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Suggested Citation:"CHAPTER ONE - INTRODUCTION." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2004. Integrating Tourism and Recreation Travel with Transportation Planning and Project Delivery. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/23369.
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Suggested Citation:"CHAPTER ONE - INTRODUCTION." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2004. Integrating Tourism and Recreation Travel with Transportation Planning and Project Delivery. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/23369.
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Suggested Citation:"CHAPTER ONE - INTRODUCTION." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2004. Integrating Tourism and Recreation Travel with Transportation Planning and Project Delivery. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/23369.
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5 CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION This chapter describes the motivation for this study, fol- lowed by a brief chronology of federal legislation that has prompted state and regional transportation agencies to in- tegrate tourism-related travel issues into transportation de- cision making and project delivery. The data collection and methodology used in this study are also summarized. STUDY MOTIVATION Transportation facilities can span all modes of travel— highways, aviation, waterways, public transit, and rail- roads. Any and all of these modes may be relevant for tour- ism or recreational travel. Recreational facilities can in- clude parks, stadiums, sporting facilities, and beaches. Tourism sites are attractions for outsiders as well as local residents and may include recreational facilities as well as cultural attractions (such as historical, musical, or educa- tional facilities). Any type of recreational or tourism facil- ity can have special transportation needs. The TRB Task Force on Transportation Needs for Na- tional Parks and Public Lands (A5T55) articulated the need to gauge how well and how often tourism and recreational travel needs and objectives are included in the transporta- tion planning and project delivery activities of state de- partments of transportation (DOTs) and metropolitan plan- ning organizations (MPOs). This assessment was to consider the wide breadth of issues that arise at the inter- section of tourism travel and the transportation system cur- rently available to carry visitors into, out of, and around a region for nonwork-related trips. This study was designed to explore the following issues: • Technical analysis tools for forecasting tourism, visi- tor, and recreation travel demand; • Assessment of the effects of this demand on transport system performance and the economy; • Institutional relationships and partnerships; • Stakeholder involvement techniques; • Integration of state, MPO, and federal plans, proc- esses, programming, and decision making; • Advantages, limitations, and effectiveness of alterna- tive strategies, including best practices and strategies previously identified in NCHRP Report 419: Tourism Travel and Transportation System Development; • Innovative financing; and • Best practice case studies. These issues span multiple types of public agencies and thus often require some form of partnership across bounda- ries—that is, across state, regional, and local boundaries; across tourism and transportation planning boundaries; and across the public-sector/private-sector boundaries—to suc- cessfully address tourism travel needs in relevant transpor- tation projects. The specific needs associated with developing and serv- ing tourism travel fall into three main classes. • Information needs—Visitors to tourism and recrea- tion sites often need guidance on how to access those facilities and sometimes also suggestions regarding routing, scheduling choice of destinations, and modal options. These needs can be served through welcome centers, information displays or kiosks, web-based resources, 511 traveler systems, specialized road maps, and signage. • Facility investment needs—Travel to tourism and recreation sites is often concentrated in certain sea- sons or on weekends or days of special scheduled events. Sometimes there are also special needs for parking or scenic pullovers. All of these conditions represent unique demands on transportation facilities. There may be needs for special types of improve- ments to address congestion, air quality preservation, safety, and design of roads and other facilities, as well as the provision of alternative modes of access into and within these facilities. • Promotion needs or opportunities—Because there are potential economic benefits of tourism development, tourism and recreation agencies sometimes seek to promote visitation to natural and man-made attrac- tions (particularly when there are underutilized re- sources available to serve this demand). Transporta- tion agencies do not typically promote increased travel demand, although there are some notable ex- ceptions such as scenic byways and scenic railroads (attractions in their own rights) and bypass or alterna- tive routes (that relieve congestion on primary routes to attractions). Signage, advertising, and brochures may all be used as tools to help address these needs. All of the above-cited projects and investments may be addressed through individual projects at specific sites or through broader statewide or regional programs. The fac- tors influencing how multiple agencies/entities have been

6 working together to define and deliver transportation re- sources that support tourism travel is discussed next. BACKGROUND ON EVOLVING MANDATES GUIDING THE PLANNING OF STATE DEPARTMENTS OF TRANSPORTATION AND METROPOLITAN PLANNING OFFICES Public agencies can be involved in the development of facilities and support services for tourism and recreation- related travel in a variety of ways, including defining pol- icy, planning and design, funding, implementation of new facilities, and/or operation of facilities and programs. It is important to note that some of these forms of in- volvement occur as part of the normal roles of transporta- tion, tourism, and recreation agencies acting alone. The act of coordination among agencies typically requires some additional effort to establish interagency working relation- ships. However, examples do exist of state DOTs and MPOs that have long-established track records of “thinking integrally” during the transportation planning process re- gardless of whether or not they have formal mandates to do so. Starting in the late 1950s, numerous federal laws (vari- ous highway acts and environmental laws) and more recent federal transportation programs [e.g., the Intermodal Sur- face Transportation Efficiency Act of 1991 (ISTEA), Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century (TEA-21), and Transportation Community and System Preservation (TCSP) Pilot Program] describe the mandates for state DOTs and MPOs to integrate their planning processes. In addition to these federal requirements some states may also be fulfilling directives from the governor’s office to sup- port tourism as a means of economic growth. The Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1962, successor to the 1950 and 1956 acts, established a formal paradigm for the planning process in metropolitan areas, labeled the “3C” (continuous, coordinated, and cooperative) process. MPOs were formally established by the mid-1960s to carry out the federally financed, local transportation planning efforts within this structure. Emphasis was placed on public par- ticipation in the process, an idea required as a result of the first Federal-Aid Highway Act. Various environmental acts [including Section 4(f) of the U.S.DOT Act of 1966; air and water quality; species, habitat, historic, and cultural preservation; environmental justice; and National Envi- ronmental Policy Act (NEPA) regulations] were introduced from the 1960s through the 1980s to further expand re- quirements on the transportation development process at both regional and state levels. In 1997, the U.S.DOT and the U.S. Department of the Interior signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) in which the two federal depart- ments agreed to collaborate in addressing transportation needs in and around national parks and other federal lands. Opportunities for transportation agencies to assist in tourism and recreational development have been explicitly defined in the U.S. federal transportation policy that has evolved since 1991. ISTEA, legislated in 1991, provided explicit funding for a national scenic byways program, including interpretive facilities, overlooks, and tourist in- formation about byways. It also provided funding for rec- reational trail projects and other recreation-related trans- portation enhancement projects. The legislation specified 15 aspects that MPOs were required to fulfill during their planning activities, and 23 factors (some identical to those pertaining to the MPO) for state DOTs. Specifically, MPO planning activities should consider access to national parks, recreation areas, monuments, and historic sites, as well as how their transportation decisions affect the re- gional economy. State DOTs are to plan for adding bicycle facilities and pedestrian facilities to a project, where appropri- ate, and invest in strategies to adjoin state and local roads that support rural economic growth and tourism development, and multipurpose land management practices, including recrea- tional development. ISTEA funds were provided to accom- modate the institutional investment required to bring the en- tire planning processes to fruition. In 1995, with subsequent changes to ISTEA, an addi- tional state DOT factor was added under the National Highway System Program (Section 101) mandating “pro- motion of tourism and recreational travel.” This expansion of the funding scope was reinforced by other ISTEA require- ments mandating that local governments be involved in de- veloping regional transportation plans and that transportation planning processes be strengthened by local participation. In this way, local interests in tourism and economic development could provide direct input to transportation plans. TEA-21 was signed into law in 1998. It continued pro- grams that were originally developed under ISTEA and added new funding initiatives and project funding criteria related to improving safety, enhancing communities and the natural environment, and advancing economic growth and competitiveness. These additional criteria further ex- panded the extent to which projects could be justified and funded to serve tourism and recreation-related travel. TEA- 21 specifically expanded program funding by including an allowance for funding transportation museum projects, a Ferry Boat and Ferry Terminal Facilities Program, a Na- tional Historic Covered Bridge Program, and deployment of intelligent transportation systems (ITS) and advanced transit for national parks. The net effect of this program evolution is that it has served to encourage state transportation departments (and MPOs) to think more broadly about the range of ways in

7 which transportation investments interact with other activi- ties, including specifically the development of tourism and recreational activity. Although new authorizing federal leg- islation is soon expected to replace TEA-21, these funda- mental themes for defining the range of transportation pro- jects and purposes are expected to continue. The same can be said for the support of the integration of planning among various federal, state, and local agencies. METHODOLOGY This synthesis is based on three types of information: (1) a literature review drawn predominantly from TRB publica- tions, conference proceedings, academic publications, and state DOT reports; (2) a survey of agency practice distrib- uted to state DOTs, MPOs, state tourism and parks depart- ments, federal land management agencies, and regional planning agencies (RPAs); and (3) case studies as identi- fied by the literature, the survey, or additional research. The survey was designed to profile the range of activi- ties being undertaken by state transportation agencies and also to provide insight into the extent of their involvement with RPAs, as well as state tourism and recreational agen- cies. It was sent to all state DOTs and also to correspond- ing state tourism and parks and recreation offices. In addi- tion, metropolitan and regional planning agencies were invited to participate through announcements by the Na- tional Association of Regional Councils, the Association of Metropolitan Transportation Organizations, and the Na- tional Association of Development Officials. Overall, 27 responses were received from state transportation depart- ments and 14 from other agencies. A further discussion of the survey outcome and findings is provided in chapter three. The survey instrument is shown in Appendix A, and Appendix B provides a roster of the survey respondents and summarizes their responses. The qualitative nature of responses to several open-ended questions are not con- densed into this summary, but instead are reflected in the presentations in chapter three. The specific topics covered by the survey were • Types of agencies involved in tourism, recreation, and transportation planning; • Agency priorities and concerns; • Forms of multi-agency coordination; • Funding and implementation priorities; • Data analysis and evaluation; and • Identification of successful planning or project deliv- ery activities. REPORT ORGANIZATION The remainder of this report is organized into three chap- ters. Chapter two presents a review of the literature and re- cent research on the subject of transportation and tourism travel planning. Chapter three reviews the state of existing practice regarding the inclusion of tourism travel in trans- portation planning as revealed by the results of a survey of agencies and by relevant case studies addresses multi- agency collaboration, analytical resources, and project so- lutions. Chapter four provides conclusions and recommen- dations drawn from this study.

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TRB’s National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP) Synthesis 329: Integrating Tourism and Recreation Travel with Transportation Planning and Project Delivery provides an overview of current practice at transportation agencies, metropolitan planning organizations, state tourism and parks departments, federal land management agencies, and regional planning agencies. Overall, findings reveal that many state departments of transportation (DOTs) are now actively involved in tourism-related planning issues -- either proactively or in building solutions to infrastructure, access, or environmental issues that impinge on the success of tourism in the region.

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