01518962

Component

Establishing national Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act (MAP-21) congestion-related performance measures presents a problem due to regional variations in the scale of congestion and approaches to mitigating it. The Washington State Department of Transportation’s recent vehicle miles of travel (VMT) reduction monitoring framework overcomes these problems. The framework calls for the use of adopted regional transportation plans to set congestion reduction targets using a limited set of performance measures: 1) mode split in geographic zones within the region where alternative modes are expected to relieve congestion or increase personal mobility, 2) changes in population and employment in zones predicted to generate either new congestion and/or large numbers of trips via alternative modes, and 3) the performance (volume and reliability) of key travel corridors. Regions would select the measure(s) appropriate for their local congestion levels and mitigation strategies. Congested metropolitan areas would report all three sets of measures while less congested regions may focus on the third. The third set directly captures roadway congestion, but the first two are key to ensure the effectiveness of congestion reduction efforts in dense urban areas. Elements selected from adopted regional plans set the performance targets in simple terms that the public can understand. The monitoring framework then holds the region accountable for those expected outcomes. This framework allows each region to adopt targets that make local political and financial sense, while also holding them accountable for actually meeting those targets. At the national level, the performance targets are selected in a standardized way, but allowed to vary by region.

This paper was sponsored by TRB committee ABC30 Performance Measurement.

01503729

14-4722

English

17p

2014

Transportation Research Board 93rd Annual Meeting

Digital/other

Figures; References

Congestion management systems; Modal split; Performance measurement; Regional planning; Transportation planning; Vehicle miles of travel

Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act; Washington State Department of Transportation

Highways; Planning and Forecasting; I72: Traffic and Transport Planning

Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting 2014 Paper #14-4722

TRIS, TRB, ATRI

Jan 27 2014 3:39PM