Traffic Incident Management Driving Cooperation and Coordination in the U.S.

Tim Lane, Chief of Enforcement Az Department of Transportation Enforcement and Compliance Division 602-712-8735

Cultural Change!

Moving from Building a System Using and Operating the System

Key Factors

•

Increasing Congestion

•

Struggling Economy

• Delays • Unreliable Travel Time • Overall Frustration • Unreliable System • Responder Safety

What is the target of TIM?

Reoccurring vs. Non-reoccurring Congestion Bad Weather 15% Work Zones 10% Poor Signal Timing 5% Special Events 5% Traffic Incidents 25% Bottlenecks 40%

Economic Costs of Traffic Congestion

•

2010 Urban Mobility Report

Texas Transportation Institute stated congestion costs: produced by the – 4.8 billion hours in lost time – 3.9 billion gallons of fuel – Total loss in dollars $115 billion* *Based on 439 urban areas adjusted to 2009 dollars, does not include collateral costs related to missed meetings, late deliveries etc.

Key to Success

•

Responder Safety

• Increasing Congestion • Delays • Unreliable Travel Times • Struggling Economy • Overall Frustration • Unreliable System

Responder Safety

•

National Impact

• From 1987 to 2010, 278 law enforcement officers were struck and killed by vehicles • Five firefighters were killed in “struck by” incidents in 2010, which accounted for about 6 percent of firefighter deaths.

• An average of 23 highway workers were struck and killed by vehicles each month in 2010 compared to 22 in 2009.

Effects of Congestion on First Responder Safety

• 20% or more of all crashes are secondary in nature. • 18% of all fatal crashes are secondary in nature. • A vehicle sitting adjacent to the travel lanes or on the shoulder increases the risk of a secondary crash by 2.8% per minute • For every minute a roadway is blocked it takes 4 minutes to clear the related queue

2012 Senior Executive Transportation and Public Safety

Summit

Bridging the National Gap

 National Leadership & Legislation  Institutional & Sustainability (Policy)  Practitioner Capacity Building (Training)  Public Awareness & Education (Outreach)

National Objectives

• Improve universal understanding of TIM processes and strategies • Identify localized TIM gaps/needs to collectively develop strategies for enhancement • Leverage the TIM National Unified Goal as a foundation for developing and/or sustaining an on-going TIM program

National Objectives

• Recognize common elements/activities of good TIM programs • • Recognize the importance of monitoring/measuring TIM performance

Advance TIM Training- SHRP II National TIM Responder Training

Driving Factors

“ The Arizona Department of Public Safety, in part through necessity, has recognized the need for further improvement and has adopted the TIM strategies as one solution to improve

officer safety

, increase efficiency, increase un-obligated time and

ultimately reduce collisions

and unnecessary congestion.”

Local Impact

“The Arizona DPS has lost 28 officers, 15 were traffic related and 11 of those were involved in crashes that were secondary to an initial traffic incident.”

Local Impact

These are only those that were killed, how many more were injured or were lucky enough just to have their unoccupied vehicles struck?

During calendar year 2011 the Arizona Highway Patrol investigated 1616 collisions which were secondary to a primary incident of these 541 were secondary to a prior collision and

54 involved first responders

.

Local Impact

Since 2008, the Arizona Highway Patrol has gone through some very lean years.

– DPS has 158 fewer sworn than we had in 2008 – By the end of 2012, 55% of DPS patrol fleet will have over 100,000 miles. – The traffic trends indicate an increase in volume over the next several years.

– Various initiatives have created more obligations for officers in the area of obligated and administrative time.

We have to find a way to do more with even less

• Un-obligated time during our first year of TIM went from 18% to 21% an increase from 2010 of nearly 3% or 44,565 hours.

– 1750 hours per full time employee (FTE) – 25 FTEs

• Where do we go from here?

– Continue TIM training among Coalition – Memorialize TIM strategies as an HPD priority in HPD Policy. – Add performance goals into HPD Strategic Plan to: • Further reduce secondary collisions involving first responders and motorists • Further reduce roadway clearance times • Further reduce incident clearance times

Through the use of TIM Strategies we believe the AzDPS has: • Reduced the risk to officers and motorists of secondary crashes.

• Increases available un-obligated time officers can use for proactive activities.

• Reduced non-reoccurring congestion.

Future of Incident Management

• Next Steps: – Develop strategies to measure performance related to Incident Management – Continue the deployment of Tier 1, 2 and 3 TIM Training – Improve Legislation, Policies, and Outreach specific to TIM

• We have reached the most difficult chapter in advancing Traffic Incident Management!

• In order to move forward we have to work together.

– Within our countries and together • Cooperation and Collaboration are the keys to success