CE 222 Design Guide

TRANSPORTION HISTORY, LEGISLATION, FINANCING, ORGANIZATIONS, AND PERFORMANCE

Reading Assignment:

  1. (Chapter 2 from FHWA’s Flexibility in Highway Design)

Objectives

  1. Summarize important transportation history, legislation, and financing
  2. Name two components of a roadway that need to be designed.

Highway History

  1. Pre-1900s - “make-do” era
  2. 1900 to WWII – Highway Departments emerge
  3. WWII to 1960 – Pave to get out of mud
  4. 1960 to 1980 – Interstate full blast, planning/safety/environment issues
  5. 1980 to 1990 – Finish interstate? – Rehabilitation era
  6. 1990 to present – rehabilitation, restructure, and refinance

Important Legislation

  1. 1893 Office of Road Inquiry (later Bureau of Public Roads)
  2. Early construction: working on the road tax
  3. Early roads were toll roads such as the National Pike – Cumberland, MD to Vandalia, IL
  4. 1910s First Federal Aid Road Act, based upon area/population/mileage, 50-50 match
  5. 1920s designated roads
  6. 1930s planning studies
  7. 1940s defense/interstate designation, secondary designation
  8. 1944 – National System of Interstates
  9. 1950s funding for interstates 90 – 10, $0.04 gas tax went to trust fund
  1. 1956 – Federal Aid Highway Act – Authorized completion of National System of Interstate and Defense Highways (in 13-15 years, 41,000 miles, 24.8 Billion)
  2. Now: 1992 – 45,500 miles, 100 Billion
  3. 1960s urban problems, 3 Cs planning required, transit, 1.5% req., NHTSA, vehicle safety (50/50 for operation), education funds (NHI), 55 mph for energy concerns
  4. 1962 – Act required Federal work to follow continuing, comprehensive, and cooperative planning procedure.
  5. Safety Act 1966
  6. NEPA 1969
  7. 1970s FAU (to go with FAS, FAP) 70/30 matching funds for non-interstate, 80/20 transit (50/50 for operation), education funds (NHI), 55 mph for energy concerns
  8. 1970 – Federal Aid Highway Act – requires consideration of economic, social and environmental effects in planning and development air, noise, water pollution, displacement of citizens, farms, businesses, disruption/destruction of natural resources, public facilities, community cohesion, and aesthetics).
  9. 1973 Endangered Species Act, 1990 ADA, 1990 CAAAs
  10. 1980s Motor Carrier Act, $0.09 gas tax, bridges, larger trucks, STAA (82), STURA (87), 65 mph speed limit on highways
  11. 1990s ISTEA (1991), National Highway System (NHS), TEA-21 (1998), STP block grants, speed limits removed, ITS, CAA (1990), ADA (1991)

Highway Financing – Budget Terms

  1. Allocation – Distribution of Authority made available administratively prescribed procedure or process.
  2. Apportionment – Distribution of Budget Authority made available by statutory formula, or procedure prescribed by law.
  3. Appropriation Act – Substantive legislation that sets up or continues the operation of a federal program or agency either indefinitely or for a specific period of time or that sanctions a particular type of obligation or expenditure within a program.
  4. Budget Authority – Authority provided by law to enter into financial obligations that will result in immediate or future outlays involving federal government funds.
  5. Contract Authority – Authority that permits obligations to be incurred in advance or appropriations or receipts
  6. Fiscal Year (FY) – Any yearly period, regardless of its relationship to a calendar year. The Federal Government FY starts on October 1 and ends on September 30.
  7. Obligation Limitation – A restriction on the amount of budgetary resources that can be obligated or committed for a specific purpose.
  8. Obligations – Amounts of orders placed, contracts awarded, service received, and similar transactions during a given period that will require payments during the same or a future period.
  9. Urbanized Areas – Comprises an incorporated place and adjacent densely settled surrounding area that together have a minimum population of 50,000.
  10. Trust Fund – A fund credited with receipts, which are earmarked by law and held in trust or in a fiduciary capacity by the Government for use in carrying out specific purposes and programs in accordance with an agreement or a statute.
  11. Highway User Taxes – fuel, registration, and commercial vehicle taxes
  12. Property Taxes
  13. Tolls
  14. Other funds – sales, income
  15. Bond Financing – fines
  16. Gas Tax

Performance

Organizations

  1. The Department of Transportation – Operating Administrations
  1. Federal Highway Administration – FHWA
  2. Administers the Federal Aid Highway Program
  3. Helps states in the planning and construction of federal highways
  4. Regulates and enforces safety for trucks, buses, and hazardous cargo on the highways
  5. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration – NHTSA
  6. Establishes and enforces safety standards to reduce deaths, injuries, and economic losses resulting from vehicle crashes
  7. Administers grants to states for highway safety programs
  8. Conducts test of standards, establish/enforce fuel economy standards
  9. Bureau of Transportation Statistics
  10. Identifies, compiles and publishes statistics on major modes of transportation
  11. State Transportation Agencies
  1. State Regulatory Agencies
  1. Transportation Commission - IA
  1. State Departments of Transportation
  2. DOT
  3. Transportation Facts
  4. Transportation Associations
  5. AASHTO: American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials
  1. Members are the engineering officers of the various state and federal highway and transportation agencies
  2. Function – to develop and improve administration, design, construction, and maintenance of highways
  3. Creates standard for materials testing
  4. TRB: Transportation Research Board
  1. Private organization that encourages and correlates research of universities, government agencies and industry
  2. ITE: Institute of Transportation Engineers
  1. Members are mostly traffic engineers
  2. Meets annually, and publishes several handbooks and a monthly magazine, the ITE Journal
  3. ATA: American Trucking Association
  1. Federation of the trucking associations
  2. Promotes highway safety, supports highway research, and studies technical and regulatory problems of the trucking industry
  3. Other Federal Transportation Agencies
  1. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB)
  1. Investigates accidents involving all modes of transportation
  2. Reviews US DOT denials or suspensions of licenses when appealed
  3. Compiled of a five person board appointed by the president

DEVELOPMENT PROCESS FOR LOCATION STUDY

Early Project Development

Form Management Team

(Need to assign EA writer at this time)

Coordinate with TC Plannerduring team formation

Ask Division/Office directors to assign team members

Define Project Scope

access control

systems planning (CIN, NHS, corridor)

Identify facility type (4-lane, 2-lane, super-2, freeway, expressway)

Typical cross-section

Develop preliminary location concept (note: per the new process, this is to be completed without any of the Engineering Data and Environmental Data available. Time allowed, 3 months. HOW?)

Develop preliminary horizontal alignments using aerial photos and quad maps

Develop preliminary vertical alignments using quad maps (possibly digitized)

Develop access control scenarios

Project Review

Obtain concurrence from staff at project review on project scope and preliminary location concept, if needed. Determine on a project by project basis.

Public Involvement

(prepare aerial base maps showing known information and current status of location study)

Public Information Meeting (for gathering input to the project prior to development of alt’s)

Meet with local agencies as required (cities, RPA, MPO)

Engineering Data Gathering

order aerial photography

order Digital Terrain Model

order traffic estimate

collect engineering data

accidents

Pavement history

As-built plans

Previous location/economic studies

Sufficiency ratings

property information - Plat books, ROW

Utilities data

Critical existing features (off quad maps and field review)

Planned construction in adjacent areas

Bridge and culvert information

order life cycle cost analysis on existing pavement

Prepare base maps showing engineering data

Environmental Data Gathering

Environmental Scoping Meeting

(Need to define who is included. Contact Mark Mastellar; he held meeting 2/2/98 discussing these future meetings with some affected agencies.)

DNR

Corps of Engineers

US Department of Interior

SHPO?

Order environmental studies from specialists for wide corridor (400 m either side of centerline for each alternative under consideration)

Regulated Substances investigation

Cultural resources - archaeological and historical Phase I and II

Preliminary Geotechnical - soils data, includes availability of borrows

Wetland inventory - identification and delineation

Biological survey - upland habitat, bat survey

water resources/floodplains

begin 404 permitting process

Other environmental data gathering

cemeteries

land use inventory

local planning

Prepare base maps showing environmental data

Develop Alternatives

(will the new process include development of a location concept statement? Otherwise, there is no screening process for showing the alternatives to staff at Project Review before we include all alternatives in the EA.)

Building on the preliminary project concept, define and develop location alternatives.

Use engineering data and environmental data base maps to compare impacts for alternatives

Evaluate engineering data

Evaluate existing horizontal and vertical geometry

horizontal sight distance

substandard curves

access control

determine passing opportunities and the need for passing/climbing lanes

analyze accident data

intersection capacity analysis

determine interchange needs

left-turn lanes

right-turn lanes

signal warrant analysis

Develop horizontal and vertical alignments using Geopak

mainline

sideroad

(Do not develop entrances unless critical)

Preliminary interchange layouts using Geopak (assistance from Methods as required)

(Office of Design (through the representative on Project Team) to review the proposed layouts on CADD. This will ensure the provision in the new process that 30% of the design is complete prior to the combined formal public hearing. This will obtain buy-in from the Office of Design to the concepts. ???)

Prepare Location Study Concept Statement for presentation of study to Project Review (This document will be the basis for the EA and will include much of the information that the EA will ultimately include.

Screen to reasonable alternatives

Present alternatives to Staff at Project Review

Obtain concurrence on alternatives to be included in the environmental document

Value Engineering (to be done with VE Team sometime during alternative development)

Public Involvement

additional public information meetings during development of alternatives as determined by the Project Team.

Prepare Environmental Document

*to be done concurrently with development of alternatives

*send early coordination letters at same time as Environmental Scoping Meeting?

*Location Study Concept Statement will make up a significant share of the EA.

*EA will be completed following completion of the Environmental Data gathering by specialists. A minimum of Phase 1 cultural resources should be completed prior to the publishing of the EA. ?

Combined Formal public hearing

100% planning complete

30% design complete

???What type of involvement will the Office of Design have in this hearing? They will not have received the project nor done any work to date on it except for their Project Team member and possible additional review during alternatives development.

Project Review of hearing results

Commission Approval

Transmit project to Office of Design

HIGHWAY DESIGN PROCESS AND ROADWAY CLASSIFICATION

Reading Assignment:

  1. A Policy on Geometric Design of Highways and Streets 1-14, 88-91
  1. (Chapter 3 from FHWA’s Flexibility in Highway Design)

Objectives

  1. Summarize general highway design process
  2. Identify different roadway classification systems
  3. Identify and describe functional classes and their characteristics
  4. Summarize functional system characteristics (rural – urban)
  5. Gain basic knowledge and feel for extent of California system by class

Design Process (General)

  1. flow chart (different stages) see power point
  2. Opinion:
  1. Much is decided in early stages (concept and alternative planning/design)
  2. Environmental concerns and public involvement are very important
  3. Involves generating full range of alternatives and technically evaluating

This class will focus on applying commonly used design techniques, controls, criteria, and standards

Do roadways serve different purposes?

3.One of the most important parts of the design process is determining what (who?) purpose a roadway serves?

Classification TYPE

What factors define the character or purpose of a roadway?

Roadway Classification

Three types

  1. Funding
  2. Administrative/Jurisdictional – City (streets), Local/County (roads), State primary and secondary, Federal (National Highway System)
  3. Function (See question above)

Functional Classification

  1. Determined by system network planning (how it fits in system)

Goals:

  1. Match trip portion with roadway
  2. Aggregate trips safely and efficiently
  3. Satisfy trip demands
  1. Basis of Current Design Approach (form follows function)
  2. Defines Design Standards
  3. Sizing based on function and demand

Roadway Functional Classes

  1. Class Determined by characteristics: function, access density, traffic demands, trip length, expected speed
  2. Function: access and mobility

Three Major Roadway Classes:

  1. Arterial (mobility, low, high, long, fast)
  2. Collector (mobility/access, moderate, moderate, moderate, moderate)
  3. Local (access, high, low, short, slow)

Green Book (GB) Functional System Characteristics (Rural and Urban)

We will focus on Rural:

1.Principal Arterials
  1. Function: Statewide/Interstate Travel and Connect urbanized areas
  2. Characteristics: Long trips, no stubs, high speed, widely spaced, full/partial access control
  3. Subclasses: Freeways, Other non-Freeways with access control
2.Minor Arterials
  1. Function: intrastate/intercounty trips, connect small urban areas with major trip generators
  2. Characteristics: Moderate everything (routes, speed, spacing, mostly mobility)
3.Rural Collectors
A.Major Collectors: Connect county seats to large towns not served by arterials, link entities with nearby arterials, urban areas
B.Minor Collectors: Serve remaining small towns, link local traffic generators with rural areas
C.Characteristics: Shorter, Moderate Speeds (in rural areas), Intermediate spacing
4.Rural Local Roads
  1. Function: Provide access to land on collector network, serve short distance travel
  2. Characteristics: Short routes that terminate at higher classes, relatively low speeds, intermediate spacing

Urban Functional System

1.Principal Arterials

  1. Functions: carry most trips entering/leaving urban area, serve intraurban trips, carry intraurban and intercity bus routes, provide continuity to rural arterials
  2. Characteristics: longest distance routes and highest volume, high speed, spacing is less than 1 km in CBD and greater than 8 km in urban fringe, full/partial access control
  3. Subclasses: interstates, other freeways and expressways, other principal arterials with partial access control
  1. Urban Minor Arterials
  2. Functions: interconnect with and augment principle arterials, accommodate moderate length trips, distribute traffic, carry local buses, provide intracommunity continuity, connect to urban collectors
  3. Characteristics: moderate trip length high volumes, moderate speeds, spacing 0.2 to1.0 km in CBD and 3 to 5 km in suburbs

3.Urban Collectors

  1. Functions:
  • Provide traffic circulation within residential neighborhoods and industrial/commercial areas
  • Collect traffic from locals and channel to arterials
  • Carry local buses
  • Provide some direct land access
  • Characteristics:
  • Shorter than minor arterials
  • Moderate speeds
  • Spacing intermediate to arterials
  • Penetrates residential neighborhoods
  • Subclasses: major and minor

4.Urban Locals

  1. Functions:
  2. Provide direct access to land
  3. Connect properties to higher class streets (i.e., collectors)
  4. Characteristics:
  5. Short in length
  6. Dead end – terminate at collections
  7. Low speeds
  8. No bus routes

TRANSPORTATION PLANNING

Reading Assignment:

  1. (Chapter 1 from FHWA’s Flexibility in Highway Design)

Objectives

  1. Identify highway system components
  2. Define transportation planning
  3. Recall the transportation planning process and its design purposes
  4. Identify the four steps of transportation demand modeling and describe modeling basics.
  5. Explain how transportation planning and modeling process results are used in highway design.

See: (Chapter 1 from FHWA’s Flexibility in Highway Design)

Highway System Components

  1. Vehicle – Design Vehicle
  2. Driver (pedestrian) – Design Driver
  3. Roadway – Traffic and other design criteria and controls (design speed, sight distances, etc.)
  4. The characteristics, capabilities, and interrelationships of these components need to be considered in design

Start with volume/demand needs for design (use planning models or estimation) – in general, need to know required number of lanes

Transportation Planning (one definition)

Activities that:

  1. Collect information on performance of existing system
  2. Identify existing and forecast future system performance levels and changes (socioeconomic factors, traffic demand, etc.)
  3. Identify solutions to the expected problems

Focus: provide transportation facilities to meet existing and forecast travel demand

Transportation Planning Process

  1. Collect and Maintain Inventory of Transportation Facilities (roadway function/jurisdiction) and socioeconomic factors (income, number of autos, etc.) and land use data
  2. Define goals and objectives for system (general goals and specific objectives)
  3. Identify system deficiencies or opportunities (existing/future) – use computer to model/represent existing and future transportation system (TransCAD, QRS, Tranplan/TP Plus, …)
  4. Develop and analyze alternatives
  5. Evaluate Alternatives (systematically compare) and Recommend Plan
  6. Implement plan
  7. Monitor system performance and implementation of plan

Models - General

Most models today still calibrate to and forecast ADT – Average Daily Traffic (def.) – Total volume during a given time period (in whole days) greater than one day and less than one year divided by number of days in time period (AADT – for whole year)

Some models are peak hour (needed more)

Four Steps of Transportation Modeling

  1. Trip Generation – calculate trips by traffic analysis zone (defined relatively common land use area)
  2. Trip Distribution – trips produced from zone i and attracted to zone j
  3. Mode Split – identify trip mode
  4. Trip Assignment – trip by mode goes by route x (model is calibrated by comparing these to traffic counts at specific locations)

Some Transportation Modeling Basics

  1. Number of Trips is a function of demographics and land use (intensity, character, and location relative to CBD)
  2. Trip generation from national or local study sources
  3. Trip distribution from one zone to another is dependent upon trip purpose, trip length and travel time (very important)
  4. Trip assignment methods –

a)all or nothing/free = assign all trip to shortest time path

b)Capacity Restraint/Equilibrium – assigns/reassigns trips to links as predicted travel time on link changes

c)Stochastic – based on utility and attractiveness of route

d)Incremental – load traffic in predefined increments, adjusting travel time after each increment