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How best to stitch a community back together divided by an interstate?

USDOT is in the midst of a new initiative to address some of damage created by interstates driven through the heart of urban areas. Last week a group of experts traveled to Nashville to discuss ways to repair the damage inflicted upon a part of North Nashville by a segment of Interstate 40.

Photo by Rochelle Carpenter

Jefferson Street overpass over Interstate 40. Photo by Rochelle Carpenter

More than a half-century ago, the new Interstate Highway System connected millions of Americans, creating new, valuable economic connections between cities and speeding the movement of goods and people across the country in a new network of roads that were the envy of the world. But the social costs weren’t shared equitably, and inside many urban areas, interstates were most frequently constructed through communities of color, disrupting, disconnecting, and displacing them.

Acknowledging this unfortunate reality, Secretary Foxx and the US Department of Transportation announced the Every Place Counts Design Challenge in May, which “seeks to raise awareness and identify innovative community design solutions that bridge the infrastructure divide and reconnect people to opportunity,” according to USDOT. Through an open competition, USDOT selected Spokane, Minneapolis-Saint Paul, Philadelphia, and Nashville to receive pro bono design guidance to mitigate the disastrous effects of urban highways in each city.

On July 11th and 12th, a team with representatives from Transportation for America, USDOT, The Congress for The New Urbanism, Toole Design Group, and others participated in Nashville’s design challenge, focusing on North Nashville’s Jefferson Street corridor and its two intersections (one overpass, one underpass) with Interstate 40.

every place counts nashville

Jefferson Street in Nashville during a walk through the corridor. Photo by Rochelle Carpenter

North Nashville, and especially Jefferson Street, has been the cultural and educational heart of black Nashville, and is still home to three historically black colleges and universities (Meharry, Fisk, and Tennessee State University). Though more than a dozen music venues once called the corridor home, all but one have been demolished — some by the construction of I-40, and some from the later decline aided by it. (Some of the historic venues were also torn down before Interstate 40 was built.)

Today, Jefferson Street suffers from a relatively high rate of vacancy, a lack of adequate sidewalks and connections across I-40, and property owners holding on to buildings with the hope that property values will increase, rather than selling or developing. Despite this, the corridor is also home to a collection of small cultural institutions, including the Art History Class Lounge and Gallery, Woodcuts Gallery, and the nearby Norf Walls street art project. In Nashville’s hot real estate market, the very real physical barrier of I-40 encircling downtown here has contributed to slowing development in North Nashville — much to the relief of renters and the chagrin of many property owners.

It was in this context that the design team met with stakeholders representing local, state, and federal government agencies, local residents and business owners, anchor institutions, and design professionals for two days of visioning exercises. Ideas generated included everything from widening sidewalks and removing right turn lanes, to decking over I-40 and building aerial parks à la downtown Dallas.

Thaxton Abshalom Waters, founder of the Art History Class Lounge, asked the designers and experts to “focus on tapping back into the same sources that made the neighborhood a beautiful and culturally rich landscape in the first place.” It’s a reasonable request: much of the positive momentum on Jefferson Street today comes, as it did before I-40, from artists and performers, building community through cultural production, art walks, and creative resuse of structures and spaces along Jefferson Street.

every place counts nashville

Discussions during the design charette. Photo by Rochelle Carpenter

Long before the term was coined, Jefferson Street has benefited from creative placemaking, an approach to community development that acknowledges the integral role that arts, culture, and creativity play in community development and in ensuring that communities better reflect and celebrate local culture, heritage and values.

Reminder: Have you browsed our new guidebook to creative placemaking yet? Visit httpcreativeplacemaking.t4america.org

Creative Placemaking 

To learn more about the ways in which corridor revitalization and transportation projects benefit from the arts, explore T4A’s guide to creative placemaking, the Scenic Route.

The design interventions generated by the two-day charrette are a good start, but on their own, they won’t be enough to produce the kind of positive change sought by the local leaders and residents who’ve been fighting an uphill battle to see some of the pride and glory restored to their neighborhood. But the process proved to be a great organizing tool for bringing together leadership from the neighborhood, government, business community, and transportation planners and engineers.

USDOT, with assistance from The Congress for the New Urbanism and Toole Design Group, will release a report summarizing findings and suggestions from the two-day event in the fall.

What would a better measure of congestion look like? Unpacking an alternative

USDOT’s draft rule that will govern how states and metro areas will have to measure and address congestion would define “success” in incredibly outdated ways. In a webinar earlier this week, we discussed better ways to measure congestion and a proposal we’re sending to USDOT.

Nearly 3,000 of you have already sent letters to USDOT telling them that their draft rule takes the wrong approach. But is there an alternate proposal that could get traction with USDOT as they modify the proposal based on the feedback they receive?

congestion-webinar-feature-slideIn a webinar on Wednesday, July, 13th, our policy team discussed alternative measures for congestion and unpacked the proposal that we’re submitting to USDOT for their consideration, which was developed in collaboration with a handful of MPOs, transit agencies, state DOTs, and advocates throughout the country.

Click the image at right (or here) to view the presentation from the webinar and hear more about the proposal we are submitting to USDOT this week. Update: For those of you who are more technically inclined, you may download our full 12-page proposal (pdf) that we submitted to USDOT on July 14th.

Deciding how to evaluate which projects are “successful” will influence which transportation projects are selected and built for years to come. And the problem with using old measures for assessing traffic congestion is that it leads directly to old “solutions,” like prioritizing fast driving speeds above all other modes of transportation and their associated benefits. We’ve been illustrating this with some simple graphics that show what results when “moving cars fast” becomes the prime or only consideration:

Congestion We All Count

Have you sent your letter yet? There’s still time.

Success is about a lot more than moving cars fast. Tell USDOT to improve their proposed rule. Sign an individual letter that we will deliver on your behalf to USDOT.

USDOT’s congestion measure is not good — what would a better one look like?

Thousands of you have sent letters to USDOT on their draft rule that will govern how states and metro areas will have to measure and address congestion — a proposal that currently defines “success” in outdated ways. It’s clear that USDOT’s proposed measure doesn’t cut it, but if you want to hear more about a better way to measure congestion, join us next week.

Join T4A’s policy team on July, 13th at 3 p.m. EDT to learn about some proposed alternatives to improve USDOT’s congestion performance measure, as well as measures covering performance of the National Highway System, Interstate freight movement, on-road mobile source emissions, and greenhouse gases.

REGISTER NOW

 

Nearly 3,000 of you have already sent letters to USDOT telling them that their draft rule takes the wrong approach. But what would a better measure look like, and is there an alternate proposal that could get traction with USDOT as they modify the proposal based on the feedback they receive?

The alternatives we’ll be discussing on this webinar were developed in collaboration with a handful of MPOs, transit agencies, state DOTs, and advocates throughout the country. Join the webinar on July, 13th at 4pm EDT to learn more, ask questions, and engage in this rulemaking process.

Deciding how to evaluate which projects are “successful” will influence which transportation projects are selected and built for years to come. And the problem with using old measures for assessing traffic congestion is that it leads directly to old “solutions,” like prioritizing fast driving speeds above all other modes of transportation and their associated benefits. We’ve been illustrating this with some simple graphics that show what results when “moving cars fast” becomes the prime or only consideration:

Congestion We All Count

Have you sent your letter yet? There’s still time.

Success is about a lot more than moving cars fast. Tell USDOT to improve their proposed rule. Sign an individual letter that we will deliver on your behalf to USDOT.

Columbus, OH takes center stage of national movement for transportation innovation – but cities nationwide are interested in connected streets

Earlier today the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) named Columbus, Ohio, the winner of its highly competitive Smart City Challenge. The win gains Columbus $40 million from USDOT, $10 million from Paul Allen’s Vulcan, Inc., as well as additional matching local public and private investments of $90 million to help the city become a national proving ground for intelligent transportation systems and a suite of new mobility-on-demand services.

Columbus’ application focused specifically on increasing social equity and access to opportunity. The city’s Linden neighborhood has “a high proportion of carless households, unreliable access to employment and health services, a lack of access to digital information, and a high portion of cash-based households,” said Mayor Andrew Ginther.

In its application, Columbus outlined plans for several significant transportation innovations: an autonomous vehicle test fleet that will connect a transit terminal to a job center; increasing travel options in poor neighborhoods to better connect expectant mothers to health services; expansion of electric vehicle infrastructure; a multi-modal transit pass payment system that will include transit as well as ride-sharing and -hailing services; and kiosks that can reload transit cards for low-income residents without credit cards or bank accounts.

Columbus is far from alone in wanting to use innovative technology to better connect disadvantaged populations to opportunity. The seven other Smart City finalists — Denver, San Francisco, Austin, Pittsburgh, Portland, and Kansas City — are all working hard on these issues, as are the 71 other applicant cities that did not make it to the final round, and many more.

T4America will be working with a number of these cities through our recently announced partnership with Sidewalk Labs and a new Smart Cities Collaborative that will help define how technology can meet cities’ pressing transportation challenges. T4America will also be helping cities win funding, tools, and authority to advance smart city initiatives. This will be a huge hurdle as current transportation policy at the federal level and within most states either underfunds or completely ignores local governments.

The collaborative network will also begin to define and design the “connected streets” of the future. Just as the popular Complete Streets approach gives leaders a framework for making streets safer for everyone, connected streets outlines tech-enabled interventions that can help create a truly balanced, multimodal approach to urban transportation that expands access to job opportunities and improves quality of life for all residents.

USDOT’s Smart City Challenge is emblematic of a giant wave of change that’s coming to cities. Technology, innovation, and new mobility solutions are changing the urban landscape and will have big implications for public transit systems, public works departments and how many of us get where we need to go. Vibrant, thriving communities are ones that provide access and opportunity for people of all incomes. Local business and civic leaders are quickly discovering that they need to get out ahead of the coming disruptions and shape the technology transforming their cities or else get shaped by it.

USDOT’s drive to innovation has generated tremendous excitement across the country — in Columbus and beyond. There’s been an explosion of cross-departmental and cross-community collaboration from both the public and private sectors. Many cities also know they’ll need to undertake a large shift in their internal cultures. T4America is here to help cities lean forward and embrace these changes and drive the discussion about what they want their cities to look like in 25 years.

Ask USDOT to #MakeMeCount this Bike to Work Day

This Friday, thousands of people across the country will put on their helmets and take to the streets for National Bike to Work Day, an annual event promoting active commuting options and safer streets. 

CiGfqFXUgAArtpOWill you be joining the event this week? If so, make your ride even more impactful by telling USDOT to #MakeMeCount and look at people, not just vehicles, when it comes to measuring how well a street works.

More and more Americans are choosing to bike — as well as walk, take transit, or share a ride — to work each day. Yet a recent USDOT proposal for measuring traffic congestion would ignore all these people when evaluating whether a street is working well or not.

If you bike to work this week, snap a photo and share it on Twitter or Facebook with the following text:

Hey @USDOT, I biked to work today! #MakeMeCount when measuring congestion. http://bit.ly/make-me-count #BTWD2016
Twitterlogo

USDOT’s proposed rule would make driving fast the ultimate goal of our transportation system—regardless of what type of street you’re on. That means driving fast could take precedence along streets where children are walking or commuters are biking, as so many people will be doing this week.

Don’t plan to bike this week but still support streets that work for everyone? Sign the petition to USDOT and then help spread the work with our gallery of shareable images.

I’ll be asking USDOT to #MakeMeCount this Friday. I hope you’ll join me.

When it comes to traffic congestion, we need to measure more than just vehicles

UPDATE:

The comment period closes Saturday, August 20th but we are sending in all of your comments to USDOT on Friday, August 19th. If you haven’t sent in a letter yet, you can do that right here.

Last week, USDOT issued a draft rule that will govern how states and metro areas will have to measure and address congestion, along with other metrics like freight movement and emissions. However, the rule as it is currently written would measure success in outdated ways. Old measures leads to old “solutions,” like prioritizing fast driving speeds above all other modes of transportation and their associated benefits.

Congestion We All Count

The comment period is finally open: So tell USDOT to take a wider view of success and change the proposed rule.

The rule as it is currently written fails to consider people taking transit, carpooling, walking, and biking. It would also penalize communities where people live close to work, or travel shorter distances at slower speeds.

This rule makes driving fast the ultimate goal of our transportation system, regardless of what type of road you’re on. Should driving fast be the highest priority on our main streets where people might be shopping or dining at an outdoor café? Should that be the priority in residential neighborhoods where children might be biking or walking.

Photo by NACTO. httpswww.flickr.com/photos/nacto/14442453218Of course not.

Success is about a lot more than moving cars fast. Tell USDOT to improve their proposed rule. Sign an individual letter that we will deliver on your behalf to USDOT.

This rule is particularly disappointing in light of Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx’s unprecedented effort to improve Americans’ access to economic opportunity through better transportation options. Those are worthy goals, and passing the rule as currently written would be a missed opportunity to achieve them.

Deciding what projects we consider “successful” will influence which transportation projects are selected and built for years to come.

Tell USDOT that #WeAllCount and that the new rule should reflect that.

Join us as we break down FHWA’s most recent rulemaking on measuring traffic congestion

Do you want a transportation system that makes you count? Join Transportation for America for a free, public webinar on Wednesday, April 27 at 1:00 p.m. EST to discuss the recently announced Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) national transportation performance rulemaking on measuring traffic congestion and its implications for communities nationwide.

For the first time, USDOT has released new requirements for how states and metro areas will have to measure traffic congestion. However, the rule as proposed doubles down USDOT’s focus of prioritizing single occupancy vehicles over multi-modal solutions and completely discounts non-vehicular users. How we measure congestion matters, and this rule applies to the lives of all who use our transportation system.

Joe McAndrew, T4’s Policy Director, will cover what’s in FHWA’s performance rulemaking, a few high-level first principles to guide change, and how civic, business and elected groups can impact the outcome of this rulemaking.

Register for Webinar

There’s a direct connection between how we decide to measure congestion and how we choose to address it. If we focus, as this rule does, on keeping traffic moving at a high rate of speed at all times of day on all types of roads and streets, then the result is easy to predict: our solutions will prioritize the investments that make that possible, regardless of cost vs. benefits or the potential impacts on the communities those roads pass through.

Sign up for Wednesday’s discussion, and in the meantime, here are ten things you should know about this new rule and what you can do about it.

Ten things to know about USDOT’s new proposal for measuring traffic congestion

For the first time, USDOT has released new requirements for how states and metro areas will have to measure traffic congestion. While the new rule marks a continued, necessary shift to assessing what our federal transportation dollars actually accomplish, this proposal as introduced doubles down on outdated measures of congestion that will push local communities to spend billions of dollars in vain attempts to build their way out of it.

For two years, USDOT has been working to establish a new system of performance measures to help govern how federal dollars are spent and hold states and metro areas accountable for making progress on important goals. This proposal for congestion (and several other measures focused on “system performance”) is the last of three sets of new Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) rules that will be finalized in early 2017.

Though this represents an incredibly important and necessary shift toward measuring what our transportation spending actually accomplishes, using the wrong measure for congestion will help advance projects that divide communities, cut people off from opportunity, and cost billions of dollars (we don’t have) in the name of solving “congestion” by trying in vain to keep traffic moving.

As we laid out in our post on congestion last week, how we measure congestion matters.

There’s a direct connection between how we decide to measure it and how we choose to address it. If we focus, as this rule does, on keeping traffic moving at a high rate of speed at all times of day on all types of roads and streets, then the result is easy to predict: our solutions will prioritize the investments that make that possible, regardless of cost vs. benefits or the potential impacts on the communities those roads pass through.

Here are ten things you need to know about this new rule from USDOT and what you can do about it

 

#1 The rule undermines Secretary Foxx’s unprecedented effort to connect communities and use transportation to give people greater opportunities

Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx recently launched a campaign based on the stunning admission that federal policy had long incentivized poorly designed highways that isolated communities and cut people off from jobs and opportunities.

Springing out of powerful personal examples he saw firsthand growing up in Charlotte when new freeways were built “to carry people through my neighborhood, but never to my neighborhood,” he expressed his firm commitment to ensuring that our transportation investments connect more people to opportunity and knit communities together — rather than divide them.

crestdale drive charlotte interstates congestion rule

Where the streets around Secretary Foxx’s childhood neighborhood dead-end into Interstates 77 and 85 in Charlotte, NC

It’s an inspiring effort, but as he said, “These principles sound very easy, but they’re really hard and they’re also very necessary if we’re going to make transportation work for everybody.”  This rule produced by FHWA illustrates the uphill battle against the institutional inertia for the old way of doing things.

This proposal also undercuts the Secretary’s ongoing Mayors’ Challenge for Safer People and Safer Streets intended to “help communities create safer, better connected bicycling and walking networks,” explicit requirements from Congress to design streets safe for all users, and the nearly 900 communities that have passed complete streets policies to do the same.

“We’re trying to be more attuned, but it’s not a situation where the federal government is solely in control. We can’t tell a state what project to do. They have to make those determinations,” Sec. Foxx noted.

Indeed, states and metro areas will still be making the bulk of the decisions. Yet through this rule and other guidance, USDOT can absolutely usher in a new paradigm by steering states and metro areas to a more holistic approach for measuring traffic congestion that counts all people in a community by counting all modes of transportation. And we will need your help to hold USDOT’s feet to the fire to make this change happen.

#2 Focusing on delay is simply the wrong measure for addressing congestion

USDOT plans to measure vehicle speed and delay seven different ways, while ignoring people carpooling, taking transit, walking & biking or skipping the trip entirely.

A host of people and groups from all across the map, including T4America, have already explained in detail how a singular focus on delay for drivers paints an incredibly one-dimensional picture of congestion. Focusing on average delay by simply measuring the difference between rush hour speeds compared to free-flow 3 a.m. traffic fails to count everyone else commuting by other modes, rewards places with fast travel speeds at the expense of places with shorter commutes and less time spent behind the wheel overall, and completely ignores how many people are actually moving through the corridor.

This measure treats a corridor filled with buses or carpoolers the same as a corridor filled with single-occupancy vehicles. It ignores millions of people who opt out of congestion entirely by taking transit, telecommuting, walking or biking, and even penalizes places where people get to take shorter trips. While USDOT’s proposal to measure delay per capita at least begins to recognize that not everyone in a region is stuck in traffic on the highway, it still fails to measure how many people are moving through a corridor.

Shouldn’t the actual impact on real people be the core principle of anything we measure? Any traffic congestion measure should lead us to solutions that increase access to opportunity for everyone — regardless of how they travel each day.

#3 You can’t manage what you don’t measure

In the pointed words of a USDOT official earlier this week, “you can’t manage what you don’t measure.” The really staggering thing is that FHWA knows they’re missing the boat on measuring other crucial things that paint a more accurate picture of delay. From their own words in the 425-page rule:

As with delay metrics, FHWA acknowledges that travel time indices do not capture system attributes in terms of shorter trips or better access to destinations and mode options, which may occur at the expense of greater delay.

True. So let’s find a better way than focusing narrowly on delay.

#4 USDOT should stick with reliability and dump delay

One of the few positives is that (in one of the measures), USDOT recognizes that predictability is incredibly important. The rule includes a people-centric metric of “reliability” — whether a trip on a corridor takes the same amount of time from one day to the next. While completely eliminating rush hour congestion isn’t either possible or affordable, what many travelers are looking for is the basic assurance that their morning commute will take the same amount of time each day, allowing them to plan their trips with predictability.

But reliability for whom? Unfortunately, this rule only considers the reliability of those traveling by car, and will ignore whether or not your transit trip is hit or miss.

Though one of the other measures is labeled “reliability,” it’s just another measure of delay in sheep’s clothing: It defines “reliability” as trips taking the same amount of time at any time of the day – middle of the night or rush hour — an incredibly unlikely scenario.

#5 When it comes to congestion, this treats highways the same as main streets — and could do real harm to our most economically vibrant places

Take a look at these two sets of streets from Nashville and Charlotte. First: US 41/Clarksville Pike in northern Nashville, and then Broadway in downtown Nashville.

US 41 Nashville congestionNashville Broadway NHS congestion

And Brookshire Blvd/NC-16 headed south into Charlotte, and Tryon Street near downtown

NC 16 Charlotte congestionCharlotte Tryon Street NHS congestion

Are the needs of all of these streets the same? Do they all need to accomplish the same thing? Should we expect them to function the same way?

Partially because of a decision made all the way back in 2012 in MAP-21 to expand what’s known as the National Highway System to include nearly every four-lane (or larger) road — regardless of what kind of traffic it carries or where it passes through, this measure proposes to measure congestion roughly the same way on all of them.

Whether in a rural small town or a big city, the needs of our country’s main streets are radically different from the highways and interstates designed to connect disparate places. For a main street to function well, it has to serve everyone who needs to use it.

On a main street, that which looks like “vehicle delay” to a traffic engineer looks like economic activity and success to a local merchant or mayor on a main street.

#6 USDOT ignores the innovative things other states and metro areas are already doing

California has already moved to scrap level of service (LOS) as an evaluation criteria for transportation projects, one that has typically resulted in the same outcomes as this narrow congestion rule. As Angie Schmitt wrote in Streetsblog back in January:

Instead of assessing how a building or road project will affect traffic delay, California will measure how much traffic it generates, period. Car trips, not car delays, will be the thing to avoid. This is likely to have the opposite effect of LOS, leading to more efficient use of land and transportation infrastructure.

At the same time that USDOT is proposing to double down on 1960’s measures for traffic congestion, other metro areas across the country are setting ambitious new goals and accompanying performance measures for improving health, improving access to jobs for more people or expanding transit to connect more people to opportunity.

#7 We can’t wait to develop better measures until we have the “perfect” data

Throughout the rule’s 425 pages, USDOT continues to perpetuate the myth that they lack adequate data to measure other modes of transportation, ignoring sources like (their own!) National Transit Database, the U.S. Census American Community Survey, and cell phone network data among others. USDOT invested millions of taxpayer dollars after the passage of MAP-21 to procure the data necessary to develop these vehicle-only measures. If USDOT is spending our money to collect data then they must find ways to acquire the data needed to better measure the entire system and all of its users.

#8 It puts containers above commuters

By defining congestion on interstates as speeds below 35 mph for commuters but below just 50 mph for freight trucks, this rule strangely prioritizes the needs of freight movement at the expense of people. While the movement of freight is indeed incredibly important, it should be on a level playing field with the people picking up the majority of the tab for the system’s maintenance. (To say nothing of the difficulty of actually implementing different standards for various types of vehicles on the same roadway.)

This rule also sets an impossible standard for freight movement in urban settings. Freight bottlenecks obviously occur far more often in urban areas where demand is far greater. Does anyone think that it’s feasible or affordable to spend enough or build enough capacity so that trucks can travel at 50 mph through the middle of major cities during rush hour?

#9 It undercuts the goal of protecting and enhancing the environment

This rule does include more than just measures for traffic congestion, including a requirement to measure mobile source emissions (i.e. pollution from vehicles). Yet states and metro areas would only have to measure the impact of the few projects funded by the relatively tiny Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality (CMAQ) program, which is akin to not being required to reduce highway deaths on a road because that road was built with highway dollars instead of safety improvement dollars.

Though the rule makes a first-ever move to include language on measuring the contribution of the potential emissions impacts of transportation, it stops far short of actually including any requirements with teeth. As Joe Cortright wrote earlier this week:

Despite some hopes that the White House and environmentalists had prevailed on the USDOT to tackle transportation’s contribution to climate change as part of these performance measures, there’s nothing with any teeth here. Instead—in a 425 page proposed rule—there are just six pages (p. 101-106) addressing greenhouse gas emissions that read like a bad book report and a “dog-ate-my-homework” excuse for doing nothing now. Instead, DOT offers up a broad set of questions asking others for advice on how they might do something, in some future rulemaking, to address climate change.

#10 We still have a chance to improve this rule — but we’ll need your help to do it

The comment period for this rule isn’t open yet — it will open on Friday, April 22 and run for at least 90 days. Though USDOT has gone in the wrong direction on many of these measures, we know from our past experience on similar rules that they are absolutely listening for suggestions for improving this. They’re eager to hear how it can be improved.

There are three things you can do in the next week to help.

Not on our email list already? Sign up here.

Breaking news: USDOT releases draft rule for measuring congestion

A new federal proposal governing how states and metro areas will be required to measure congestion was just released early today. Our brief analysis finds that though there’s potential for improvement with how the rule is worded, it would still push local communities to waste time and money attempting to build their way out of congestion by using a measure of traffic congestion that’s narrow, limited and woefully out of date.

As we alluded to last week, thanks to new requirements in the 2012 transportation law (MAP-21), USDOT was preparing to release the last batch of new performance measures to help ensure federal dollars are spent to make progress on important, measurable goals. Though these new directions on measuring congestion (along with other important measures) won’t be officially released and open for comment until this Friday, this document posted by FHWA today is likely to be the final proposal for new performance measures.

We’re reading through the full 425-page rule now, and will have much more here on the blog soon (and in your email inboxes), including a way for you to send official comments to USDOT urging them to do better.

Do you want to be notified with the latest news on this front? Sign up for email from T4America today. 

In the meantime, if you missed our post last week explaining why it’s important how we choose to measure congestion, catch up with that here.

Though not selected as finalists, other Smart Cities Challenge applicants still hopeful to make their plans a reality

Though 77 cities will leave USDOT’s Smart Cities competition empty-handed later this summer, T4America is looking to help many of those cities advance the great ideas still deserving of help.

Seven cities were selected two weekends ago as semifinalists in the first-ever Smart City Challenge from USDOT, a competition that will eventually award $40 million to just one of those seven cities to help them rethink urban mobility, powered by innovative new technologies. Which means that 77 of the 78 will ultimately walk away empty-handed without any funding. (Save for the $100,000 that the seven semifinalists received to further develop their initial proposals.)

After reaching out over the last few months to all of the cities that applied, T4America held an invite-only conference call earlier this week to offer advice and support for advancing parts of their applications forward; applications with interesting responses to the question of how to rethink the future of transportation within cities of all sizes.

USDOT was a guest on our webinar, offering ideas, suggestions about other possibly little-known federal programs that can be used to advance certain ideas, or more information about grant programs like TIGER or the new freight grant program that can meet the need.

One of the most interesting things that USDOT shared with everyone was this graphic showing a list of 13 challenges facing cities. (There are certainly others, but this is fascinating summary of some of the most pressing.)

USDOT smart cities — challenges for cities

Win or lose the Smart Cities Challenge, these issues above are ones that cities of all size face today or will be facing in the future for years to come as the landscape radically changes due to the impact of new technologies, consumer preferences and new mobility options.

We at Transportation for America are excited to find ways to support these other cities that are eager, engaged and motivated to become smarter cities and ask big questions about the future of mobility in their communities. This week was a small step forward, and we’re hopeful for more chances to help support cities that are ready to rethink the status quo when it comes to transportation.

Are you associated with one of the cities that applied (or chose not to for whatever reason) and missed the invite-only conference call this week? Email us at smartcities@t4america.org

Secretary Foxx questioned at Senate THUD Appropriations hearing

The Senate Transportation, Housing & Urban Development, and Related Agencies (THUD) Appropriations Subcommittee hosted Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx, as well as USDOT Inspector General Calvin Scovel, on Wednesday, March 16 to discuss the department’s FY2017 budget request.

Here are some of the key highlights from the hearing:

Skepticism over a larger, new funding request

The administration’s budget would grow funding for the department to $98 billion in FY17, in part by raising new revenue through a new, $10.25-per-barrel oil fee. Chairman Susan Collins (R-ME) opened the hearing with a note of disappointment and incredulity that the administration would submit such a sizable revenue proposal just months after Congress passed the five-year FAST Act and after many years of debate over transportation finance in which the administration declined to offer specific funding options.

Support for TIGER funding

Several members of the committee—including Chairman Collins (R-ME), Ranking Member Jack Reed (D-RI), and Sens. Roy Blunt (R-MO), Christopher Coons (D-DE), and John Boozman (R-AR) voiced their support for the TIGER program and the projects it has funded. Sen. Boozman, however, had concerns about the department’s support for applicants and the way it helped strengthen the proposals in from applicants who were not awarded funds. Sec. Foxx spoke to the outreach the department is already doing and noted the success the program has had in funding projects in rural areas.

Support for Amtrak primarily in Northeast Corridor

There was support for Amtrak primarily from the two senators from the Northeast Corridor, Sens. Jack Reed (D-RI) and Christopher Coons (D-DE). They each spoke of the importance of making capital improvements on that corridor. Sen. Reed also sought assurance that the Northeast Corridor Futures project would not realign Amtrak service out of his state.

Metro closure was the only transit topic of conversation

The only discussion of transit in the hearing focused on the emergency shutdown of Washington’s Metrorail system. Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), chairman of the full Appropriations Committee, focused her questioning on ways that Congress or the department can further ensure Metro’s safety and improve reliability. Sec. Foxx placed the onus for additional improvement on the local jurisdictions—the District of Columbia, Maryland, and Virginia—to make safety a priority for the agency. He also said the department is looking into ways that it can require open grants to the agency be used for safety purposes.

There was no discussion of Capital Grants (New Starts) or other transit funding.

USDOT want to support all Smart City Challenge applicants

Several members asked how the department is anticipating new technology, especially autonomous vehicles. Sec. Foxx spoke of the innovative ideas submitted through the Smart City Challenge grant program. Though the department will pick just one winner, Foxx said the department plans to advise all of the losing cities on ways they may be able to fund their visions through other, existing funding sources.

USDOT on the way to establishing the Innovative Finance Bureau

 In response to a question from Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) about P3 financing for roads, Sec. Foxx said the department is well on the way to standing up the National Surface Transportation and Innovative Finance Bureau, a consolidated office for innovative financing created under the FAST Act.

Timing going forward

 House Appropriations Chair Hal Rogers has announced that committee will begin consideration of the first of 12 appropriations bills next week and we expect the Senate to proceed on a similar schedule, debating bills through April following the Easter recess. The House will apparently start on these appropriations bills even through consideration of the budget resolution has been postponed two weeks until after the recess. (The budget resolution declares intended top-line spending amounts, while appropriations bills set specific, program-level outlays.)

Supporters spoke out for safer streets, and USDOT listened

Thanks to the action of supporters like you, all Americans will be safer on our streets. Yesterday the U.S. Department of Transportation released a much-improved ruling for how states and metro areas should measure — and be held accountable for improving — the safety of streets for everyone that uses them.

Back in 2014, 1,500 Transportation for AmericaSmart Growth America and National Complete Streets Coalition supporters sent a letter calling for the U.S. Department of Transportation to make the safety of all roadway users a top priority, and your voice has clearly been heard. Yesterday USDOT released its final safety rule for a new system of measuring the performance of our transportation investments that includes new and improved language to hold states and metro areas accountable for reducing preventable pedestrian deaths and injuries.

Under the last federal transportation law (MAP-21), USDOT was required to create a new system to govern how federal dollars are spent by measuring the performance of those dollars against tangible goals and outcomes. The first proposed measure dealt entirely with safety guidelines that would hold states and metro areas accountable for tracking their progress in reducing traffic collisions. But the proposal USDOT initially came up with was too weak to be effective.

USDOT-selfieThat’s where supporters like you came in. Over 1,500 people mobilized to tell USDOT to make that measure stronger, and to hold states and metro areas accountable for the safety of everyone on the road — no matter how they’re choosing to get around. Smart Growth America’s President and CEO Geoff Anderson personally hand-delivered those letters to USDOT Secretary Anthony Foxx—all 1,500 of them.

Yesterday’s final ruling is leaps and bounds ahead of what was originally proposed. Some of the highlights include:

  • Five measures in total, and they include people on foot or bike: rate of serious injuries; rate of fatalities; total serious injuries; total fatalities; and the number of combined non-motorized fatalities and serious injuries.
  • States and MPOs must set targets for reducing fatalities for people on foot or bike. It’s treated as an equal measure to the others.
  • States and MPOs must make progress on four of the five measures.
  • Significant progress will be measured by beating targets. If that doesn’t occur, states must at least beat their baselines for each measure.
  • USDOT will not wait to finish developing the rest of the performance measures before they begin rolling out this safety measure.

Logged-in T4America members can read a more detailed memo on the final rule below. 

[member_content]Members: Click here to access the policy memo.[/member_content]

Seven semifinalist cities selected over the weekend in USDOT’s Smart City Challenge

Over the weekend, while appearing at the South by Southwest Interactive festival, USDOT Secretary Anthony Foxx announced the selection of seven cities to continue as semifinalists in the first-ever Smart City Challenge — a competition that will eventually award $40 million to just one city to “use technology to connect transportation assets into an interactive network.”

Through this open competition for a sizable grant award, the USDOT and Secretary Foxx have asked cities to think big on the future of mobility, and what could they do with $40 million to bring that future to fruition.

78 cities from 34 states plus the District of Columbia applied for their chance to win the single $40 million grant. Foxx, speaking at SXSW on Saturday, said, “The level of excitement and energy the Smart City Challenge has created around the country far exceeded our expectations,” said Secretary Foxx. “After an overwhelming response – 78 applications total – we chose to select seven finalists instead of five because of their outstanding potential to transform the future of urban transportation.”

The cities of Austin, TX; Columbus, OH; Denver, CO; Kansas City, MO; Pittsburgh, PA; Portland, OR; and San Francisco, CA will now receive $100,000 each to put more meat on the bones of their proposals and create a detailed roadmap on how they will make their plans a reality. Come June, one of those cities will be selected to receive the full $40 million grant to implement their winning plan over a three-year period.

What about the other 73 cities?

USDOT kicked off an incredibly important discussion and 78 cities responded by asking big questions about the future of transportation within our cities. While we’re celebrating these seven cities today, come this Summer, there will be 77 cities that leave empty-handed, and many of them will have great ideas still deserving of help.

Where can they turn?

For one, we at Transportation for America are kicking off an effort to help support these other cities that are eager, engaged and motivated to become smarter cities and ask big questions about the future of mobility in their communities. Next week, we’re going to be holding an invite-only online discussion soon with the applicants that weren’t selected. (We’re reaching out to most of you directly, but if you’re interested and don’t hear from us, email us at smartcities@t4america.org)

More than 300 private companies — whether popular providers like Uber or Lyft, backend technology companies like Amazon Web Services or Google, or providers of intelligent transportation systems like NXP or Siemens — have expressed their interest to USDOT to work not just with the winning city, but with other smart, forward looking cities that are thinking about the future of urban mobility.

These other cities will certainly need help figuring out how best to proceed, and how best to do it without the aid of a $40 million grant to kickstart their efforts.

T4America will be announcing some exciting partnerships in the coming days and weeks that will help make connections between these cities and the private companies, providers and experts to help support their work, so stay tuned.

USDOT announces funding available for the new FASTLANE freight and highway grant program

Last year’s five-year FAST Act transportation law included a new freight program for the first time (see this section under “A one-size-fits-all freight program“) and the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) has announced that the first round of $800 million in competitive grants is open for business. 

Last Friday, USDOT released a Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) for the new competitive grant program for freight and highway capacity projects, created in last year’s FAST Act.

The Nationally Significant Freight and Highway Projects program includes a dedicated competitive freight program totaling $4.5 billion over the life of the five-year FAST Act, with $800 million available in FY2016. The department has renamed the program and it’s a mouthful: The Fostering Advancements in Shipping and Transportation for the Long-term Achievement of National Efficiencies (FASTLANE) grants.

Last week’s FASTLANE funding notice outlines the FY2016 discretionary competition structure and criteria being used to measure applications. Full applications are due by 8:00 PM EDT on April 14, 2016 and should be submitted through www.Grants.gov.

Transportation for America has summarized the NOFO for our members. Download the members-only summary here (pdf).

While Congress’ FAST Act legislatively limits Secretary Foxx to using the majority of this program’s funding for highway-only capacity improvements for freight, there are still possibilities to think outside of the box. The grant program does indicate a determination to support projects that reconnect communities torn apart from interstate development, such as capping highways.

Beth Osborne, T4America’s Senior Policy Advisor, and Michael Rodriguez, AICP, Director of Research for Smart Growth America, will provide an informative session discussing both the FY2016 FASTLANE and TIGER grants program for T4America members on Thursday, March 4 at 4:00 pm EST. Register for this members-only webinar here.

President Obama releases robust final budget; summary included

Today, the White House released President Obama’s fiscal year 2017 (FY17) budget proposal, the final of his presidency. This budget adheres to the $1.07 trillion spending cap that resulted from the bipartisan two-year budget deal agreed to last November. The President’s budget proposal either falls in line with or exceeds FAST Act funding levels, increases transit and rail funding, and funds TIGER (the FAST Act does not authorize the program), among other programs. The budget also calls for the creation of a 21st Century Regions program, a clean communities competitive grant program and funds the President’s 21st Century Clean Transportation Plan.

Speaker Ryan (R-WI) has asked congressman to maintain the funding levels agreed to last November, though there are signals that some may seek additional cuts.

Read a more detailed analysis here.

The 1 thing you need to know about President Obama’s clean transportation plan

On February 4, the White House released President Obama’s 21st Century Clean Transportation System plan to be included in his FY2017 budget proposal expected out on February 9. The President asserts that his budget proposal will strengthen the nation’s transportation fund through one-time revenues from business tax reform and a $10 per barrel fee on oil, and make large investments in transit and improve funding for local and regional governments.

“This is a new vision. We’re realistic about near-term prospects in Congress, but we think this can change the debate,” one senior administration official said.

The announcement comes two months after the passage of the 5 year surface transportation bill known as the FAST Act. However, Congressional leaders have not expressed willingness to consider the proposal.

House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-LA) made this point clear. “President Obama’s proposed $10 per barrel tax on oil is dead on arrival in the House.”

What the plan proposes

The plan includes a wide range of innovative solutions. It would refocus federal investments to reduce congestion, reform the existing transportation formula programs, and invest in competitive programs, including the popular Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery (TIGER) program. It would also increase investments in mass transit funding by $20 billion annually, provide $2 billion for an autonomous and low-emission vehicle pilot, and add $10 billion per year to reform local and regional transportation programs. The latter would include new discretionary grant programs for regions that lower emissions and better link land use decisions with transportation investments.

To pay for these investments, revenues from a $10 per barrel fee paid by oil companies would be phased in over 5 years. During the development of the FAST Act, Congress was unwilling to even hold a floor vote on increasing transportation user-fees, which hasn’t been raised in over 23 years.

USDOT proposes to remove restrictive design guidelines that make safer streets more difficult to build

The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) took an encouraging and surprising step, proposing to ease federally-mandated design standards on many roads, making it dramatically easier for cities and communities of all sizes to design and build complete streets that are safer for everyone.

This proposal is open for comment, and FHWA is waiting to hear from the public.

FHWA design guidelines promoSend a letter of support to FHWA

These outdated federal guidelines get in the way of better street design, but FHWA is proposing to scrap many of them. This is indeed great news, but for these changes to go ahead, FHWA needs to hear that they have strong support for the proposed changes.

Join us and generate a letter to FHWA today. We’ll be delivering your letters in person to FHWA all at once before the December 7th deadline.

Currently, FHWA has a long list of design criteria that local communities and states must adhere to when building or reconstructing certain roads, unless they choose to go through an arduous process of requesting an exception to do things like line a downtown street with street trees, reduce the width of lanes to add a bike lane, or curve a street slightly to slow traffic and make it safer for people in cars and on foot.

In this new proposed rule, FHWA decided after a thorough review to scrap 11 of 13 current design criteria for certain roads because they decided these criteria have “minimal influence on the safety or operation on our urban streets” and has a stronger connection for rural roads, freeways and higher speed urban arterials.

This new freedom for local planners and engineers would cover all roads on the National Highway System (NHS) with designed speeds under 50 mph. This covers most of the non-interstate roads and highways running through communities of all sizes that are built with federal funds, like the typical four-lane state highway through town that we’re all familiar with, perhaps with a turning lane on one side. Incidentally, many of these roads are among the most unsafe for pedestrians.

Walking & Roads

In FHWA’s own words, this move will “refine the focus on criteria impact on road safety and operation” and “encourages engineered solutions rather relying on minimum, maximum, or limiting values found in design criteria.”

In our words, this move will liberate local communities that have been working hard to make their roads safer for everyone that uses them, and rid them of the need to petition FHWA for exceptions to do exactly that. It’s a win for the movement for safer and more complete streets and also a liberating change for transportation engineers, especially those that have been working hard with their planners and elected leaders to bring innovative, safer street designs to their communities.

Since these controlling design criteria were first established in 1985, any project that didn’t meet all of the minimum design standards had to receive individual approval from FHWA. This was done on a project-by-project basis and added time and difficulty for those wanting to create safer roads. Now, for these NHS roads under 50 mph, engineers will only be required to attain design variances for just two criteria – design speed and structural capacity.

Today’s proposed rule follows on the heels of FHWA’s summer release of the Bicycle and Pedestrian Funding, Design, and Environmental Review: Addressing Common Misconceptions that addresses 10 misconceptions that often prevent or slow construction of safer roads. This is a valuable resource that will help local governments, metropolitan planning organizations and civic leaders improve the safety of our roads by debunking misconceptions ranging from the pots of money available for bike and pedestrian projects to explaining that FHWA rules are not the roadblock to complete street road design.

FHWA deserves praise for their leadership on this important issue. The rule is open to public comment for 60 days through December 7, 2015. Let’s take the opportunity to provide public comment and thank FHWA for their leadership and make sure it is implemented to help make safer streets for all to enjoy.

For these proposed changes to go ahead, FHWA needs to hear that they have strong support for the proposed changes. 

Generate a letter to FHWA now, and urge your friends to join in. It only takes a moment.

White House Honors Champions Transforming Transportation

Last week, the White House, in collaboration with the U.S. Department of Transportation, acknowledged and honored a new group of “Champions of Change” in the transportation world. Leaders and innovators were recognized for their work.

2015 Champions of Change in Transportation (Photo by T4America staff)

2015 Champions of Change in Transportation (Photo by T4America staff)

The most recent White House Champions of Change ceremony took place at the White House on Tuesday, October 13, 2015. US DOT’s Secretary Foxx was on hand to introduce the Beyond Traffic: Innovators in Transportation award to honor eleven key leaders. These eleven recipients discussed their work advancing transportation in their communities and also the importance of local innovation and local leadership.

A key theme during the ceremony was the concern for our nation’s economic development and the need for new, innovative ideas to improve our infrastructure while making the best use of limited resources. Visionaries like professor Habib Dagher, Director of Advanced Structures and Composites Center at the University of Maine, is a leader and advocate who is developing advanced structural systems for bridges. The program, Bridge in a Backpack, uses lightweight bridge materials to advance structural applications. His work is helping our nation’s construction/engineering industry to build and restore bridges in an efficient and inventive way.

Lightweight bridge materials being used to transform a 70-year-old bridge  Neal Bridge in Pittsfield, ME (Picture courtesy of the University of Maine)

Lightweight bridge materials being used to transform a 70-year-old bridge
Neal Bridge in Pittsfield, ME (Picture courtesy of the University of Maine)

Other honorees shed light on pedestrian safety concerns in their community. Kyle Wagenschutz, bike and pedestrian program manager in Memphis, TN, was recognized for pushing his city to become a national leader on accessible transportation options by advocating for more than 100 miles of new-dedicated bike lanes in his community. Olatunji Reed, another Champion of Change and community organizer, fights for social equity and fair accessibility in Chicago, IL. He leads a movement called “Slow Roll” an organization that teaches communities to embrace bicycle riding. As a result, people in all communities including low-income neighborhoods are embracing the idea of bicycling as a means of transportation this change can be seen in South Side and West Side neighborhoods in Chicago today.

When asked what drove participants to become champions of change, many expressed the desire to change the future of their communities and the nation. Finally, the honorees charged future students that were present at the ceremony to consider careers in the transportation field and to become strong and informed advocates.

Our team would like to congratulate the Champions of Change in this round’s group for their work to improve their communities. Interested in learning more about the awardees? The White House has profiles of all of the awardees participating in the Beyond Traffic event here. Know a great leader who should be among the Champions of Change? Nominate them here.

Announcing a new academy for local leaders who want to dig in on performance measures for transportation

In partnership with the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA),T4America is announcing a new yearlong training academy for metro regions that are hoping to learn more about the emerging practice of performance measurement, and applications are open now.

Transportation leadership academy performance measures

2012’s transportation law (MAP-21) ushered in a new era, creating a nascent system for states and metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs) to better determine success or failure by measuring the performance of their investments against federally-required measures. Some metro areas have been doing this for years before MAP-21 passed, and others are now scrambling to understand how to incorporate this new system into their process of creating plans, selecting projects, and measuring the effects of those projects and the effectiveness of each transportation dollar that gets spent.

Register for the webinar

 

This year-long leadership training program will educate local business, civic, elected leaders, and practitioners at the early stages of performance measure development, and will prepare participants to act on opportunities within their communities while plugging them into a dynamic national network of like-minded leaders throughout the country.

We know it sounds like wonky stuff, but with money for transportation harder to come by than anytime in recent history, a more accountable system that sets goals with input from the community, chooses transportation projects accordingly to meet those goals, and then measures the outcomes in a feedback loop will be essential for ensuring we get the best bang for the buck going forward.

This new academy for 2016 builds off the successful experience in 2015 with our partners at TransitCenter in a similar yearlong academy with leaders from three metro regions who have plans to invest in transit as part of their long-term economic development strategies. There are scores of smart, capable people at the local level who are trying to make great things happen in their communities, and we’re hopeful that this Transportation Leadership Academy will provide participants at the metropolitan level with the tools and support they need to set up a system for measuring performance to guide their planning and project selection processes.

Four things to know about applying: Get your application. Common questions are answered in this FAQ. Applications are due on November 13th. We’re hosting an informational webinar on October 21st at 2 p.m. EDT for those who want to learn more. Register for the webinar today.

Who should apply: Individuals who are working on transportation at the metropolitan level in regions that are at the early stages of performance measure development. Participating individuals may include local business, civic, elected leaders, and practitioners. For example, individuals may be elected officials on the board of an MPO or senior staff of chambers of commerce, labor organizations, civic groups, community associations, local or regional foundations, or major employers. Each regional team should have a participating staff member or board member of their local MPO. Both a staff member and Board member are encouraged to participate on a team.

Not sure who your MPO is? Search USDOT’s database of MPOs to find out. 

Don’t settle for the limited things Congress could agree on: Performance measures for members, part II

If states and metro areas don’t act now to establish their own priorities for their transportation system, they’ll end up only measuring what Congress deemed important in MAP-21. The time is now to start the conversation of what else also matters to the leaders and citizens in your area.

This is the second post in a series on performance measures by Beth Osborne, T4America Senior Policy Advisor. Read the rest of the series and dive into high-level overview of the concept, learn more about choosing the best measures for addressing your priorities, and learn how to demonstrate to the public that their dollars are being used wisely. -Ed.

With federal performance measures rolling out, what happens next?

Beth Osborne, T4America

Beth Osborne, T4America

The transition to a new system of “performance measurement” represents an attempt by Congress to get a better sense of how our transportation system is performing nationally, to allow states and regions to be compared with against another, and to communicate with the public about what they are getting for their tax dollars.

With USDOT nearing the end of the rulemaking process for establishing new performance measures for our transportation dollars, attention will turn to state DOTs and MPOs which will soon need to establish accompanying goals for their transportation system in these limited priority areas set by Congress, including safety, infrastructure condition, air pollution and congestion.

Each state DOT and MPO will set a target for each of USDOT’s measures. For example, State A may currently have 700 highway fatalities a year and want to bring this down to 650. The state would announce that goal, describe which projects will help them attain it and then report back to USDOT and the public about whether they hit their target.

In the case of the safety and infrastructure conditions measures, if a state or MPO fails to hit their target then they’ll have to spend a minimum amount of funding in that area. In the case of the other measures, there is no specific implication or consequence if targets are missed. But the process should still help improve accountability and transparency for priorities and spending: the public will have the chance to help set those targets, scrutinize whether or not the projects being chosen are likely to help meet the state and/or regional goals and to hold leadership responsible for the results.

Should we do more? Why won’t these federal measures alone be enough for our state or MPO?

If you have other important priorities and big picture goals for your transportation dollars outside of the limited set of measures agreed to by Congress — and many of you do — you need to begin work now to establish your own system. If not, with all the time and attention going into Congress’ limited measures, they could easily overwhelm your other priorities not addressed by them.

If your other priorities are to get the same emphasis, they need to receive the same treatment, including a system for measuring and setting goals for those priorities. Failing to have your other measures in place could easily lead to a system where projects get funded to satisfy federal measures but neglect certain regional priorities or even do damage to them. For example, building a highway expansion to address auto congestion (federal measure) that cuts off local access to jobs in a commercial center (metro priority).

One example of how to ensure your priorities are in the mix

The Salt Lake City region has conducted extensive outreach to the public and stakeholders to identify goals for the region with excellent results. Through a (widely admired and emulated) visioning process called “Envision Utah” that engaged thousands of citizens in its feedback process, the booming Salt Lake City region looked at future challenges and considered different ways to grow, including the infrastructure needs associated with each vision. They developed several approaches and evaluated them against their valued priority outcomes, like protection of open space, household transportation cost, and disaster resilience — all measures that the federal performance measure system will not take into account.

By doing this a decade ago, the region chose a growth pattern that saved $4.5 billion in avoided infrastructure costs over 10 years. And the public involvement led to strong support and excitement for the eventual projects selected based on this process. Citizens see their views reflected in the vision, and feel included in the process — which, incidentally, makes it easier to raise new revenue to invest in transportation, as the state recently did.

Transportation is just a mechanism to reach your shared vision and goals, so focus on the goals first

What is particularly exciting about Utah’s approach is that it isn’t rooted in the notion that transportation is a separate thing; an end unto itself. Their analysis of transportation needs flow from the shared vision for the region overall and aren’t simply reactive to current traffic conditions. The region believes that transportation should be planned to support economic development in the area and that traffic flow alone does not equal economic development.

Remember almost no one travels just to travel. There’s always a destination in mind. The goal is to get to work in order to earn money or to get to school to pick up your kids or to get to the doctor for medical care. The end goal isn’t just to drive the designed speed of the roadway or never spend a minute in congestion, though that is often where traditional engineering standards can take you. On the other hand, it is not the job of the engineers to decide our values or choose the community’s broader goals and outcomes. That is the job of the political and civic leadership.

And performance measures are where that process happens.

Now is the time to start the conversations with stakeholders and the public to ensure all regional priorities are being considered and measures are chosen to address those goal areas. And if you want your regional and local priorities to be reflected in the state DOT’s performance management system, a discussion about how to align those priorities should occur before the federal rules are pushing states to implement the new system.

For more information, feel free to check out our report on performance measures, Measuring What We Value.

Performance Measures Report Cover 350x300