Long Description: Traffic Management Plan Checklist - Step 2
Step 2. Site Access and Parking Planning (separate plans for ingress and egress)
Assessment: Lot assignment
If Assessment applies:
- Efficiently distribute the flow of traffic
- Minimize the superimposition of traffic flow on a single access road section
- Separate pedestrian, automobile, and bus/taxi/limo traffic
- Accommodate group needs
- Factors influencing lot assignment include:
- On-site parking location
- Off-site parking location
- Disabled parking
- Reserved (VIP/permit) parking
- Participant parking
- Valet parking
- Media parking
- Employee parking
- Bus parking
- Recreational vehicle parking
- Taxi/limo staging
- Emergency Vehicle staging
Assessment: Vehicle access and circulation
If Assessment applies:
- Identify operations strategies that prevent potential congestion on parking area access roads and allow for good circulation on roadways surrounding the event site
- Evaluate: (1) parking area ingress, (2) pick-ups and drop-offs, and (3) parking area egress
Tips/Examples:
- Parking area ingress tactics:
- Right turn circulation pattern
- Contraflow operation
- Shoulder utilization
- Lane channelization
- Parking area overflow access points
- Pick-up and drop-off tactics:
- Use of off-street areas
- Designation of pick-up/drop-off areas to avoid conflict with primary traffic ingress/egress routes
- Storage area
- Parking area egress tactics:
- Right turn circulation pattern
- Preservation of adjacent street flow
- Provision of rapid parking area unloading
Assessment: Parking area design and operation
If Assessment applies:
- Evaluate operations strategies for processing vehicles at parking area access points
- Minimize pedestrian / vehicular conflicts inside parking areas.
- Survey the parking area(s) and mitigate any features (e.g., ditches, sand, and humps) that may unnecessarily slow vehicles traversing a parking area
Tips/Examples:
- Vehicle processing tactics:
- Manual transaction
- Permit display
- Automated transaction
- Manual transaction refers to cash transactions made between a driver and human server, and vehicle service times may average as high as 12 seconds
- Access points to a permit-only parking area operate like a free parking area, and vehicle headways average approx. 4 seconds
- An automated transaction involves deployment of an electronic fee collection system
Assessment: Parking occupancy monitoring
If Assessment applies:
- Develop a detail for monitoring parking area(s) occupancy levels for the ingress period so that the traffic management team can make a "lot full" decision at a time when all vehicles between the parking area access point and traveler information devices directing motorists to the parking area (i.e., the pipeline) can still park at the subject lot(s)
- Determine pipeline capacity by dividing the defined pipeline length (account for multiple travel lanes) by the average spacing of moving vehicles (typically 30-40 feet)
Tips/Examples:
- Two methods for making a "lot full" decision in the field include: (1) vehicle count at parking area access points and (2) visual inspection
- The vehicle count method involves conducting a manual or machine count at the downstream pipeline end beginning at the start of parking area load-in to determine the number of vehicles that have entered the parking lot. The following equation defines a "lot full" decision: (Capacity of parking area) - (Vehicle count) - (Pipeline capacity) = 0 (Lot full)
- The visual inspection method involves the traffic management team or parking operators making a "lot full" decision based on comparing a visual estimate of available parking spaces to the pipeline capacity
