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TRANSPORTAT ION RESEARCH BOARD WASHINGTON, D.C. 2011 www.TRB.org N A T I O N A L C O O P E R A T I V E H I G H W A Y R E S E A R C H P R O G R A M NCHRP REPORT 708 Subscriber Categories Planning and Forecasting ⢠Environment ⢠Society A Guidebook for Sustainability Performance Measurement for Transportation Agencies Josias Zietsman Tara Ramani TEXAS TRANSPORTATION INSTITUTE College Station, TX Joanne Potter Virginia Reeder Joshua DeFlorio CAMBRIDGE SYSTEMATICS Cambridge, MA Research sponsored by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials in cooperation with the Federal Highway Administration
NATIONAL COOPERATIVE HIGHWAY RESEARCH PROGRAM Systematic, well-designed research provides the most effective approach to the solution of many problems facing highway administrators and engineers. Often, highway problems are of local interest and can best be studied by highway departments individually or in cooperation with their state universities and others. However, the accelerating growth of highway transportation develops increasingly complex problems of wide interest to highway authorities. These problems are best studied through a coordinated program of cooperative research. In recognition of these needs, the highway administrators of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials initiated in 1962 an objective national highway research program employing modern scientific techniques. This program is supported on a continuing basis by funds from participating member states of the Association and it receives the full cooperation and support of the Federal Highway Administration, United States Department of Transportation. The Transportation Research Board of the National Academies was requested by the Association to administer the research program because of the Boardâs recognized objectivity and understanding of modern research practices. The Board is uniquely suited for this purpose as it maintains an extensive committee structure from which authorities on any highway transportation subject may be drawn; it possesses avenues of communications and cooperation with federal, state and local governmental agencies, universities, and industry; its relationship to the National Research Council is an insurance of objectivity; it maintains a full-time research correlation staff of specialists in highway transportation matters to bring the findings of research directly to those who are in a position to use them. The program is developed on the basis of research needs identified by chief administrators of the highway and transportation departments and by committees of AASHTO. Each year, specific areas of research needs to be included in the program are proposed to the National Research Council and the Board by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials. Research projects to fulfill these needs are defined by the Board, and qualified research agencies are selected from those that have submitted proposals. Administration and surveillance of research contracts are the responsibilities of the National Research Council and the Transportation Research Board. The needs for highway research are many, and the National Cooperative Highway Research Program can make significant contributions to the solution of highway transportation problems of mutual concern to many responsible groups. The program, however, is intended to complement rather than to substitute for or duplicate other highway research programs. Published reports of the NATIONAL COOPERATIVE HIGHWAY RESEARCH PROGRAM are available from: Transportation Research Board Business Office 500 Fifth Street, NW Washington, DC 20001 and can be ordered through the Internet at: http://www.national-academies.org/trb/bookstore Printed in the United States of America NCHRP REPORT 708 Project 8-74 ISSN 0077-5614 ISBN 978-0-309-21365-3 Library of Congress Control Number 2011940563 © 2011 National Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved. COPYRIGHT INFORMATION Authors herein are responsible for the authenticity of their materials and for obtaining written permissions from publishers or persons who own the copyright to any previously published or copyrighted material used herein. Cooperative Research Programs (CRP) grants permission to reproduce material in this publication for classroom and not-for-profit purposes. Permission is given with the understanding that none of the material will be used to imply TRB, AASHTO, FAA, FHWA, FMCSA, FTA, or Transit Development Corporation endorsement of a particular product, method, or practice. It is expected that those reproducing the material in this document for educational and not-for-profit uses will give appropriate acknowledgment of the source of any reprinted or reproduced material. For other uses of the material, request permission from CRP. NOTICE The project that is the subject of this report was a part of the National Cooperative Highway Research Program, conducted by the Transportation Research Board with the approval of the Governing Board of the National Research Council. The members of the technical panel selected to monitor this project and to review this report were chosen for their special competencies and with regard for appropriate balance. The report was reviewed by the technical panel and accepted for publication according to procedures established and overseen by the Transportation Research Board and approved by the Governing Board of the National Research Council. The opinions and conclusions expressed or implied in this report are those of the researchers who performed the research and are not necessarily those of the Transportation Research Board, the National Research Council, or the program sponsors. The Transportation Research Board of the National Academies, the National Research Council, and the sponsors of the National Cooperative Highway Research Program do not endorse products or manufacturers. Trade or manufacturersâ names appear herein solely because they are considered essential to the object of the report.
The National Academy of Sciences is a private, nonprofit, self-perpetuating society of distinguished scholars engaged in scientific and engineering research, dedicated to the furtherance of science and technology and to their use for the general welfare. On the authority of the charter granted to it by the Congress in 1863, the Academy has a mandate that requires it to advise the federal government on scientific and technical matters. Dr. Ralph J. Cicerone is president of the National Academy of Sciences. The National Academy of Engineering was established in 1964, under the charter of the National Academy of Sciences, as a parallel organization of outstanding engineers. It is autonomous in its administration and in the selection of its members, sharing with the National Academy of Sciences the responsibility for advising the federal government. The National Academy of Engineering also sponsors engineering programs aimed at meeting national needs, encourages education and research, and recognizes the superior achievements of engineers. Dr. Charles M. Vest is president of the National Academy of Engineering. The Institute of Medicine was established in 1970 by the National Academy of Sciences to secure the services of eminent members of appropriate professions in the examination of policy matters pertaining to the health of the public. The Institute acts under the responsibility given to the National Academy of Sciences by its congressional charter to be an adviser to the federal government and, on its own initiative, to identify issues of medical care, research, and education. Dr. Harvey V. Fineberg is president of the Institute of Medicine. The National Research Council was organized by the National Academy of Sciences in 1916 to associate the broad community of science and technology with the Academyâs purposes of furthering knowledge and advising the federal government. Functioning in accordance with general policies determined by the Academy, the Council has become the principal operating agency of both the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering in providing services to the government, the public, and the scientific and engineering communities. The Council is administered jointly by both Academies and the Institute of Medicine. Dr. Ralph J. Cicerone and Dr. Charles M. Vest are chair and vice chair, respectively, of the National Research Council. The Transportation Research Board is one of six major divisions of the National Research Council. The mission of the Transporta- tion Research Board is to provide leadership in transportation innovation and progress through research and information exchange, conducted within a setting that is objective, interdisciplinary, and multimodal. The Boardâs varied activities annually engage about 7,000 engineers, scientists, and other transportation researchers and practitioners from the public and private sectors and academia, all of whom contribute their expertise in the public interest. The program is supported by state transportation departments, federal agencies including the component administrations of the U.S. Department of Transportation, and other organizations and individu- als interested in the development of transportation. www.TRB.org www.national-academies.org
CRP STAFF FOR NCHRP REPORT 708 Christopher W. Jenks, Director, Cooperative Research Programs Crawford F. Jencks, Deputy Director, Cooperative Research Programs Lori L. Sundstrom, Senior Program Officer Megan Chamberlain, Senior Program Assistant Eileen P. Delaney, Director of Publications Doug English, Editor NCHRP PROJECT 8-74 PANEL Area of Transportation PlanningâField of Forecasting Wayne W. Kober, Wayne W. Kober Transportation & Environmental Management Consulting, Dillsburg, PA (Chair) David J. Carlson, Parsons Engineering, Washington, DC David S. Ekern, Ashland, VA Lee A. Fithian, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK Teresa M. Gardner, City of Salisbury, Salisbury, MD George Gerstle, Boulder County (CO), Boulder, CO William E. Knowles, Texas DOT, Austin, TX Robert A. Leiter, San Diego Association of Governments, San Diego, CA Bruce G. Marcot, USDA Forest Service, Portland, OR Jay J. Messer, Chapel Hill, NC Joshua R. Proudfoot, Good Company, Eugene, OR Keith M. Sherman, Illinois DOT, Springfield, IL Michael Culp, FHWA Liaison Shannon Eggleston, AASHTO Liaison Matthew Hardy, AASHTO Liaison Martine A. Micozzi, TRB Liaison AUTHOR ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The research reported herein was performed under NCHRP Project 8-74 by the Texas Transportation Institute (TTI), the Texas A&M University System, in collaboration with Cambridge Systematics, CH2M Hill, Inc., and High Street Consulting. Dr. Henrik Gudmundsson (Technical University of Denmark), Dr. Ralph Hall (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University), Dr. Greg Marsden (University of Leeds), and Dr. Steve Muench (University of Washington) served as consultants to the project. Josias Zietsman, Ph.D., P.E., Head of the Environment and Air Quality Division at TTI, served as prin- cipal investigator of this project. The primary authors of this report are Josias Zietsman and Tara Ramani of TTI and Joanne Potter, Virginia Reeder, and Joshua DeFlorio of Cambridge Systematics. The authors thank all members of the research team and the editorial and production staff who con- tributed to this report. C O O P E R A T I V E R E S E A R C H P R O G R A M S
This guidebook provides state departments of transportation (DOTs) and other transporta- tion agencies with a practical and easy-to-use approach to identify and apply sustainability- related performance measures, some number of which may already be integrated into agency business practices, to produce a new lens through which decision makers can view their agencyâs performance. It describes the underlying principles of sustainability as it relates to transportation, possible goals that can be used to address those principles, and per- formance measures that can be used to address those goals. Aspects of sustainability-related performance measures, including data sources and examples of use, are discussed. A refer- ence compendium of performance measures has also been provided. This guidebook should be of immediate use to those who have mastered the basics of performance measurement and who are familiar with their own agenciesâ performance measurement program, but who are challenged with providing useful information to agency leadership on how effectively their organization is meeting or can meet sustain- ability goals. Examples from DOTs, private industry, and Europe illustrate how sustainability can be successfully added to an agencyâs extant performance measurement system. State DOTs are mission-driven organizations that strive to simultaneously achieve multiple strategic goals. Goals such as improving safety, reducing congestion, enhancing economic opportunity, contributing to community vitality, improving air quality, improving reliability, preserving system assets, and accelerating project delivery can and often do reflect the principles of sustainabilityâpreserving and restoring environmental and ecological systems, fostering community health and vitality, promoting economic prosperity, and ensuring equity between and among population groups and over gener- ations, to some degree. This research shows how progress toward achieving a DOTâs goals can contribute to a sustainable transportation system and provides an easy-to-use approach that DOTsâor other transportation agenciesâcan tailor to meet their self- defined sustainability goals. Performance measurement has evolved over the decades into an effective methodology for quantifying goals and objectives and communicating progress toward their attainment. Working with performance measures, however, can be a daunting task due to the large number of possible measures, the extensive and potentially expensive data that might be required, and computational complexity that is often introduced. Under NCHRP Project 8-74, the Texas Transportation Institute at Texas A&M University was asked to develop a guidebook for state DOTs to demonstrate how they can implement performance measure- ment to assess the relative sustainability of their transportation networks and corridors over space and time. F O R E W O R D By Lori L. Sundstrom Staff Officer Transportation Research Board
In addition to this guidebook, the contractorâs project Final Report that contains the results of the literature review, surveys of the state of the practice, case study interviews, detail on research methodology and findings, and a discussion of future research needs is available on the NCHRP Project 8-74 website. The CD-ROM included with this guidebook contains an Excel-spreadsheet-based version of the performance measures compendium located in Appendix B of the guidebook. The spreadsheet allows the existing measures to be modified, and macros enable the user to generate and export a custom list of measures. Instructions for using the spreadsheet are found in Appendix C.
1 Chapter 1 Welcome to the Sustainability Performance Measures Userâs Guide 1 About This Guide 2 How Is It Organized? 3 Chapter 2 What Does Sustainability Mean to Transportation Agencies? 3 Guiding Principles of Sustainability 4 Sustainability and Sustainable Transportation 8 Using Performance Measures for Sustainability 10 Chapter 3 Getting Organized: Setting Yourself Up for Success 10 Understand Why You Are Doing This 11 Understand Where You Are Starting From 13 Phasing in a Performance Measurement Approach 14 Chapter 4 Understanding the Sustainability Performance Measurement Framework 14 Fundamental Components 15 Overarching Components 15 Auxiliary Components 16 Chapter 5 Using the Sustainability Performance Measurement Framework 16 Step 1âUnderstanding Sustainability 17 Step 2âDeveloping Transportation Sustainability Goals 21 Step 3âDeveloping Objectives 22 Step 4âDeveloping Performance Measures 24 Step 5âImplementing Performance Measures 27 Step 6âRefining the Framework and Applying Feedback 28 Chapter 6 Resources for Performance Measure Development and Application 28 Compendium of Objectives and Performance Measures 31 Examples of Use and Data Sources 31 Workshop Materials to Facilitate Performance Measurement Development 32 Chapter 7 Sustainability Measures Checklist 34 Chapter 8 Examples of Practice in Sustainability Measurement 34 What Are Some Agencies Doing? 46 Rating Systems for Sustainability 47 Chapter 9 Summary and Additional Resources C O N T E N T S
47 Summary 48 Additional Resources A-1 Appendix A Defining Sustainability for Your Agency B-1 Appendix B Performance Measures Compendium C-1 Appendix C Electronic Compendium User Instructions D-1 Appendix D Sustainability Performance Measure Examples E-1 Appendix E Data Sources F-1 Appendix F Case Studies and Rating System Summaries G-1 Appendix G Project Overview and Interactive Workshop Material H-1 Appendix H Glossary R-1 References Note: Many of the photographs, figures, and tables in this report have been converted from color to grayscale for printing. The electronic version of the report (posted on the Web at www.trb.org) retains the color versions.