Progress ReportReliability Focus Area

Subcommittee on Systems Operation and Management

June 2009

Reliability

• Travel time reliability- consistency of travel conditions from day to day

• Goal: to reduce non-recurring congestion through reduction, management, response, and mitigation of the primary factors (incidents, traffic control devices, weather, special events, work zones)

• 19 projects for $20.35 million

Effects of Incidents and Weather on Reliability

SHRP 2 and SSOM

• Share common objectives: Measure, improve and report travel time

reliabilityMainstream systems operation and

management Link planning and operationsImprove state of practice

• SHRP 2 research directly links to SSOM strategic plan

Program Status

• 10 active projects- value $11.55 M

• 9 remaining projects- value of $8.8M

• 3 new project starts

• 3 projects nearing completion

New Project Starts

Projects that have started since SSOM meeting last year

Prime contractor: North Carolina State UniversityBudget: $1,800,000Duration: 36 monthsContract Start Date: March 18, 2009

L02 Establishing Monitoring Programs for Travel Time Reliability

• Guidebook on how to establish monitoring programs for travel time reliability

Anticipated Products

The objective of this project is to develop system designs for programs to monitor travel time reliability and to prepare a guidebook that practitioners and others can use to design, build, operate, and maintain such systems. 

Prime contractor: DelcanBudget: $1,250,000 Duration: 36 monthsContract Start Date: February 6, 2009

L04 Incorporating Reliability Performance Measures in Planning and Operations Modeling Tools

• Demonstration of a traffic simulation model that reflects reliability in a subarea of a network and preparation of application guidelines

• Guidance for incorporating reliability into travel demand forecasting models and addressing feedback with simulation models

•  

Anticipated Products

The project will (1) develop the capability of producing measures of reliability performance as output in traffic simulation models and planning models, and (2) determine how travel demand forecasting models can use reliability measures to produce revised estimates of travel patterns.

Prime contractor: Virginia Tech Transportation Institute

Budget: $300,000

Duration: 12 months

Contract Start Date: February 9, 2009

L10 Feasibility of Using In-vehicle Video Data to Explore How to Modify Driver Behavior that Causes Non-Recurring Congestion

This project will involve review of driver videos from past driving studies to determine the ability to extract useful information on behaviors and responses to factors that influence travel time reliability.

Anticipated Products

• Report on the feasibility of using in-vehicle video data to help identify driver behavior modification strategies to improve travel time reliability

In-Vehicle Video Clip

Projects Nearing Completion

Projects that will be completed this year

Prime contractor: Kimley-Horn & Associates

Budget: $400,000

Duration: 18 months

Expected Completion : August 2009

L01 Integrating Business Processes to Improve Reliability

• Development of case studies and summary information

• Business process and data flow diagrams capturing integrated procedures

• A guide on how to best integrate business processes related to operations

Anticipated Products

This project will identify and report on successful practices that integrate business processes to improve travel time reliability

I-80 Winter State Line Closures (NV/CA)

• Winter weather, elevation changes necessitate closure of CA/NV state line

• Limited (i.e., none) parking near state line for trucks not permitted to cross

• 5 year period – 23 closures, 31 truck prohibitions• Typical winter day – 2500 trucks I-80 WB• Why selected: Winter weather ops/management, multi-

agency event management, freight, rural corridor

Ca

ltra

ns

ND

OT

D2

Ma

int

ND

OT

PIO

Fre

igh

t O

ps

ND

OT

D2

Op

s

511 web siteUpdate media

NNROC initiate response plan (received notification)

Maintenance crews moblized

Establish truck control check point

Upgrade/expand system to support winter operations

Enter closure details into Road Database

Plan/Deploy infrastructure placement

Declare closure on I-80 at CA/NV state line

NH

PT

rav.

Info

Sys

tem

Policy Level/Organization Structure Evaluation/DocumentationOperations/Specific Process

Multi-agency pre-winter Coordination

Planning

Multi-agency pre-winter Coordination

Planning

Multi-agency pre-winter Coordination

Planning

Multi-agency pre-winter Coordination

Planning

Outreach plan and materials

Notify NDOT D2

Receive notification of closure

Implement incident mgmt plan

Monitor field equipment

Active DMS/HAR

Monitor truck parking impacts to road operations

Stop at border; find parking

Use alt. route

Multi-agency pre-winter Coordination

Planning

Established processes

Determine level threat

Follow Level 1 guidelines

Follow Level 2 guidelines

Follow Level 3

guidelinesNotify D3 and Utah DOT

Excessive truck

parking?

Notify NHP

yes

no

web site

I-80 Agencies Involved

• NDOT District 2 Operations, Maintenance, PIO• NDOT District 3 Operations/Operations Center• Caltrans• Nevada Highway Patrol• Private Entities (Truck/Freight)• Additional stakeholders – cities, counties, media

I-80 Process Types

• Pre-planning for winter operations/closures• Process to establish closure and initiate

notifications• Internal agency processes/procedures for winter

operations, closure operations• Disseminating traveler information during

hazardous winter conditions• Planning and programming infrastructure to

support corridor monitoring/info dissemination

Prime contractor: Cambridge Systematics, Inc. Budget: $1,750,000Duration: 30 months Expected Completion: August 2009

L03 Analytic Procedures for Determining the Impacts of Reliability Mitigation Strategies

• Reliability vocabulary and definitions for application and communication

• Data and collection requirements, performance metrics, analysis methods

• Technical relationships between reliability improvement strategies, causes of non-recurring congestion and performance measures

Anticipated Products

This project will provide the means to predict what effect various improvement measures will have on travel time reliability performance

L03 Preliminary Findings

• Virtually all performance measures are derived from travel time distributions – reliability is a probabilistic phenomena

• At least six months of data are required to develop travel time distributions – a year is better

• Recommended reliability performance measures include Buffer Index, Failure/On-time Measures, Planning Time Index, Skew Statistic, Misery Index, Travel Time Index

• Travel time data traditionally comes from speed detectors on urban freeways- now the private sector is proving to be a valuable source of data on all key types of roads (e.g. signalized urban arterials)

Prime contractor: Parsons Brinckerhoff Budget: $1,000,000Duration: 31.5 monthsExpected Completion: August 2009

L06 Institutional Architectures to Advance Operational Strategies

• Report providing guidance to transportation agencies on institutional architectures that will support operation programs that can improve travel time reliability

Anticipated Products

This project will examine the ways agencies should be organized to successfully execute operations programs to deliver travel time reliability by:

conducting workshops to identify key issues examine and assess leading agency organizational structures examine organizational theory hold executive forums to determine the potential for widespread application

L06 Preliminary Findings

• Institutional issues account for the failure to capitalize on SO&M, not lack of concepts, technology or even money

• Only two states address SO&M as a stand-alone multi-year and annual budgeting process at the same level of formality as other core programs.

• A powerful approach for organizational self assessment and continuous improvement of operations is a Capability Maturity Model (CMM), similar to that used in the IT industry.

This framework would : consolidate the Reliability research findings to provide

decision-makers and practitioners a guide to understand travel time reliability,

incorporate reliability in project planning promote the merit of systems operations and management

solutions to prevailing problems. develop and communicate the business case for travel time

reliability

L17 A Framework for Travel Time Reliability (New Project)

• A framework, possibly web-based product, that supports the planning, design and delivery of Reliability programs

Anticipated Products

SHRP 2 Implementation• Report to Congress in January 2009

recommended: AASHTO as principal implementation agent, in

partnership with AASHTO, NHTSA and TRB Funding at $400M over 6 years Formal stakeholder advisory structure with

detailed implementation plansStrategies to include- pilot testing of institutional

approaches and technical products, lead users/demonstration projects, training and education programs, etc.

SHRP 2 and SSOM

• SHRP 2 will disseminate research results on a project by project basis- not solely at end of the program.

• A communication protocol between SHRP 2 and SSOM would have mutual benefits

• SHRP 2 implementation strategies- opportunities for SSOM members to conduct pilots, demos, be a lead state, etc.

Summary

• Program continues on schedule

• Project results becoming available now

• Dissemination of results will be a priority

• Encourage States to track and consider an active implementation role

Accelerating solutions for highway safety, renewal, reliability, and capacity

More information can be found at:

www.trb.org/shrp2