Nevada Department of Transportation’s (NDOT) Highway Freight Network is composed of six components. Critical Rural Freight Corridors (CFRC) and Critical Urban Freight Corridors (CUFC) are two of the six components being highlighted here. Both are defined in the FAST Act and each has a total mileage cap (defined by USDOT). While Critical Rural and Critical Urban Freight Corridors are optional designations, including them in a state’s defined freight network allows these roadways to be eligible for certain types of federal funding opportunities.

Defining Nevada’s CFRC and CUFC involved a multi-tiered process. The state’s Freight Advisory Committee (FAC) provided feedback on the basic criteria used to identify the initial set of roadways to be considered for the CFRC and CUFC designation. The types of criteria included annual average daily truck traffic (AADTT) thresholds, key linkages to the urban network or key economic development areas, and route redundancy. The initial set of roadways were then reviewed through one-on-one meetings with each of the state’s Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs). Additional feedback from the MPOs resulted in a final list of 141 roadway segments with each segment being classified as either rural or urban.

As the total mileage for both the rural and urban segments exceeded the maximum allowable designated mileage for each of the CURC and CUFC, a multi-objective decision analysis (MODA) tool was used to prioritize the 141 roadway segments based on specified criteria. The top scoring rural and urban roadway segments, up to the allowable maximum mileage, were deemed the most critical and selected for the respective CRFC or CUFC designation.

NDOT’s MODA tool, developed for the evaluation of CRFC and CUFC within Nevada, included the following four equally weighted criteria: AADTT, access to intermodal facilities (scored 0 to 3 based on the number of modes served), access to freight dependent employment centers (scored 0 to 3 based on the density of and direct or indirect access to an existing or planned freight-dependent employment cluster), and potential role in advancing the development of the I-11 corridor (scored 0 to 2 based on whether or not the roadway has been identified for potential inclusion in the I-11 corridor). Each of the criteria are detailed in the NDOT’s State Freight Plan with data source, rationale, and scoring criteria. The resulting scores are provided in the plan for full transparency.

For NDOT, the MODA tool has been a successful approach for prioritizing CRFC and CUFC. The MODA tool is flexible and adaptable to changing criteria and for use in different applications. For example, NDOT also utilized a MODA tool, with different criteria, to score and prioritize projects within its State Freight Plan and a MODA tool is being developed for use in prioritizing projects in the state’s long range transportation plan.

Takeaways for other agencies:

• Developing a prioritization tool such as MODA can provide a mechanism to prioritize roadways or projects based on criteria that are adaptable to a state’s needs or priorities.
• Having a clearly defined process and evaluation criteria for making decisions improves transparency with stakeholders and the general public during the state freight planning process.
• Your state FAC and MPOs are key partners offering different types of expert and local knowledge. Consider how, when, and the frequency to engage your state FAC and MPOs at key points in your state freight planning process.

Read more about Nevada’s MODA tool in Appendix 1: https://www.dot.nv.gov/mobility/freight-planning/nevada-freight-plan

Truck parking availability is a critical freight infrastructure component in Arkansas, but often is hard to quantify. Since 2006, the Arkansas Department of Transportation (ARDOT) has conducted truck parking field surveys. Fifteen teams of two people, each based in different ARDOT offices across the State, conduct the surveys by periodically driving major highway routes to count truck parking spaces and occupancy at both public and private facilities in their areas of the State. The teams then report their findings to a centralized team at ARDOT headquarters. The results of the survey provide insights into the total number of truck parking spaces available, instances of overcrowding, and number of legally and illegally parked trucks. An online web-based GIS provides the results for all locations surveyed. Within the State Freight Plan, the results of the survey are aggregated by highway exits for analysis.

Federal hours-of-service regulations have created a shortage of truck parking infrastructure, as drivers must stop and rest at defined intervals. While ARDOT’s freight team has limited capacity, their ability to collaborate across the agency has allowed them to build a novel and useful truck parking data set to inform where there is a high demand for truck parking and prioritize limited funds for expansion of existing truck parking facilities or construction of new truck parking facilities in the state.

Takeaways for other agencies:

• Agency-wide collaboration can help a small freight team achieve more; consider asking partners to help fill your most important data gaps in creative, low-tech methods where other decision-support tools do not exist (or are cost prohibitive).
• Incorporate data collection into existing processes.
• Leverage regional employees to reduce the burden from any one person. These individuals also bring valuable local knowledge insights.
• Collect data that can help inform specific decisions.

The Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) developed its statewide Freight and Goods Transportation System (FGTS) to identify and designate freight corridors based on freight tonnage and their importance to freight movement. The FGTS network uses statewide truck, rail, and waterway freight volumes to identify the highest-volume freight routes in the state supporting the industries that are most important to Washington.

FGTS helps to enhance and standardize freight data and availability across partner organizations, and provides a consistent source of information across the state. WSDOT works with county and local governments across the state every two years to collect data, such as truck volumes and tonnage on local roads, and update freight network designations. The collaborative contribution from local partners helps improve the FGTS which supports various transportation planning processes and informs freight investment decisions across the state. For example, the State’s Freight Mobility Strategic Investment Board uses this designation to establish project selection criteria for its grant program.

The results of FGTS is a focused, coherent freight network designation that 1) is based on current freight volume data; 2) considers economic development (FGTS network connects different parts of the state that produce or export WA goods); and 3) incorporates resiliency by identifying redundant routes.

Takeaways for other agencies:

• Some counties, municipalities, and regions collect local freight volume data, which may be used in combination with statewide travel models and freight flow data to create a more nuanced look into goods movement across the State.
• Identifying data-based evaluation criteria can help a State objectively prioritize its freight investments. In WSDOT, freight projects are evaluated based on various criteria, including how would they improve the high-volume freight routes and support regional and state economy. However, another agency may choose to rank projects based on expected improvements to reliability, mobility, etc.

Learn more about WSDOT’s FGTS: https://wsdot.wa.gov/freight/fgts

Learn more about WSDOT’s freight project prioritization framework: https://wsdot.wa.gov/sites/default/files/2014/09/22/FreightInvestmentPlan_Appendix_A_9_11_19_v2.pdf