Making the Connection: Advancing Traffic Incident Management in Transportation Planning

Transmittal Letter

US Department of Transportation
Federal Highway Administration
1200 New Jersey Ave., SE
Washington, DC 20590

September 11, 2013

Dear Colleague:

Unexpected delays caused by traffic incidents contribute significantly to Americans' safety and productivity. The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) recognizes the importance of traffic incident management (TIM) and sees a significant opportunity for the metropolitan transportation planning process to support and sustain these efforts. The purpose of this primer is to showcase how transportation planners and TIM professionals can work together to create transportation long term plans and programs that support regional objectives, performance measures, and strategies to improve safety and reliability.

The great challenge in writing this primer, however, mirrors the challenge inherent in the planning process as a whole, i.e. finding ways to help very different and very diverse sets of stakeholders understand the benefits of reaching across institutional and cultural divides in order to work together to achieve common safety and mobility objectives. This primer does that by sharing the experiences of planners and operators who have partnered successfully to overcome the challenges and realize the benefits of collaboration and coordination – concepts both planners and incident responders embrace daily in their respective activities.

The audience for the primer includes TIM program leaders, managers and supervisors involved in TIM operations as well as transportation planners from State, regional, or metropolitan planning organizations. The contents feature the following:

• Opportunities to integrate TIM into the planning process,
• Explains the players in the regional planning process as well as in the TIM community,
• Case studies of successful collaboration,
• Examples of TIM incorporated into a metropolitan transportation plan, and
• Information sheets that provide sample regional TIM objectives, performance measures, and strategies.

We look forward to receiving your feedback, reactions, and experiences in implementing these concepts. Please direct any comments, questions, and suggestions to Wayne Berman at Wayne.Berman@dot.gov, 202-366-4069 or Laurie Radow at laurie.radow@dot.gov, 202-366-2855.

Robert E. Arnold, Director Office of Transportation Management

Mark R. Kehrli Director, Office of Transportation Operations