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21st Century Operations Using 21st Century Technologies
Table of Contents

Maryland State Highway Administration Pilot of the Data Business Plan Guide for State and Local Departments of Transportation: Data Business Plan

Chapter 1. Introduction

Maryland Department of Transportation (MDOT) State Highway Administration (SHA) has developed a number of initiatives and partnerships that have helped the agency reach a highly mature stage in their mobility data management practices. Among these are 1) the Transportation System Management & Operations (TSMO) Strategic Implementation Plan, which institutionalizes planning for operations in Maryland; 2) The Strategic Highway Research Program (SHRP 2) L06 implementation assistance from the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), focusing on providing reliable travel time and performance-based planning; and 3) the Reliability Roadmap that implements a four-step process for managing congestion.

The TSMO Strategic Implementation Plan includes a vision to "maximize mobility and reliable travel for people and goods within Maryland by efficient use of management and operations of transportation systems". The third goal in the plan is to "Develop data-and performance-driven approaches to support TSMO planning, programming, implementation, and evaluation decisions". The Implementation Plan identified the need for a Data Business Plan (DBP) to organize mobility data pertaining to planning and operations. At the same time, FHWA approached MDOT SHA to conduct a pilot DBP to test a draft FHWA Data Business Plan Guidance for State and Local DOTs. This DBP serves both as a pilot for FHWA and as a plan for continuing to improve the management and governance of mobility data at MDOT SHA.

As far as external collaboration, MDOT SHA has existing relationships with data repositories (e.g., University of Maryland's Center for Advanced Transportation Technology (CATT) Lab) as well as providers of data—including speed, asset, and traffic count data. The agency has a strong interest in bringing asset and performance data together, and to involve MPOs and other jurisdictions to be able to more easily coordinate in strategic and tactical processes. Data management and governance is of crucial importance for SHA to move forward in these efforts.

However, many of these initiatives have been conducted somewhat independently, and while a number of MDOT SHA's offices already have established their own data processes, the agency would greatly benefit from having a unified Mobility DBP to help synchronize all the existing efforts and build upon each other's strengths. MDOT SHA has already built momentum for this to happen through recent efforts:

  • Created a new office for Performance Management.
  • Developed a Mobility Dashboard.
  • Has expanded Enterprise Geographic Information System (eGIS) (now in its 6th year)—This is an online platform, with about 2,000 internal users, that stores basemaps, map services and widgets and enables their use without requiring an ArcGIS license. They have developed data governance, including identifying data stewards, are finishing an inventory of the authoritative data layers they have, and are developing a catalog and metadata.

Scope

Despite the fact that different MDOT SHA offices have collaborated in their data efforts in the past, there is an important need to identify common data sets, common performance measures, and to establish a governance structure that helps identify roles and responsibilities for each office. Specifically, this DBP aims to develop a mobility DBP Framework that includes automobile and freight traffic volume and speed. The Framework will also support data associated with travel origin/destination (O/D) movements, accessibility to transportation, work zone performance, data available from signals related to signal timing, and data generated by connected/automated vehicles. These data topics were prioritized as part of this DBP as follows:

  • Tier 1. Traffic volume and speed.
  • Tier 2. Origin/Destination, accessibility, truck freight, work zone, and signal timing.
  • Tier 3. Connected and Automated Vehicle.

The tiers are intended to assist with prioritizing action items in the Plan. The data elements are described in more detail in Section 3 of this Plan.

The Framework developed in this Plan represents the interaction, structure, and components for MDOT SHA to integrate and report on mobility data. It has three components:

  • Data—Description of data elements including data inventory and required improvements related to availability, timeliness, coverage, and quality.
  • Architecture—A high-level description of the interaction between databases and tools to support use of the integrated mobility data.
  • Governance—Components of an institutional structure describing roles and responsibilities related to ensuring all data is available and able to be integrated.

In summary, this Plan is intended to be:

  1. A high-level action plan for improving mobility data and serve as the TSMO DBP recommended in the TSMO Strategic Plan.
  2. A pilot of the FHWA Data Business Plan Guidance for State and Local DOTs.
  3. An example of how other areas within MDOT SHA could approach the process of developing similar plans.
  4. Documentation of existing GIS related data governance and recommendations for MDOT SHA to enhance data governance activities at an enterprise level.

Organization

The remainder of the DBP is organized as follows:

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