Getting More by Working Together — Opportunities for Linking Planning and Operations

1. Background and Purpose

1.1 WHAT DO WE MEAN BY LINKING PLANNING AND OPERATIONS?

A safe, efficient, and reliable transportation system requires more than just infrastructure. It demands coordinated management and operations. Management and operations¹ (M&O) is an integrated approach to optimize the performance of existing infrastructure through the implementation of multimodal, intermodal, and often cross-jurisdictional systems, services, and projects.

M&O refers to a broad range of strategies. Examples of M&O strategies include traffic detection and surveillance, work zone management, electronic toll collection, traffic incident management, road weather management, emergency management, and traveler information services. Such strategies enhance service efficiency and improve public safety and security; reduce traveler delays associated with incidents and other events; and improve information for businesses and for the traveling public.

Traditionally, planning the transportation system and operating the transportation system have been two relatively detached sets of activities with different requirements and different cultures. In the traditional model, transportation planning focuses on infrastructure projects, relying on an analysis of long-range travel demands, transportation system goals, and funding constraints, but often with limited consideration of short-term and ongoing operational issues. Management and operation of the transportation system typically involves a different set of practitioners with a short-term or real-time focus, often with limited consideration of how activities relate to regional transportation system goals and objectives.

Transportation agencies, metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs), and other stakeholders are increasingly recognizing the value of coordination and collaboration among transportation planners and operators. Although they come from differing perspectives, transportation planning and operating agencies generally share the goal of enhancing system performance, and they can mutually benefit from stronger linkages.

Regional transportation planning and investment decisionmaking requires a great deal of coordination and collaboration among State and local governments, MPOs, highway and transit agencies, other stakeholder organizations, and the general public.² Similarly, effective regional management and operations requires collaboration and coordination among operating agencies across jurisdictions and between transportation and public safety agencies in order to improve the security, safety, and reliability of the transportation system. Strengthening the connections between these two processes and activities – planning and operations – can enhance both activities.

1.2 WHAT IS THE PURPOSE OF THIS RESOURCE GUIDE?

This resource guide is designed to help planning and operations managers understand the value of working together and realize the benefits of pursuing management and operations strategies at the regional scale. As shown in Exhibit 1, this goes a step beyond jurisdiction and agency coordination on planning and investment. It also goes beyond regional collaboration and coordination on management and operations activities.³ The guide highlights how existing relationships can be strengthened and new ones developed, and how opportunities for greater coordination and collaboration can be exploited. It emphasizes the important role that both planners and operators have to play in building stronger connections and the benefits of these relationships.

Exhibit 1: Scope of Linking Planning and Operations

This resource guide describes a number of specific opportunities for improving connections between planning and operations. These opportunities are derived from an extensive review of the literature and interviews with nearly 30 transportation professionals who represent planning and operations at all levels of government. Based on the collective, practical experiences of these professionals, this guide is organized around the following linkage opportunities:

• The Transportation Planning Process,
• Data Sharing,
• Performance Measures,
• Congestion Management Systems,
• Funding and Resource Sharing,
• Institutional Arrangements,
• Regional Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) Architecture,
• Regional Management and Operations Projects, and
• Regional Concept for Transportation Operations.

Each of these linkage opportunities is discussed in detail in Section 2.

1.3 WHY LINK PLANNING AND OPERATIONS?

Linking planning and operations is important to improve transportation decisionmaking and the overall effectiveness of transportation systems. Coordination between planners and operators helps ensure that regional transportation investment decisions reflect full consideration of all available strategies and approaches to meet regional goals and objectives.

Factors Motivating the Linkage

Federal Requirements: Federal requirements emphasize this linkage. One of the seven planning factors that must be considered in the planning process at both the metropolitan and statewide levels is to "promote efficient system management and operation."⁴ The planning requirements, therefore, emphasize the important role that system management and operation should take in regional planning. Through the MPO certification process, the United States Department of Transportation (U.S. DOT) considers whether these factors have been adequately assessed.

Environmental, Community, and Funding Constraints: At a practical level, increasing transportation needs and constraints faced by transportation agencies are requiring new solutions. At the same time communities are facing the need for mobility improvements, transportation agencies are faced with environmental, community, and funding constraints that limit their ability to build new capacity to address these needs. Moreover, the length of time it takes to complete large-scale transportation infrastructure projects emphasizes the need for transportation solutions that can respond quickly to congestion, safety, and economic concerns. Given budget and other constraints, the public expects transportation agencies to operate the system at peak efficiency before providing funding to expand physical capacity.

New Technologies: New technologies and intelligent transportation systems (ITS) provide the potential for operational improvements that substantially improve system performance and for better data to pinpoint and prioritize transportation needs. These technologies also offer opportunities to improve reliability, safety, and security, which are difficult to address with traditional highway and transit capacity increases.

Benefits for Planners and Operators

Greater coordination and collaboration among planners and operators can help to focus attention on investments that more effectively and efficiently address short-term and long-term needs. Stronger linkages, therefore, help both planners and operators to do their jobs better.

For planners, collaboration with operators can:

• Help planners better understand how operational strategies can meet regional transportation goals.
• Provide access to system-wide, 24-hour travel data that can be used to better characterize existing system performance and travel conditions, to identify the most critical transportation problems, and to prioritize funding.
• Provide operations data and expertise to improve forecasts of future conditions, broaden the understanding of existing conditions, and analyze the effectiveness of alternative investments.
• Foster greater consideration of the day-to-day functioning of the transportation network and the real conditions facing travelers that can help frame transportation goals, objectives, and priorities.
• Reveal how transportation plans can address issues such as reliability, security, and safety—issues that are difficult to address solely with traditional infrastructure investments.

For operators, collaboration and coordination with planners can:

• Help operators have a greater understanding of how the long-range planning process can support M&O activities and how M&O activities fit into the context of regional goals and objectives.
• Provide increased opportunities and incentives for getting involved in the planning process, thereby helping to shape system goals and objectives.
• Provide regional leadership and greater participation by stakeholders in regional M&O efforts.
• Clarify the role of operations in meeting the region’s transportation vision and goals.
• Direct attention to the value of M&O strategies.
• Increase resources assigned to operations projects and programs.

Benefits for System Users

Ultimately, greater coordination and collaboration among planners and operators improves transportation decisionmaking and benefits the traveling public, businesses, and communities.

• Improved ability to address short- and long-term needs–Improved traffic operations information and understanding can help planners better predict future conditions and system improvements. It can also bring attention to operational improvements that can be implemented in a shorter time frame than traditional infrastructure investments. This will lead to a more effective mix of operational, capital, safety, maintenance, and preservation investments.
  
  
• Improved reliability–Travelers and freight shippers are increasingly sensitive to unanticipated disruptions to tightly scheduled personal activities and manufacturing supply-chain processes. Yet trip times have become increasingly unpredictable due to the growth in non-recurring congestion–unexpected or unusual congestion caused by accidents, inclement weather, special events, or construction. Growth in overall traffic volumes often means that even small disruptions can have a significant ripple effect on transportation system performance over a broad geographic area. Today, non-recurring congestion accounts for about half of all travel delay. The planning process typically deals with ongoing or predictable congestion issues, and traditional infrastructure investments that do not address the disruptions that are the source of non-recurrent congestion. Stronger connections between planners and operators help planners consider programs and strategies to improve reliability, such as deployment of technologies to rapidly detect incidents; variable message signs and other approaches for providing quick, reliable traffic information to the public and media outlets; and use of roving incident response teams to quickly clear accidents to open up a roadways for full operation.
  
  
• Improved emergency preparedness–Coordination between planning and operations reinforces efforts to ensure emergency preparedness and transportation security. Regional operations planning and flexibility is a critical element of a secure transportation system. States and regions that advance operational flexibility in their planning and investment prioritization are building their capacity to address the myriad of emergency and security situations that could arise. In addition, sources of funding may be available specifically for activities that support transportation security and emergency preparedness, which can be used to support transportation M&O objectives.

1.4 CAN IT BE DONE?

Challenges

Although there are many reasons for improving the linkage between planning and operations, there are also serious challenges. The challenges of linking planning and operations vary depending on factors such as the experience, size, institutional arrangements, and institutional culture within each region. Some challenges that are common to many regions include:

• Difficulty demonstrating the benefits of management and operations investments. Analysis tools to evaluate the benefits resulting from operational strategies and ITS projects are limited. Most analysis tools are oriented toward calculating the benefits of major infrastructure investments. These tools do not consider non-recurring congestion caused by incidents, construction, or special events. Moreover, travel demand models have been the subject of legal challenges particularly in air quality nonattainment areas. Tools that model the effects of M&O strategies must have demonstrated the credibility to withstand such challenges.
• An initial unwillingness of local officials to discuss management and operations costs at a regional level. Often, there is a perception that management and operations are local, not regional, issues.
• A lack of training among planning staffs about operations activities. MPO staffs tend to be primarily focused on planning and programming of capital programs.
• A lack of training and experience among operations staff about planning activities. Operations practitioners tend to emphasize a short-term outlook, with limited consideration of how their activities fit into broader regional goals.
• Limited funding to pay for capital needs of the roadway and transit network that may have been in plans for years. This can push any consideration of funding for operational programs and strategies off the radar screen.
• Limited funding to pay for ongoing operations.

While the capital costs of ITS technologies and traffic management centers are often paid for with Federal funds, ongoing operational costs typically fall to State, regional, and local agencies.

Can These Challenges Be Overcome?

Yes, they can! That is what the remainder of this guide is about. Coordination between planning and operations is happening today and is being enhanced through a diverse range of strategies. This resource guide discusses the lessons from those who have had success at building this linkage and highlights opportunities to further regional coordination.

Historically, operational considerations have been integrated into planning for transit projects, but much less so for highway projects. However, that is changing. Today, highway agencies are evolving to focus greater attention on maintaining existing infrastructure and recognizing the critical role of operations in achieving regional mobility goals. Both transit and highway agencies are recognizing new opportunities to improve reliability, security, and safety, and public information through their investment programs. MPOs are increasingly seeing their role as not only facilitating regional transportation planning, but also facilitating regional management and operation.

1.5 STRUCTURE OF THE GUIDE

This resource guide discusses opportunities to strengthen linkages between planning and operations.

Section 2 is the main body of this report and is organized around the linkage opportunities discussed above. Section 2 includes a number of brief case examples and exhibits to illustrate the concepts being discussed. The case examples describe planning/operations linkages from specific regions and States. These generally include contact information should the reader wish to gather more details about the example. Purple exhibit boxes provide more general illustrative concepts that are not specific to any location.

Section 3 is a self-assessment tool thatcan be used by both planners and operators to think about current levels of coordination and opportunities for strengthening planning and operations connections. Some practitioners may wish to begin with this self-assessment tool as a way to prioritize which of the linkage opportunities in Section 2 should receive the most immediate attention.

Section 4 provides resources for further information, including links to useful Web sites, online tools, and online forums.

1 Management and operations (M&O) is also referred to as transportation systems management and operations (TSM&O). M&O is distinct from operations and maintenance (O&M), which focuses on internal agency operations and recurring maintenance and preservation.

2 Transportation planning takes place at the State, regional, and local levels. The scope and nature of the process differs based on the area being covered and requirements set out in laws and regulations. Federal regulatory requirements for transportation planning are codified in 23 CFR 450, with Metropolitan Transportation Planning addressed in Subpart C, and Statewide Transportation Planning addressed in Subpart B. Although this guide focuses on metropolitan planning, the concepts of linking planning and operations are also applicable at the statewide and local levels.

3 Collaboration and coordination on management and operations activities is the topic of a related publication, Regional Transportation Operations Collaboration and Coordination, available at http://www.itsdocs.fhwa.dot.gov/JPODOCS/REPTS_TE/13686.html.

4 Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century (TEA-21), Section 1203(f).