Strategic Planning And Decision Making In State Departments Of Transportation

TRB's National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP) Synthesis 326: Strategic Planning and Decision Making in State Departments of Transportation examines state and provincial transportation departments' experience with strategic planning and synthesizes current approaches to linking strategic planning with other decision-making processes, including operational and tactical planning, resource allocation, performance management, and performance measurement.

"TRB's National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP) Report 798: The Role of Planning in a 21st Century State Department of Transportation-Supporting Strategic Decisionmaking examines how the planning function in state departments of transportation can more effectively support strategic decisionmaking." --

This pioneering text provides a holistic approach to decisionmaking in transportation project development and programming, whichcan help transportation professionals to optimize their investmentchoices. The authors present a proven set of methodologies forevaluating transportation projects that ensures that all costs andimpacts are taken into consideration. The text's logical organization gets readers started with asolid foundation in basic principles and then progressively buildson that foundation. Topics covered include: Developing performance measures for evaluation, estimatingtravel demand, and costing transportation projects Performing an economic efficiency evaluation that accounts forsuch factors as travel time, safety, and vehicle operatingcosts Evaluating a project's impact on economic development and landuse as well as its impact on society and culture Assessing a project's environmental impact, including airquality, noise, ecology, water resources, and aesthetics Evaluating alternative projects on the basis of multipleperformance criteria Programming transportation investments so that resources can beoptimally allocated to meet facility-specific and system-widegoals Each chapter begins with basic definitions and concepts followedby a methodology for impact assessment. Relevant legislation isdiscussed and available software for performing evaluations ispresented. At the end of each chapter, readers are providedresources for detailed investigation of particular topics. Theseinclude Internet sites and publications of international anddomestic agencies and research institutions. The authors alsoprovide a companion Web site that offers updates, data foranalysis, and case histories of project evaluation and decisionmaking. Given that billions of dollars are spent each year ontransportation systems in the United States alone, and that thereis a need for thorough and rational evaluation and decision makingfor cost-effective system preservation and improvement, this textshould be on the desks of all transportation planners, engineers,and educators. With exercises in every chapter, this text is anideal coursebook for the subject of transportation systems analysisand evaluation.

The objective of this study was to develop a comprehensive understanding of the driving forces that have contributed to difficulty in program delivery in today's constrained fiscal environment.