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22 Guidebook for Conducting Local Hazardous Materials Commodity Flow Studies
2.2.8 Hazmat Route Designation
Designating routes over which hazardous material may not be transported can help prevent
incidents from impacting local populations or sensitive environmental areas, and federal law au-
thorizes states to designate highway routes over which the transport of hazardous materials may
be permitted or prohibited. The requirements for route designation, restriction, or prohibition
for transport of non-radioactive hazardous materials (NRHM) are defined in 49 CFR, Part 397,
et seq. Local communities and states may have additional requirements for hazmat route desig-
nation. As with comprehensive planning, hazmat route designation can be a very controversial
topic for a community. HMCFS information should be sufficiently detailed and specified to
maximize usability and prevent criticism or dismissal. FHWA's Highway Routing of Hazardous
Materials: Guidelines for Applying Criteria (13) is one source of guidance for conducting a haz-
mat route assessment. The information collected for an HMCFS can directly support many of
the most important routing analysis considerations, including type of roadway, accident history,
type and quantity of hazardous material, and amount of through routing. Other information
that may be included in an HMCFS consists of population densities, locations of special popu-
lations, and locations of critical infrastructures. Further risk analyses can identify relative impact
zones and risks for different hazardous materials.
2.2.9 Legal Takings
As local entities seek to prevent hazmat incidents from occurring in populated areas or im-
plement comprehensive plans, properties may be restricted to uses compatible with those
plans. Current owners may suffer a loss in opportunity costs. These legal takings (eminent
domain), although very rare, can end in serious proceedings that can be controversial and
quite costly. HMCFS data that may be used to support such limitations are likely to require
a high level of detail and precision to maximize utility, prevent criticism, and hold up in legal
proceedings.
2.3 Define Data Requirements
The project team defines the data requirements of the HMCFS project based on the objec-
tives set by the core team. The data requirements include sampling (where, when, and how
often data are collected) and precision (characterization of hazmat flows and flow mechanisms
by type and quantity). As the data requirements increase according to the level of HMCFS ob-
jectives, the number of applicable data sources decreases. This is because many data sources,
such as national-level flow estimates, are collected using techniques that are not appropriately
matched to the sampling or precision required to support the objectives at the local level. These
data should only be used to develop very general ideas about the nature and patterns of what
might be travelling through a local jurisdiction such as a city or county. Other data provide
enough information to understand the local nature and patterns of hazmat transport in a
jurisdiction, but not for specific times, locations, or individual hazmat commodities. At the
highest level, data are very locally detailed and can be used to identify the particular nature and
patterns of what has been observed in a jurisdiction, even for a specific network location, time
of day, or hazmat commodity.
Sampling and precision requirements for HMCFS data are discussed in Chapter 5. Appendix
D.2, Let HMCFS Objectives Guide Sampling, suggests some guidelines for sampling hazmat
transport data (that is, where, when, and how often data should be collected) according to proj-
ect objectives. Appendix E provides further information about sampling frameworks.
