Freight Performance Measures

Crystal JonesFHWA

Office of Freight Management and Operations

Federal Highway AdministrationOffice of Freight Management and Operations2

INITIATIVE GOALS

• Short Term• Develop baseline measures to support monitoring the

agency’s progress in “Global Connectivity”

• Mid Term• To develop a rich data source that can be used by

stakeholders in the transportation community and by academia

• Long Term• Target investment in National Highway System based

on sound data that identifies where the greatest needs exist

Federal Highway AdministrationOffice of Freight Management and Operations3

Why Performance Measures?

• Performance measurement is mandated by the Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA) of 1993.

• Performance measures provide mechanism for understanding system performance

• Performance measurement improves the management and delivery of products and services

• Performance measurement demonstrates the accountability of Federal stewardship of taxpayer resources.

• Performance measurement helps justify programs and their costs --Given limited budgets, etc., another tool for informing investment decisions at a national, state or local level

Federal Highway AdministrationOffice of Freight Management and Operations4

What are the benefits of performance measurement?”• Set goals and standards

• Detect and correct problems

• Manage, describe, and improve processes

• Gain insight into, and make judgments about, the effectiveness and efficiency of programs, and processes

• Provide measurable results to demonstrate progress towards goals and objectives

Federal Highway AdministrationOffice of Freight Management and Operations5

FHWA’s FREIGHT PERFORMANCE MEASURE (FPM) INITIATIVE

Strategic Goal: Global Connectivity

" Sustain the economic efficiency of goods movement on the surface transportation

system “

• Develop baseline indices and performance measures for truck travel on the interstate system (freight significant corridors) and border crossing time and delay for commercial vehicles

Federal Highway AdministrationOffice of Freight Management and Operations6

Global Connectivity

• Desired Outcomes• Reduced barriers to trade in transportation goods and services• More efficient movement of cargo throughout the supply chain

• Goals• To reduce travel time and improve reliability of travel time in key

highway freight corridors. • To reduce delay of commercial vehicles processed at US land

border crossings

• Measures (Tentative)• Travel Rate and Buffer Time on Freight Significant Corridors• Border Crossing Measures (TBD)

Federal Highway AdministrationOffice of Freight Management and Operations7

Travel Time Variability –

• Incidents• Work Zones• Weather• Fluctuations in Demand• Special Events• Traffic Control Devices.• Inadequate Base Capacity

Research on the trucking industry shows that shippers and carriers value transit time at $25 to $200 per hour, depending on the product being

carried. Unexpected delays can increase that value by 50 to 250 percent.

Federal Highway AdministrationOffice of Freight Management and Operations8

Key Border Challenges –

• Congestion• Long Wait Times• Unpredictability of Crossing Times• Queues

• Security and Efficiency

• Safety

• Imbalance Between Crossings

Federal Highway AdministrationOffice of Freight Management and Operations9

Cooperative FPM Research Team

• Federal Highway Administration’s Office of Freight Management and Operations

• American Transportation Research Institute (formerly ATA Foundation)

• Technology Vendors

• University of Minnesota ITS Institute

Federal Highway AdministrationOffice of Freight Management and Operations10

Identification of Freight-Significant Corridors

• Multi-System Process Used to Identify Primary Freight Corridors:

• Freight Analysis Framework• Industry Surveys & Website Solicitations• Technology Vendor Databases

• Information Cross-Factored to Generate 50-Corridor Corridor Compendium• Initial focus on 5 corridors

• I5, I10, I70, I65, I45

Federal Highway AdministrationOffice of Freight Management and Operations11

Selecting an Optimal Tracking System

Technologies Considered:

Satellite-Based Systems

Terrestrial Wireless Systems

Hybrid Systems

On-Board Systems

Fixed-Site Systems

Federal Highway AdministrationOffice of Freight Management and Operations12

Data Collection and Analysis (ALPHA)

• Carrier ID Cleansing System developed for private sector Data Privacy issues

• Truck Tool software developed to “relate” position data to US DOT maps

• Alpha test successfully tracked speeds by corridor locations (manual calculations)

• Focused on segments of interstate highways

Federal Highway AdministrationOffice of Freight Management and Operations13

Data Collection and Analysis (BETA)

• Truck Tool reconfigured and automated• Developed “virtual mile markers” software to

accommodate missing points on maps• Truck travel data “automatically” converted into

travel times and speeds by location• Micro-deviations in speeds can be used to

identify bottlenecks and system impediments• Can typically differentiate temporal bottlenecks

from infrastructure bottlenecks• Focused on entire interstate highways

Federal Highway AdministrationOffice of Freight Management and Operations14

Accomplishments to Date….

Travel Time on Significant Corridors• Data Collection and Analysis for Freight Significant

Corridors• I10, I70, I65, I45 and I5

• Location data from Satellite used to calculate travel rates and derive measures of travel time reliability

• 7 months of data (1 Full Year of Data by Jan 06)

February FPM Report1.doc

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Federal Highway AdministrationOffice of Freight Management and Operations15

Accomplishments to Date….

Border Crossing Measures• Conducted initial meetings with various stakeholders

(Ambassador , Pacific Highway, and Peace Bridge)• Collaboration with Transport Canada on their Border

Wait-time Study• Selected 5 US/Cda Crossings

Blaine (Pacific Highway): Blaine, WA Pembina: Pembina, ND Ambassador Bridge: Detroit, MI Peace Bridge: Buffalo, NY Champlain: Champlain, NY

• Data Collection started Jul 1st 2005

Federal Highway AdministrationOffice of Freight Management and Operations16

NEXT STEPS and TAKE AWAYS

• Expand data collection and analysis to additional freight-significant corridors

• Explore other technologies that can support automated measurement

• Conduct initial analysis of data from border data collection effort

• Use the data to conduct two case studies on effects of Severe Weather and Work/Construction Zones on travel times

• Select Two States to work with research team to examine usefulness and application of the data

• Considering two outreach sessions to provide information on the initiative and provide a technical overview of how the raw data is used to derive travel time measures

• Finalize data sharing agreement

Federal Highway AdministrationOffice of Freight Management and Operations17

Conclusions…

FPM INITIATIVE WILL PROVIDE…

baseline freight performance measures that accurately reflect what we are accomplishing, in quantitative terms, right now, at the present time

Intercity measures that when integrated with the urban mobility measures will provide a more holistic picture of transportation system performance

INPUT FROM STAKEHOLDERS WILL PROVIDE…

measurable, time-based targets that explicitly stipulates, also in quantitative terms, what measure of performance we expect

Federal Highway AdministrationOffice of Freight Management and Operations18

More Information

http://ops.fhwa.dot.gov/freight/documents/travel_time_flyer.pdf

FHWA Office of Freight Management and Operations

“

http://www.ops.fhwa.dot.gov/freight

Crystal Jones

202-366-2976

Crystal.Jones@fhwa.dot.gov