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Surface Transportation Research and Technology Assessment

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4. Progress Made Under ISTEA and Lessons Learned

Under ISTEA, support was provided to a number of programs for which the goal was to deploy and implement innovations in technologies and materials. This Chapter discusses some of the lessons learned from these programs, identifies which of the Technology Innovation programs have been reasonably successful in achieving their goals, and reviews the reasons for this success.

Modal Programs

Highways: ISTEA included provisions directed at developing and introducing innovative methods and technologies for highway infrastructure monitoring, maintenance, and rapid renewal. Notably, this legislation provided more than $100 million for the explicit purpose of fostering the implementation of R&D products. However, at the outset, it must be acknowledged that measuring the impacts of Federally-funded highway research and implementation programs is difficult. In addition to the inherent difficulty of isolating program effects from external influences, few means exist to collect the necessary data. To assist in evaluating the effectiveness of Federally funded highway research, interviews were conducted with a small sample of highway agency representatives and research and program administrators. Their insights provide one measure of effectiveness.

One study has found that the rate of adoption of innovations by State highway agencies has improved recently. ³⁸ However, the results of the interviews suggest that the overall rate of innovation in highway agencies has not changed enough to make a significant improvement in infrastructure preservation processes or costs in the near term. Moreover, most interviewees did not anticipate a significant acceleration in innovation, given the decentralized control over the nation’s highways by numerous independent agencies and organizations. Most of the interviewees believe that because of such fragmentation, research and technology implementation provisions should be an integral part of any major Federal surface transportation research initiative. They also believe that facilitating innovation is an important national role that extends beyond the research and technology products associated with DOT programs.

Despite the difficulties associated with implementation, the pursuit of innovation is endorsed as essential by those interviewed. Funding pressures to "do more with less" are spurring a new focus on research that helps to identify better ways of "doing business." It is assumed that research results address relevant goals; have been proven in actual field conditions; and address critical institutional and organizational implementation factors.

Organizational and institutional barriers are widely recognized as significant impediments to realizing the benefits of a broad range of highway research results with the potential for high benefit/cost ratios. Barriers range from a simple lack of awareness regarding new developments, to concerns about readiness and proven effectiveness over time, to organizational policies and practices that hinder change. This suggests a need to evaluate innovations from the viewpoint of the intended beneficiaries — to focus on the outcome of field testing under real-world conditions, rather than the results of artificial academic experiments.

New methods, materials, and technologies that can extend the useful life of pavement and bridges and reduce life-cycle costs can play a key role in reducing the gap between apparent need and available resources. There are several examples of these innovations, such as "Superpave" asphalt pavements that increase pavement life by ten percent or possibly more (see Chapter 3). However, significant up-front investments in staff training, expanded testing facilities, or more costly materials may be required to reap longer-term savings. Such tradeoffs are difficult for agencies that are under pressure to produce tangible near-term improvements. This creates a bias toward making minimal improvements on a large number of roads, rather than concentrating funding on a small number of facilities to create more significant improvement over the long run.

Federal research programs have modified their goals over the past decade, shifting gradually from developing materials and technologies for building new roads and bridges to maintaining and rebuilding existing facilities. It is true that many innovations are relevant to reconstruction as well as new construction; it also is true that research is being conducted on condition monitoring and infrastructure modernization. New facilities account for less than one-half of one percent of the highway inventory, and the cost of maintaining traffic flow during reconstruction can on occasion equal or exceed the costs of the facility itself. Therefore, more resources could be directed at the challenges of monitoring, maintaining and rapidly renewing existing road and bridge facilities.

Transit: Attitudes within the transit industry are changing significantly. According to the Urban Mobility Corporation Innovation Brief on mass transit,

Most representative of this change is the application of advanced traffic management and travel information systems to public transit operations in both urban and suburban areas. Innovative partnerships among public agencies and the private sector are resulting in major investments in intelligent transportation, ranging from research and development and operational tests to real-world deployment. Understandably, transit agencies are most interested in technologies that improve operations and save costs. From that perspective, ITS technologies are more attractive than infrastructure monitoring and renewal.

Rail: New technologies and track materials have allowed railroads to improve their track performance. Freight railroads and Amtrak have upgraded their tracks, replacing them with stronger rails and improving the track ties. Multi-year research results of the jointly funded FRA/railroad industry Heavy Axle Load testing program at the Facility for Accelerated Service Testing (FAST) at Pueblo, Colorado, have shown that modern rails made of cleaner premium steels have a longer fatigue life: up to five or ten times longer than rails made of conventional steels. In addition, given the recent trend towards track reduction, railroads will be able to concentrate their capital investments on improving the maintenance of their remaining tracks and signal systems.

Emerging maintenance methods and technologies have the potential to reduce maintenance costs and enhance safety for the railroad industry. The defect detection methods, for instance, could have predictive or even prescriptive capabilities. Maintenance worker productivity has improved as advanced maintenance technologies, including better track defect detection technologies, are implemented, and better scheduling techniques are used. In addition, recent increased use of lubricants has led to significant reductions in rail wear, while automated and mechanized maintenance allows for better control of surface geometry. These reduce overall wheel and rail forces and the resulting track degradation

Ports: Advanced technologies have the potential to improve port infrastructure maintenance and rehabilitation, which would increase the capacity, safety, and cost-effectiveness of the U.S. port system. Significant opportunities exist for improving infrastructure capacity and throughput through the joint-use of military facilities and promotion of dual-use technologies. The ongoing defense conversion programs offer the potential for improving the capacity and throughput of the existing port infrastructure. Given cost issues and environmental restrictions on physical capacity expansion, more joint civilian use of military facilities and diffusion of dual-use technologies could be cost-effective approaches to increasing capacity. Notable among current efforts are the U.S. TRANSCOM initiatives to leverage commercial technologies, streamline landside lift operations, and establish in-transit visibility. Many of the benefits from the DOD partnership efforts may accrue to the civil sector, which could take advantage of a global commercial intermodal transportation network, including vessels, logistics management services, infrastructure, terminals and equipment, communications and cargo tracking networks.

Despite this potential, the complexity of the operations and technologies involved in ocean shipping has made it increasingly difficult to pursue more effective Federal R&T and infrastructure maintenance policies. Public-private partnerships, joint ventures, and extensive training have emerged as the most effective approaches to managing these needs. MARAD’s CHCP program is moving to a focus on training, and to encouraging broader participation by DOD and private sector beneficiaries.

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Lessons Learned

Based on this assessment of the surface transportation infrastructure research and technology transfer programs, a number of important factors are key to the success of any innovation. The following appear to be critical to successful programs.

The results of innovative research activities must be of strategic significance to the intended users — strategic in the sense that the result relates to a critical agency function, and significant in the sense that it make a discernible difference in performance or cost from the viewpoint of the implementing organization. At a minimum, this implies a need for the endorsement of the Chief Executive Officers within implementing agencies; ideally, the agency leaders will provide a strong mandate for and commitment to implementing favorable findings.

Among the most important lessons learned is that applied research should not be initiated without the commitment of prospective implementers. In addition, such research should not be considered complete until the results are implemented.

User-defined performance criteria and measures are helpful in guiding research activities. Early and ongoing involvement of intended users is essential to ensure meaningful results that will be practical and applicable in the appropriate institutional context. Users control implementation by choosing whether to adopt an innovation based on their acceptance criteria. Consequently, it is important to establish such criteria in functional terms early in the research process and to affirm these criteria periodically.

The research process must include testing under controlled and "uncontrolled" field conditions. Controlled testing is necessary to isolate and analyze critical technical variables, whereas "uncontrolled" testing is necessary to reveal and assess institutional impediments to implementation. Another testing element relates to establishing performance-based specifications and test protocols for pre-qualifying or certifying a new product as suitable for acquisition and use by public agencies. For example, AASHTO's NTPEP and CERF's HITEC programs have established a standard nation-wide qualifying procedure to try to circumvent the need for each of the highway and public works agencies in various jurisdictions to qualify a new product for itself.

Pilot implementations and demonstrations are helpful to showcase "final" results and implementation procedures to key members of the user community and to secure their endorsement, which can pave the way for rapid adoption by others. Testimonial support by leading users is a powerful force for change. Constructive comparisons of best practices can promote adoption, because most agencies do not wish to be among the last to adopt a widely accepted innovation. The key is getting a "critical mass" of user acceptance so that adoption of the innovation will proceed on its own merits.

Supportfor making the transition to a new way of doing business is an important factor contributing to success in adopting an innovation. ⁴⁰ The "lead state" concept, in which a state highway agency that implements an innovation serves as a peer counselor supporting other states as they make the transition, can be highly effective in overcoming hesitancy on the part of highway agencies at trying something that has yet to be proven in practice. Training, such as that offered by the National Highway Institute, is recognized as a key factor as well. ⁴¹ Such activities foster peer-to-peer implementation support.

The systematic evaluation, documentation and dissemination of implementation results often is neglected. However, capturing and reporting the benefits of innovations as they are implemented is key to building momentum for more widespread deployment. Efforts should be made to ensure that documentation of implementation results is developed and made available to interested parties.

Incentives can facilitate the introduction of new technologies and innovative techniques by helping agencies to deal with the costs of implementation. In many instances, deciding to "spend money now" to "save money over time" is a difficult proposition for agencies that are under pressure to deliver near-term tangible results. In addition, there are costs associated with adapting to the use of a new technology, such as deployment support and training; these large up front investments can be major impediments to innovation. For example, the use of Superpave requires laboratory procedures and facilities unlike those for conventional pavement. Any agency that wants to experiment with Superpave must find a way to cover the costs of acquiring the appropriate laboratory facilities, and of operating that laboratory in parallel with other facilities. Federal assistance in covering these costs is helpful in speeding the adoption of new technologies and techniques.

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