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From page 177... ... 177 A P P E N D I X C Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing This appendix summarizes the findings of NCHRP Project 19-14, Task 2A: Synthesize Relevant Literature and Related Research. Given the relative newness of right-sizing as a topic, the content of the appendix combines insights that come directly from the research literature, as well as interpretative discussions of implications for right-sizing, based on expert knowledge and interpretation from the research team. Read the entire page →
From page 178... ... 178 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming struggle to balance the costs of continued expansion programs against the need for capital preservation activities, routine maintenance, and operations programs (U.S. Read the entire page →
From page 179... ... Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing 179 Figure 48 Tracing transportation revenue and spending. Source: Alex Mercuri, Nelson\Nygaard, based on 2015 Status of the Na n's Highways, Bridges, and Transit: Cond ons and Performance (FHWA and FTA) Read the entire page →
From page 180... ... 180 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming Figure 50 Eroding gas tax purchasing power. Figure 51 Trend in federal government investment. Read the entire page →
From page 181... ... Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing 181 Figure 52 Government investment as a percentage of gross domestic product. Funding gaps resulted in a considerable backlog of deferred investment needs (FHWA and FTA 2016; ASCE 2011) Read the entire page →
From page 182... ... 182 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming Geographic and Demographic Shifts States face a shifting landscape of challenges in the upcoming decades regarding transportation infrastructure. Most population projections expect the South and West regions to continue to grow, while the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, Great Lakes, and Plains states will see relatively stable populations (Zmud et al. Read the entire page →
From page 183... ... Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing 183 (http://www.strongtowns.org/) is an example of an emerging movement that promotes future development that minimizes costly infrastructure for its needs. Read the entire page →
From page 184... ... 184 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming Figure 54 Per capita vehicle miles traveled: 1992–2017. However, as Figures 53 and 54 show, the last 2 years have broken from the "new" trend, with sustained rates of VMT growth that have not been experienced since the 1980s (FHWA 2015) Read the entire page →
From page 185... ... Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing 185 Moreover, new technology such as autonomous and connected vehicles and new service provision models, as typified by transportation network companies, suggest that yet more disruption to our previous assumptions may be coming soon. For example, research suggests the increased use of autonomous vehicles is projected to result in a drastic reduction of transit usage due to saving travel time and more efficient use of roadway infrastructure (Fehr and Peers 2018) Read the entire page →
From page 186... ... 186 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming This is still a growing discipline in the investment management field, with much of the literature so far focusing on guidance for setting targets and determining what performance measurement will mean for agency business processes (Cambridge Systematics et al. 2010b; Louch 2012; Volpe National Transportation Systems Center 2012; Middleton and Regan 2015) Read the entire page →
From page 187... ... Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing 187 investment to facilities and programs that minimize risk from two types of uncertainty: (1) uncertainty regarding the performance needs of changing transportation markets and (2) Read the entire page →
From page 188... ... 188 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming Figure 55 Framework for performance-based planning. Using a performance-based framework to identify and resolve right-sizing scenarios will require selection of performance measures that allow agencies to reassess the role of investments in system performance from the perspective of the social or economic objectives of the system. Read the entire page →
From page 189... ... Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing 189 Balancing top-down and bottom-up processes Balancing consistency with flexibility Some of these identified tensions, and the need for corresponding flexibility, reflect a recognition that transportation markets and funding dynamics are constantly evolving but that agencies still require a defensible and workably consistent process for decision making. This may require additional communication and feedback between strategic planners, financial planning, and project development divisions. Read the entire page →
From page 190... ... 190 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming and solutions to maximize the available funding and materials. Likewise, the tools of the trade have evolved to help preserve the asset networkwide and properly forecast the useful life of any given asset. Read the entire page →
From page 191... ... Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing 191 target specific aspects of the pavement. These agencies can then manage the specific characteristic aspects while still monitoring and reporting the aggregated PCI vales. Read the entire page →
From page 192... ... 192 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming Similarly, trade-off analysis is a big topic in asset management, but it is complex. Few states have succeeded in developing an objective process or a decision-support tool to facilitate the allocation of funds across multiple investment uses. Read the entire page →
From page 193... ... Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing 193 advances are starting to be implemented by MPOs and states and could provide new tools for assessing transportation system needs. However, these more advanced modeling tools have been somewhat limited outside the research setting due to staffing constraints and the difficulty of compiling and maintaining the input data (Popper et al. Read the entire page →
From page 194... ... 194 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming The Foresight series (NCHRP Report 750: Strategic Issues Facing Transportation) is one of the key resources for agencies seeking insight into how to consider alternative scenarios in their business practices, with Volume 6: The Effects of Socio-Demographics on Future Travel Demand (Zmud et al. Read the entire page →
From page 195... ... Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing 195 Seeking to address these issues, NCHRP Report 806: Guide to Cross-Asset Resource Allocation analyz[ing] and communicat[ing] Read the entire page →
From page 196... ... 196 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming Existing Right-Sizing-Oriented Practices This section contains short discussions of specific areas of practice and research that have been identified as already bring oriented toward the challenges of right-sizing. While there are a number of specific subject areas that can be explored in further detail (e.g., developing life-cycle costs or land use perspectives) Read the entire page →
From page 197... ... Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing 197 communities served and higher-level DOT decision making, using their local knowledge and community input to ensure prioritization recognizes broader (and often harder-to-quantify) implications of low-volume road performance. Read the entire page →
From page 198... ... 198 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming In 1994, the Executive Order on Environmental Justice was signed. The Executive Order sought to ensure the full and fair participation by all potentially affected communities in the transportation decision-making process. Read the entire page →
From page 199... ... Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing 199 related activities to provide ideas and insights into practices and techniques that agencies have found to be most successful, as well as to explore challenges faced. Also produced during this period were Environmental Justice in Transportation: Emerging Trends and Best Practices (FHWA 2011a) Read the entire page →
From page 200... ... 200 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming The synthesis also described how practical design can result in downsizing or right-sizing of transportation systems at a project level (McGee 2013) : The focus of Practical Design is on cost reduction for individual projects so that the savings can be used on additional projects. Read the entire page →
From page 201... ... Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing 201 FHWA recently worked to encourage an evolution of practical design into performance-based practical design to embrace the performance-based approaches emphasized by FHWA. In outlining the case for this evolution, FHWA cited risks of too narrowly defined PD: A concern is that agencies may overemphasize short-term cost savings without a clear understanding of how such decisions could impact other objectives (such as safety and operational performance, context sensitivity, life-cycle costs, long-range corridor goals, livability, and sustainability) Read the entire page →
From page 202... ... 202 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming Because of demographic changes, different countries have endeavored to reassess the right-size of transportation infrastructure, with the urgency of this reassessment depending in part on how scarce the available funds for maintaining, operating, and improving the transportation networks are relative to the experienced and forecast demographic change. This section summarizes some recent international examples of this type of reassessment. Read the entire page →
From page 203... ... Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing 203 Federal Road Office but does not provide additional benefits for the affected city or region. If local and regional authorities wish to benefit from additional improvements (e.g., additional highway interchanges allowing for more local traffic using the national highway or longer tunnels to protect urbanized areas from noise and fragmentation) Read the entire page →
From page 204... ... 204 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming barriers to full adoption may mean agencies also could continue to rely on traditional models as well. With respect to low-volume roadway prioritization, states are still using approaches such as earmarks to ensure some minimum level of investment is secured. Read the entire page →
From page 205... ... Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing 205 Booz Allen Hamilton. Read the entire page →
From page 206... ... 206 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming Casper, C., D Cutler, N Read the entire page →
From page 207... ... Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing 207 EPA. Read the entire page →
From page 208... ... 208 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming Flannery, A., J Manns, and M Read the entire page →
From page 209... ... Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing 209 Grant, M., T Plaskon, S Read the entire page →
From page 210... ... 210 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming Middleton, S., and T Regan. Read the entire page →
From page 211... ... Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing 211 Popper, S., N Kalra, R Read the entire page →
From page 212... ... 212 Right-Sizing Transportation Investments: A Guidebook for Planning and Programming United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division. Read the entire page →

From page 177...

... 177 A P P E N D I X C Synthesis of the Literature and Practice with Interpretation of Relevance for Right-Sizing This appendix summarizes the findings of NCHRP Project 19-14, Task 2A: Synthesize Relevant Literature and Related Research. Given the relative newness of right-sizing as a topic, the content of the appendix combines insights that come directly from the research literature, as well as interpretative discussions of implications for right-sizing, based on expert knowledge and interpretation from the research team.