Making the Connection: Advancing Traffic Incident Management in Transportation Planning

1. Introduction

In the Philadelphia region, local and State emergency responders learn about traffic incidents in real time from a web-based network connecting highway operations centers, 9-1-1 call centers, and responders in their vehicles. In Hampton Roads, Virginia, State police are clearing incidents more quickly with two new total incident investigation stations funded in the metropolitan transportation program. Incident responders in North Florida and beyond are now more aware of how to protect themselves and other motorists at incident scenes and work seamlessly with fellow responders from other disciplines to quickly clear incidents thanks to a major training program led by the metropolitan planning organization. In the Genesee-Finger Lakes, New York region, a strategic plan for transportation operations has elevated the priorities and needs of traffic incident management professionals for current and future investment decisions. In Atlanta, incident responders review infrastructure designs to ensure that incident response requirements, such as water connections and turnaround locations on highways, are planned and implemented. How did these regions make it happen? It begins with creating a strong relationship between traffic incident management and transportation planning.

Bridging the Divide between Traffic Incident Management (TIM) and Transportation Planning

Transportation planners and traffic incident management professionals are two groups of professionals who traditionally have had little interaction, but there are real and sustainable benefits to be gained for incident responders, planners, and the traveling public when the connection is made. In the examples mentioned above, tangible improvements for TIM happened when metropolitan transportation planners and incident responders began working together.

On the surface, planners and TIM professionals appear to have little in common. Planners focus on envisioning transportation systems and communities in the future, coordinating stakeholders, and preparing planning documentation, whereas TIM professionals operate in the present, dealing with immediate needs of managing the safe and efficient detection and clearance of traffic incidents on a daily basis. They have far different work cultures and talk in terms that are unfamiliar to the other group. Despite their significant differences, however, transportation planners and TIM professionals have important goals in common – safety and mobility for all road users. By working together, TIM professionals and planners can offer each other crucial pieces of the puzzle for making significant gains in safety and mobility.

TIM professionals need greater access to funding, equipment, and other resources as well as better coordination among responders regionally. By working with planners and connecting to the regional or statewide planning process, TIM professionals increase their opportunities for accessing resources and interacting with other TIM professionals across the region. By interacting with regional or statewide planning organizations, TIM professionals can increase the visibility of TIM as a vital public service that reduces costly congestion.

Despite their significant differences, transportation planners and TIM professionals have important goals in common – safety and mobility for all road users.

Planners in regions and States faced with dwindling public funds to improve mobility need low-cost strategies that allow regions to get the most use out of their current transportation infrastructure. Traffic incidents may cause significant regional roadway congestion, and some metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs) in lower population density areas view incidents to be their greatest congestion source. Planners find that they must account for incident management if they are to address congestion adequately. TIM is a low-cost way of reducing congestion that has a very high return on investment – using a traffic simulation program, analysts determined that Maryland State Highway Agency's Coordinated Highways Action Response Team (CHART) program reduced travel delay on major Maryland corridors by 32.43 million vehicle-hours in 2009, equating to a savings in delay, fuel, and emissions valued at more than $1 billion.¹ Additionally, with the 2012 passage of the Federal surface transportation legislation, Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act (MAP-21), there is a greater shift toward the use of performance- based planning in which transportation system performance measures and data are used to make planning and investment decisions. Collaboration with TIM professionals is important in developing, tracking, and meeting operations-related objectives and measures.

Purpose and Audience for Primer

The intent of this primer is to inform and guide TIM professionals and transportation planners to initiate and develop collaborative relationships and advance TIM programs through the metropolitan planning process. The primer aims to inspire planners and TIM professionals to create transportation plans and programs that support regional TIM programs through TIM-focused objectives, performance measures, and TIM strategies and projects. The ultimate goal of this primer is to strengthen, support, and elevate regional TIM programs as a crucial, lower-cost strategy for reliability, safety, environmental improvements, and mobility. The primary audiences for this primer are transportation planners, TIM program leaders, and managers and supervisors involved in TIM operations from organizations such as law enforcement, State and local departments of transportation, fire and rescue, emergency medical services (EMS), public safety communications, emergency management, towing and recovery, hazardous materials response teams/contractors, medical examiners/coroners, and transit providers.

"We don't just prioritize traffic incident management because it's effective. We rely on it because it's cost-effective." — Richard Perrin, Executive Director, Genesee Transportation Council

Throughout this primer, examples from across the country are provided to illustrate effective practices in linking TIM and planning. Examples are drawn from these metropolitan areas listed in order of increasing population size:²

• Madison, Wisconsin (Madison Area Transportation Planning Board)
• Genesee-Finger Lakes Region, New York (Genesee Transportation Council)
• Tucson, Arizona (Pima Association of Governments)
• Jacksonville, Florida (North Florida Transportation Planning Organization)
• Portland, Oregon (Metro)
• Chesapeake, Virginia (Hampton Roads Transportation Planning Organization)
• Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (Southwestern Pennsylvania Commission)
• Denver, Colorado (Denver Regional Council of Governments)
• Phoenix, Arizona (Maricopa Association of Governments)
• Detroit, Michigan (Southeast Michigan Council of Governments)
• Atlanta, Georgia (Atlanta Regional Commission)
• Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission)
• San Francisco, California (Metropolitan Transportation Commission)