Third Senior Executive Transportation and Public Safety Summit: Final Report

1. Introduction

The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) is committed to a safe and efficient highway system. To that end, the FHWA Office of Operations Traffic Incident Management (TIM) Program targets efforts to improve responder and motorist safety, while advancing incident mitigation tools, techniques, and processes. To move the National TIM Program forward, FHWA sponsored the first Senior Executive Transportation and Public Safety Summit in June 2012. During this first summit, approximately 60 executives and senior managers from all responder disciplines came together to discuss ways to advance responder and motorist safety while mitigating incident duration and impact.

The TIM Executive Leadership Group (ELG) was convened as a recommendation from the 2012 summit and currently includes the following 11 member organizations:

1. American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO).
2. American Public Works Association (APWA).
3. FHWA.
4. International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP).
5. International Association of Fire Chiefs (IAFC).
6. National Association of State emergency medical service (EMS) officials (NASEMSO).
7. National EMS Management Association (NEMSMA).
8. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).
9. National Sheriffs’ Association (NSA).
10. National Volunteer Fire Council (NVFC).
11. Towing and Recovery Association of America (TRAA).

By exercising the TIM ELG spheres of influence, member agencies have championed recommendations from the 2012 and 2015 summits, making significant advances through:

• Responder Training—The FHWA Every Day Counts Round 2 (EDC-2) National Traffic Incident Management Responder Training (SHRP 2) Program has trained over 440,000 responders and the public safety, transportation, and towing and recovery responder communities have supported the program. Over 115 public safety academies or colleges have adopted the training.
• Performance Measures to Improve TIM—The FHWA Every Day Counts 4 Program improved on the collection, analysis, and use of data to improve safety and mitigate incident impacts within more than 30 States. Statewide crash reports are now including data fields related to secondary crash and responders struck characteristics. Over 90 TIM programs throughout the Nation now routinely conduct TIM program self-assessments.
• TIM Program Institutionalization—Over 100 multidisciplinary regional and State TIM organizations now meet quarterly (or more) to implement best practices and focus on policy, technology, training, and outreach to improve TIM.
• Broader Public Awareness—The Annual National Traffic Incident Response Awareness Week (NTIRAW) is increasing public awareness about the dangers emergency responders face when reacting to traffic incidents. In 2019, over 40 States led multidisciplinary, State-specific NTIRAW events.

The TIM ELG member organizations, through strong consensus, proposed this third Senior Executive Transportation and Public Safety Summit held on November 14–15, 2019, in concert with NTIRAW. The one-and-a half-day event, sponsored by the FHWA and the NHTSA, was held at three venues—the National Museum of the U.S. Navy; the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) Headquarters; and the USDOT 3^rd Street Plaza, Washington, DC. The USDOT Secretary of Transportation, three modal administrators, four elected officials, 20+ national associations and organizations, and 120 participants interacted across eight topical sessions and a group discussion session. The summit offered participants the opportunity to reflect on progress made in the deployment of TIM since the 2015 gathering, to assess the current state of the practice, and to look ahead to a future vision of traffic incident management.

Guest speakers included USDOT Secretary Elaine L. Chao; U.S. Representative John H. Rutherford (FL-4), FHWA Administrator Nicole R. Nason, NHTSA Acting Administrator James Owen, and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) Deputy Administrator Jim Mullen. The FHWA Office of Operations’ Office of Transportation Operations Director Mark Kehrli served as facilitator for the summit. Section 2 of this report highlights the messages delivered by these speakers. Section 11 of this report summarizes the information offered by FHWA Office of Operations Associate Administrator Martin C. Knopp as he presided over the NTIRAW event, and the message shared by the NTIRAW featured speaker, retired Pennsylvania State police sergeant and retired Marine, Robert Bemis.

Eight topical sessions throughout the two days fostered dialogue and defined actions to advance TIM and the FHWA Office of Operations TIM Program goal to improve continuously the responders and road users’ safety, travel reliability, and incident and emergency response efficiency. The report organizes these sessions as follows:

• TIM ELG Member Context Setting.
• Advancing TIM through Vision Zero, Road to Zero, and Towards Zero Deaths.
• Strategies to Accelerate Responder Training.
• Using Data to Improve TIM.
• Advancing Local TIM through Partnerships.
• State and Local Legislation for TIM.
• Building Public Education and Outreach Momentum for TIM.
• Improving TIM Through Technology.

Section 12 highlights the group discussion session and lists recommendations voiced at the summit and further refined by the TIM ELG. Section 13 includes the summit agenda, presenter biographies, and the summit participant list.