include:

Highway corridors.

Managed lanes and managed lane connectors.

Freeway‐to‐freeway connectors.

Transit service.

Active transportation.

Rail grade separation (12).

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Project evaluation criteria, with associated weighted values, are nested under each goal for

each category, resulting in a total score for each project. In Figure 5, for example, the modal

category is Transit Service and the regional goal is Innovative Mobility and Planning (13).

Figure 5. Evaluation of Transit Projects that Fall into the Goal Category Listed at the Top, and

Measured by the Performance Measures on the Left along with the Project Score Against

Those Measures Listed on the Right (13).

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Next, projects are ranked by score within each category. In Figure 6, transit service projects are

ranked in the far right column by highest score, listed in the adjacent column (13).

Figure 6. SANDAG’s Regional Plan Ranking of a Selection of Transit Projects by Total Highest

Performance (13).

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Highest ranking projects are then brought together in a series of network scenarios that could

be implemented with the projected available funding for the planning period. While not all

projects from the Unconstrained Transportation Network end up in the highest ranked

scenarios, SANDAG continues to pursue additional funding while focusing available funding on

priority projects.

Finally, all scenarios were subjected to a second set of performance measures, developed

through extensive public engagement processes, designed to assess how well the scenarios

support the region’s citizens by providing safe and healthy transportation systems. Through a

second public engagement period, a final or preferred scenario was assembled and accepted

(12).

CONCLUSIONS

A combination of solid cost/benefit analysis, performance measures defined at the regional

level and with public input, and transparency in reporting characterize programs that are

successful in incorporating operational improvement strategies into their transportation plans.

Strategies that support goals related to objectives besides traditional transportation goals, like

air quality or the preservation of open space, can quickly convey the value of an improvement

to a lay public. This is all the more true if those goals were developed with a high level of public

input, and if those strategies and their performance scores are made accessible to the public.

REFERENCES

1. USDOT, FHWA, “Getting the Most from Your Transportation System Investments: Operating

for Peak Performance,” http://ops.fhwa.dot.gov/publications/fhwahop10030/index.htm,

last visited 9/27/16.

2. Minnesota Department of Transportation/Metropolitan Council, “Principal Arterial Study

For the Twin Cities Metropolitan Area Summary and Conclusions,” Publication No. 35‐08‐

043, June 2008.

3. Metropolitan Council/Parsons Brinkerhoff, “Metropolitan Highway System Investment

Study Final Report,” September 2010.

4. Email from Paul Czech, Planning Director, System Planning, Minnesota Department of

Transportation, September 2016, on file with author.

5. Puget Sound Regional Council, “Transportation 2040 Update, Appendix P: Prioritization,”

May 29, 2014.

6. Interview with Gary Simonson, Associate Planner, Puget Sound Reginal Council, October

2016, on file with author.

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7. Puget Sound Regional Council, “Transportation 2040 Update, Appendix P: Prioritization,

Attachment E Scorecard Report,”

http://www.psrc.org/assets/9403/PrioritizationScorecard20130807.pdf, last visited Nov. 14,

2016.

8. Metropolitan Transportation Commission/Association of Bay Area Governments, “Plan Bay

Area, Regional Transportation Plan and Sustainable Communities Strategy for the San

Francisco Bay Area 2013–2040,” adopted July 18, 2013,

http://mtc.ca.gov/sites/default/files/0‐Introduction.pdf, last visited Nov. 14, 2016.



Francisco Bay Area 2013–2040, Chapter 4: Investments” adopted July 18, 2013,

http://mtc.ca.gov/sites/default/files/4‐Investments.pdf, last visited Nov. 14, 2016.



Francisco Bay Area 2013–2040, interactive Performance Assessment Dashboard” adopted

July 18, 2013, http://data.mtc.ca.gov/performance/dashboard, last.

11. Email from Dave Vautin, Senior Planner/Analyst, Metropolitan Transportation Commission,

October 2016, on file with author.

12. San Diego Association of Governments, “San Diego Forward: The Regional Plan,” adopted

October 2015, http://www.sdforward.com/pdfs/RP_final/The%20Plan%20‐

%20combined.pdf.

13. San Diego Association of Governments, “San Diego Forward: The Regional Plan, Appendix

M,” adopted October 2015, http://www.sdforward.com/pdfs/RP_final/AppendixM‐

TransportationProjectEvaluationCriteriaandRankings.pdf.

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