Group 7 TRANSPORTATION SAFETY & ECONOMICS INTRODUCTION TRANSPORTATION SAFETY It is designed to inform transportation planners and practitioners with adequate knowledge of safety and opportunities for incorporating a consideration of safety in all phases of the transportation planning process. The goal of safety planning is to reduce fatalities and serious injuries on all public roads. Safety planning is a collaborative and integrated approach that brings together safety partners to leverage resources for a common safety goal. TRANSPORTATION SAFETY 1. Planning Process 2. Transportation Planners 3. Safety Practitioner Planning Process Transportation safety is a required factor in the planning process and transportation planners are key partners ensuring that safety is an integral component of all planning processes. Transportation Planners Enhance collaboration, communication, and coordination with their safety specialist partners to achieve the goal of reducing serious injuries and fatalities. Safety Practitioner Safety practitioners have found value in partnering with a variety of other disciplines, such as public health, advocacy groups, universities, and others to more fully engage the community and the public in safety enhancements. The 4 Es of Safety 1. Engineering ENGINEERS: managing and participating in the development and implementation of a Statewide or regional road safety plan; collecting and managing crash data, analyzing crash data to identify safety issues and projects, utilizing analysis methods, 2. Enforcement Law ENFORCEMENT PERSONNEL: are responsible for collecting crash data, traffic law enforcement, behavioral safety campaigns, and sharing information with transportation professionals 3. Emergency Medical Services First responders and paramedics, fire and rescue personnel, law enforcement, Department of Transportation (DOT) personnel, and tow truck operators. Crash survival and injury severity are integrally linked to response time and the medical care received after a crash. EMS personnel understanding of impediments to effect response and recovery can be critical. 4. Education SCHOOL TEACHERS AND ADMINISTRATORS: hospital and emergency medical services personnel, driver education instructors, health educators, advocacy groups, DOTs, Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPO), State Highway Safety Offices. Strategic Highway Safety Plans SHSPs are required to be data driven and identify safety issues on all public roads, select emphasis areas. It is a data-driven Statewide- coordinated safety plan that provides a comprehensive framework for reducing highway fatalities and serious injuries on all public roads. An SHSP identifies a State's key safety needs and guides investment decisions towards strategies and countermeasure with the most potential to save lives and prevent injuries. State Highway Safety Office (SHSO) SHSO staff is responsible for planning and implementing programs to address behavioral traffic safety issues, such as impaired driving, distracted driving, speeding, occupant protection, etc. Other Safety Stakeholders 1. Health Department Personnel provide safety data and analysis skills and insights, lessons learned from otherpublic health efforts, public health approaches to transportation concerns 2. Safety Advocates they serve as a useful resource for advocacy, community education, and fund raising. 3. Planners Planners identify existing and future short-and long-range needs, identify projects and programs, help in establishing priorities, and evaluate outcomes. 4. Elected Officials Decision makers. Sometimes serve as powerful advocates for road safety. The Economic Importance of Transportation When transport systems are efficient, they provide economic and social opportunities and benefits that result in positive multiplier effects such as better accessibility to markets, employment, and additional investments. When transport systems are deficient in terms of capacity or reliability, they can have an economic cost such as reduced or missed opportunities and lower quality of life. 1. Highway Safety Plans that HSP is an annual work program that outlines programs and projects, which primarily address behavioral safety issues, such as speeding, impaired and distracted driving, failure to use required safety equipment, motorcyclist safety, and pedestrian/bicycle safety. 2. Commercial Vehicle Safety Plan CVSP identifies a State's commercial motor vehicle safety objectives, strategies, activities, and performance measures. 3. Public Transportation Agency Safety Plan Public transportation systems operators must develop a safety plan based on the safety management system approach 4. Regional and Local Safety Plans The results of crash analysis in these plans can be used to inform and prioritize the selection of transportation projects. The Economic Impacts of Transportation 1. Direct Impact The outcome of improved capacity and efficiency where transport provides employment, added value, larger markets, as well as time and costs improvements. 2. Indirect Impact Transport activities are responsible for a wide range of indirect value-added and employment effects, through the linkages of transport with other economic sectors. 3. Induced Impact The outcome of the economic multiplier effects where the price of commodities, goods, or services drops and their variety increases. The economic importance of the transportation industry can thus be assessed from a macroeconomic and microeconomic perspective: Macroeconomic Level - The importance of transportation for a whole economy. Microeconomic Level - The importance of transportation for specific part of economy. The Categorization of The Types Of Impacts: Core - This involves the setting of routes enabling new or existing interactions between economic entities. Operational - Improvement in the time performance, notably in terms of reliability, as well as reduced loss or damage. Geographical - Increases in productivity from the access to a larger and more diverse base of inputs (raw materials, parts, energy, or labor) and broader markets for diverse outputs. Transportation and Economic Opportunities Five (5) major waves of economic development where a specific transport technology created new economic, market, and social opportunities can be suggested: Airways and information technology - Support the accelerated mobility of passengers, specialized cargoes, and their associated information flows. Seaports - With globalization and containerization, seaports increased their importance in supporting International trade and global supply chains. Railways - This opened substantial economic and social opportunities through the extraction of resources, the settlement of regions, and the growing mobility of freight and passengers. Rivers and Canals - This permitted the development of rudimentary and constrained inland distribution systems, many of which are still used today. Roads - Service industrial and commercial markets with reliable door-to- door deliveries. Economic Returns of Transport Investments Transport investments tend to have declining marginal returns (diminishing returns). While initial infrastructure investments tend to have a high return since they provide an entirely new range of mobility options. The most common reasons for the declining marginal returns of transport investments are: 1. High accumulation of existing infrastructure. 2. Economic changes 3. Clustering The standard assumption is that transportation investments tend to be more wealth-producing as opposed to wealth consuming investments such as services. Transport investment projects can be counterproductive by draining the resources of an economy instead of creating wealth and additional opportunities. GROUP 8 Transportation Policy Analysis and Planning/Technical Tour Nature of Transport Policy 1. Policy and Planning Transport policy deals with developing a set of constructs and propositions that are established to achieve specific objectives relating to social, economic, and environmental conditions, and the functioning and performance of the transport system. Transport planning deals with the preparation and implementation of actions designed to address specific problems. The goal of transport policy is to make effective decisions concerning the allocation of transport resources, including managing and regulating existing transportation activities. In contrast, transport planning is concerned with their effective implementation. Standard rule in ownership and operations public sector usually provides transport infrastructure and the regulatory framework private sector assumes the provision and operations of many modes and terminals. With globalization and deregulation, the private sector has much leverage in the policy process through asset allocation decisions, reflected in new public transport policy paradigms. Public policy is the means by which governments attempt to reconcile social, political, economic, and environmental goals and aspirations with reality. A major distinction between planning and policy is that the latter has a stronger relationship with legislation. Policies are frequently, though not exclusively, incorporated into laws and other legal instruments that serve as a framework for developing planning interventions. Planning does not necessarily involve legislative action and is more focused on the means of achieving a particular goal, often within the existing regulatory framework. Policy dictates while planning implements. Regulatory Framework Three major types of transport regulations: 1. Economic Regulations 2. Operating Regulations 3. Environmental Regulations Economic regulations mainly impact issues related to capital allocation and pricing in terms of who is responsible for the construction and maintenance of transport infrastructures and assets. Operating regulations mainly impact issues related to the operation of the transport system, including speed limits and permits. Environmental regulations mainly impact the externalities of transport operations, such as noise and the emission of pollutants. 2. The Relevance of Transport Policy Transport policies arise because of the importance of transport in virtually every aspect of the economic, social, and political activities of nation-states. Transport policy is undertaken by governments of all inclinations, from those that are interventionalist to the most liberal, as a vital factor in economic development. A. Transport frequently is an issue in national security. Policies are developed to establish sovereignty or to ensure control over national space and borders. B. Public safety and the environment. Public safety issues have, for a long time, led to the development of policies requiring driving licenses, limiting the working hours of drivers, imposing equipment standards, establishing speed limits, and mandating highway codes, seat belts, and other accident controls. C. Transport policy has been developed to prevent or control the inherent monopolistic tendency of many transport modes. Unrestrained competition commonly leads to market dominance by a company, thereby achieving (close to) monopoly power. D. Other reasons for policy intervention include the desire to limit foreign ownership of such a vital industry for concerns that the system would be sidetracked to service more foreign than national interests. For example, the United States limits the amount of foreign ownership of its domestic airlines to a maximum of 49%, with a maximum of 25% control. Four trends had significant consequences over the context in which the transport policy takes place: 1. Globalization increased interactions at the international level, both for freight and passengers. This led to the emergence of large actors managing a portfolio of modes and infrastructures across international jurisdictions and therefore dealing with a variety of transport policies and regulations. 2. Deregulation and privatization have been ongoing in many transport markets. This enabled the transfer of ownership and operation of many transport modes to the private sector and favored the entry of new actors. This was particularly the case in the airline industry. 3. A broader focus of policies, particularly considering intermodalism, multimodalism, and logistics. This has enabled better coordination of investments, improving the efficiency of interconnected transportation networks and the related supply chains. 4. A move toward social and political issues behind transport projects instead of technical and engineering issues. The policy process is becoming more responsive to public concerns over environmental externalities and social equity issues. This has led to the introduction of standards and benchmarking mechanisms such as Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) criteria. 3. Policy Instruments Governments have a large number of instruments at their disposal to carry out transport policies. Some are direct, such as public ownership, but the majority are indirect, such as safety standards. The most common instrument are A vital instrument concerns public ownership. Public ownership, in the form of a state enterprise or agency, also includes the operation of transport modes such as airlines, railways, ferries, and urban transit by public agencies. Subsidies represent an important instrument used to pursue policy goals. Both public ownership and subsidies represent instruments that require the financial involvement of governments. Regulatory control represents a means of influencing the shape of transportation that is widely employed. Many governments are major promoters of research and development in transportation. The outcomes of this research are significant to the industry. It is a vital source for innovation and the development of new technologies, including a testbed for technical and commercial feasibility. Labor regulations pertaining to employment, training, and certification conditions may not be directed purposefully at influencing transport. Safety and operating standards, such as speed limits, may have a similar effect. The restrictions on limiting the number of hours a truck driver may work may be instituted for safety reasons and to enhance the working conditions of drivers. A common issue concerning policy instruments is that they may have unintended consequences, particularly if they are indirect effects. 4. Policy Development Public policies reflect the interests of decision-makers and their approaches to solving transport problems. These interests and approaches are place-specific (they apply to a particular area of jurisdiction) and time-specific (they are established to reflect the conditions of transport and the intended solutions at a point in time). Policies are dynamic. They change and evolve as circumstances change and as new problems are recognized. Historical examples of private transport provision include: Turnpikes. The first British modern roads in the 18th century were the outcome of private trusts aiming at deriving income from tolls on roads they built and maintained. Canals. Many of the earliest canals were built with private capital. The Bridgewater Canal was one of the first canals that helped spark the Industrial Revolution in Britain. Urban transit. In most European and North American cities, private firms operated public transit systems. The earliest examples were horsecars that followed rail lines laid out on city streets. Ships. Most maritime shipping companies were private family-owned enterprises, some of which became large companies, such as the Cunard Line in the UK, MSC in Switzerland, or Maersk in Denmark. The primary government involvement concerns military navies and ferries Railways. Railways were developed by private companies during the 19th century. In North America, this has continued to the present day. In Europe, deregulation mainly resulted in the emergence of private carriers, but the infrastructure remained publicly owned. Deregulation and privatization policies have spread unequally to many other parts of the world. 5. Changing Nature of Policy Interventions The trends in transport policy in recent decades have been toward liberalization and privatization. This has not necessarily weakened the role of governments and their interventions in transportation. Controls over monopoly power are still in place, and even in the most liberal of economies, there is still strong evidence of public policy intervention: Ownership of ports and airports. Terminals remain largely under State or municipal ownership, but concession agreements to private operators are common. Highway provision, upgrade, and maintenance remain one of the most significant and enduring commitments of public funds. Urban transit systems remain dominantly publicly owned and operated. Intercity transport is mostly private, which brings the question of whether urban transportation would gain to be privatized. Mergers, acquisitions, and alliances between large private or public entities in the transport sector are commonly subject to regulatory approval to prevent monopolistic behavior. Alliances between major carriers, such as the maritime and air industry, are also sources of contention and regulatory oversight. Governments are exerting greater control over environmental and security concerns, issues that are replacing former preoccupations with economic matters. Sustainability and the environment are becoming significant issues for government intervention Despite economic justification, most transportation projects are subject to extensive environmental assessments, which may lead to delays and even a rejection of proposals. As a major source of environmental externalities, the transportation industry can anticipate further government environmental policy interventions. Decarbonization has become an important component of transport policy, with projects and investments assessed based on CO2 reduction and carbon neutrality. Safety has always been a policy issue. Legislation imposing speed limits, mandating seat belts, and other measures have sought to make travel safer. ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT OF TRANSPORTATION SYSTEM 1. Issue of transport and the environment: Transportation and the environment issue is paradoxical in nature Transportation conveys socioeconomic benefits but at the same time impacting environmental system Transportation activities support increasing mobility demands both passengers and freight while associated with growing levels of environmental externalities 3 Categories of Environmental Impact Direct Impact- consequence of transport activities on the environment as to its cause and effect relationship is generally clear and well understood. Indirect Impact- are of higher consequence than the direct impact but the involve relationship are often misunderstood and difficult to establish, Cumulative Impact- the additive, multiplicative synergetic consequences of transport activities. They take into account of the varied effects of direct and indirect impacts on an ecosystem, which are often unpredicted. 2. The Transport-Environment Link A. Contemporary Evolution The relationships between transport and the environment are multi-dimensional. B. Multi-dimensional Complexity The Environmental dimensions of transportation are related to the causes, the activities, the outputs and the result of transport system. Establishing linkage between environmental dimensions is a difficult undertaking. 3. Environmental Dimensions - Transportation Activities support increasing mobility demands for passengers and freight, notably in urban areas. As a result, the transportation sectors is becoming increasingly linked to environmental problems like; 1. Climate Change 2. Air Quality 3. Noise 4. Water Quality 5. Soil Quality 6. Biodiversity 7. Land footprint 4. Environmental Externalities The Environmental Externalities of Tranportation include considering physical measures of environmental damage and evaluating involve costs for society. The challenge resides over three issues: 1. Relationships- the nature and extent of the relationships between transport and the environment must be considered this is particulary complex as most environmental relationships are indirect and cumulative. 2. Quantification- relatrionships must be quantified, and their value to environmental externalities should be appraised. 3. Mitigation- the level and extent of corrective actions that can be taken to alleviate environmental externalities link to transportation, usually in a manner where those contributing bear the responsibility for their activities 5. Assessing Environmental Externalities Air Pollution is the most important source of environmental externalities for transportation, mainly because the atmosphere enables a fast and wide spread diffusion of pollutants. Two Major Factors contribute to Air Pollution, notably in Urban Areas: 1. Structural Factors are inherently linked to the size and level of consumption of an economy. 2. Behavioral Factors are linked to individualism, consumerism and transportation preferences.
