Submittal and Review Process of Roadside Safety Products for Inclusion on State DOT Qualified

DRAFT 1 July 24, 2017

Submittal and Review Process of Roadside Safety Products for Inclusion on State DOT Qualified Products Lists

I. RESEARCH PROBLEM STATEMENT

Roadside safety products are installed to provide crash protection to occupants of errant vehicles that leave the travelway. Impact performance criteria for these products are provided in MASH, based on full scale crash testing. FHWA procedures and regulations require that these products that are installed on federal-aid highway projects must meet MASH. The AASHTO Roadside Design Guide provides additional guidance on selection, placement, and installation of these products based on systems that comply with the MASH criteria and the system’s performance characteristics.

States rely on FHWA eligibility letters for these products.Once crash testing is completed and an FHWA eligibility letter has been issued, the final step in getting these products installed is submitting them to each individual State DOT for evaluationand inclusion on what is called many different things, most commonly a Qualified Products List (QPL). Although this process has been in place for many decades, there is no standardization or consistency from State to State. Only a few States have policies, practices, and procedures that have shown to be effective and efficient in the review and acceptance of roadside safety products. In addition, through the years DOT’s have reduced staff and the people involved in the product review and approval process have less time, if any to dedicate to this process.

Owners or manufacturers of these roadside safety products often have extreme difficulty getting their products reviewed as States find themselves under more scrutinythatismaking things much more difficult and in many cases adding more time to this review process. The effects of these circumstances results in a waste of valuable time and resources on the part of the product owner and the DOTs. In addition, these delays of new product implementation cost the motoring public time, money, and ultimately lives.

The need to identify and address the nationwide sources of this problem is long overdue.

II. STATE DOT SEARCH SUMMARY

Although there are some States that have simplified the submittal requirements and are regularly successful in reviewing MASH tested products in a timely manner, most States have requirements that are taxing to manufacturers, are inefficient, and take excessive time and resources to review before placing them on their QPLs. Examples include:

• Different submittal forms for different departments creating confusion and delays.
• Separation of approvals within different departments (Design Departments vs. Materials Lab).
• Unique forms requiring unique support documents that are State specific.
• Charging a fee of well over a thousand dollars to review the product.
• When applying on-line, some States have file size limitations and vendors must upload materials many times in very small file sizes.
• When vendors try to submit materials through a web link (to solve the file size problem), some States firewalls prevent them from downloading materials.
• State specific drawings stamped by a P.E. registered in that State along with the associated costs and time delays.
• New product committees that do not regularly meet or have difficulty getting products on the agenda causing products to sit for 1, 2 or more years. Although being given numerous requests for updates, one State has been known to take nearly seven years to review a (NCHRP 350) product.
• Lack of internal communications such as submittals received by the wrong person and not getting to proper people. Manufacturers checking on the status of a review being told the submittal was lost and must be resubmitted.
• Lack of external communication such as submittals received and vendor not notified; then vendor can’t locate who has it, and DOT will not return emails or phone calls.
• Requiring the manufacturer to install 2 or 3 “demonstration project” units around the State, at the manufacturers cost, to be reviewed for a year.
• Requesting unique State specific labeling/markings on the product.

III. RESEARCH OBJECTIVE

The objective of this research is to:

• Establish an Advisory Committee to research, document, and evaluate the submittal and review processes of roadside safety products that are common throughout DOT’s across the United States and develop strategies to overcome the delays and impediments. These strategies will then be adopted by all State DOT product review departments for immediate implementation.
• Work with selected States to identify policies, practices, and procedures that have demonstrated as being effective and efficient in the submittal, review, and approvalprocesses for roadside safety products.
• Develop a roadmap of proven successful policies, practices, and procedures that have demonstrated to be effective and efficient in the way roadside safety products are submitted and reviewed. This will become part of the policies adopted by all State DOT product review departments for immediate implementation. AASHTO will oversee the implementation process.

IV. ESTIMATE OF PROBLEM FUNDING AND RESEARCH PERIOD

Recommended Funding:

It is estimated that the proposed research will require approximately $150,000 in funding.

Research Period:

It is estimated that the proposed research will require approximately one yearto complete.

V. URGENCY, PAYOFF POTENTIAL, AND IMPLEMENTATION

Urgency – MASH was published in 2009 and updated in 2016. The AASHTO/FHWA joint implementation plan calls for sunset dates of MASH tested productsbeginning December31, 2017 and continuing through December 31, 2019. There will soon be an inundation of submittals going to State DOT offices. Without improvements to the submittal, evaluation, and approval process, the delays, inefficiencies, and wastes of time and resources this industry has experienced willundoubtedly become even worse.

Potential Payoff – The primary payoff is better and more timelypolicies and practices that can be used in establishing standards for MASH tested roadside safety products. The cost of this research is a small fraction of what would be saved through improved policies and practices.

Implementation – This research would likely result in significant efficiency and improvementsto the submittal, review, and approval process of MASH tested products. It would also likely provide valuable information for the FHWA and the States in developing up-grade, retrofit and replacement policies regarding roadside safety products.

VI. PERSON(S) DEVELOPING THE PROBLEM

ATSSA Guardrail Committee, Education Subcommittee

John C. Durkos

Road Systems, Inc.

2516 Mallory Lane

Stow, OH 44224

330-346-0721

VII. PROBLEM MONITOR

The person who will be assigned to monitor the research will be designated by the AASHTO Technical Committee on Roadside Safety. It is expected they will select one of their members as the monitor.

VIII. DATE AND SUBMITTED BY

Submitted XX/XX/2017 by:

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