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3PURPOSE OF THE SYNTHESIS NCHRP Synthesis of Highway Practice 207: Managing Road- way Snow and Ice Control Operations was published in 1994. It described several new innovations and concepts developed in North America, Europe, and Japan for managing snow and ice control operations at that time. Winter operations have changed in the 10 years between 1994 and 2004, as new methods, materials, and equipment have become more read- ily available. Increasing environmental concerns, limited budgets, and workforce issues must be balanced against mobility and safety demands. These innovations have been adopted in different ways for different conditions provided the purpose for a new synthesis to highlight these advances and how they can be assimilated. METHODOLOGY AND REPORTING AGENCY STATISTICS The state of practice of winter operations was sampled through responses to a questionnaire sent to highway agencies. A survey questionnaire was crafted that focused on capturing changes that have occurred over the 10 years since the pub- lication of the 1994 synthesis at the planning, managing, and operation levels of winter highway operations. To capture change, approximately one-third of the questions were simi- lar to those used for the earlier synthesis research. The sur- vey was transmitted to a sample group of transportation agency representatives. A limited number of responses were received and then cataloged and combined in a manner to support the organization of this report. A second survey was then sent to representatives from 71 transportation agencies. (This survey questionnaire can be found in Appendix A.) They included 48 state and the District of Columbia department of transportation (DOT) representatives, educational institute representatives for the remaining 2 states, 10 Canadian provincial DOTs, and 10 Canadian municipalities. Thirty-four percent (22 of 71) responded with completed questionnaires, providing a sam- ple of 22 agencies, 26% (13 of 50) of the state DOTs, 60% (6 of 10) of the provincial DOTs, and 33% (3 of 10) of the Canadian municipalities. (A list of respondents is provided in Appendix B.) The 22 respondents represent five western states and one province, two western Canadian municipalities, five mid- continent states and two provinces, two northeastern states and three provinces, and one northeastern Canadian munic- ipality. The six northeastern respondents each encompass large coastal regions. In other winter operation-related disci- plines, it has been useful to identify characteristic winter cli- mate regions. A broad spectrum of options was presented in one question to provide a possible division of winter high- way operators according to the nature of their winter climate and road network. The responses fell into five specific cat- egories: Rural Mountainous, Rural Plains or Plateau, Rural Coastal or Lake Effect, Urban Plains or Plateau, and Urban Costal or Lake Effect. Although these were useful in consid- ering the context of the responses, the simplification of the categories to two agency groups, state or provincial and municipality, afforded clearer explanation and discussion. Figure 1 illustrates this categorization and the geographic relationship of the responding agencies. According to Envi- ronment Canada (âSnowiest Cityâ 2003), the greater Monc- ton area (pop. 111,000) is the 6th snowiest Canadian city (138 in., 350 cm annual average), Edmonton (pop. 937,845) the 73rd snowiest city (49 in., 124 cm), and Vancouver (pop. 1,986,965) is the 98th snowiest city (19 in., 48 cm). The distribution of the responses for this synthesis was biased toward the central mid-west and large western states and provinces. In addition, a literature review was conducted of the pri- mary recent contributions or research related to winter oper- ations. This limited search drew on articles that provided insight into the direction that research has taken since 1994. ORGANIZATION The review of the responses for this synthesis is organized into eight chapters. The first chapter is an overview and introduc- tion to the report, along with a discussion of its limitations. Chapter two describes results of the literature search conducted for this synthesis. The responses covering state of practice are organized and presented in chapter three. An overview of envi- ronmental effects that are topical to winter highway operations is presented in chapter four. Responses of the agencies to spe- cial issues, such as catastrophic winter weather events, snow avalanches, and appropriate design and construction of winter operations make up chapter five. Institutional issues concerned CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION
with training and skill levels are described in chapter six. Emerging technologies just beginning to be introduced to win- ter operations are presented in chapter seven. Conclusions and suggested areas for further research are offered in chapter eight. Appendix A is the survey questionnaire, Appendix B a list of the responding agencies, and Appendix C tabulated results of selected questions. 4 ASSUMPTIONS AND CONVENTIONS Because this synthesis is uniquely targeted to frontline and mid-level supervisory winter maintenance decision makers and planners in the United States, English units are used pri- marily with the International System of Units (SI) secondary in parenthesis when appropriate. FIGURE 1 Responding agencies and their geographic distribution. * * * State DOTs Provincial DOTs California Alberta Connecticut Manitoba Idaho Québec Illinois New Brunswick Indiana Nova Scotia Maryland Saskatchewan Minnesota Missouri Montana Nebraska Nevada Oregon Washington State Vancouver, British Columbia Municipalities Edmonton, Alberta Moncton, New Brunswick
