Truck Parking Demand Visualization to Support State DOT Decision-Making and Stakeholder Engagement

Date and Time: Thursday: 1:30 PM - 3:00 PM
Location: NAS 120

 

Nicole Katsikides, Texas A&M Transportation Institute

PRESENTATION DESCRIPTION

This work involves the testing and analysis of INRIX Trips data to help visualize truck parking demand and the development of a dashboard tool that a state DOT can use in assessing truck parking performance information and working with stakeholders on solutions. Truck parking is a major freight transportation issue in that there is less supply of adequate parking than the demand. Truckers need safe places to park due to rest requirements, and though there are public and private truck stops throughout the United States, studies like Jason's Law have found that there are shortages in every state. IIJA now requires states to report on truck parking, and many states and Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs) are engaged in truck parking assessment and planning to identify and implement solutions.

The Texas A&M Transportation Institute (TTI) worked with both Maryland Department of Transportation (MDOT) and the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) to test INRIX Trips data as to how well it can measure truck parking facility usage and show parking demand throughout the states. Upon finding that the INRIX data told a reliable and useful story and could help understand areas of need and facility performance, TTI developed methodologies to use this INRIX data (that both Maryland and Texas originally purchased for other analytical needs) in a way to provide a truck parking dashboard. The dashboards for each state were designed to be used internally at the DOT to measure truck parking demand and facility performance such as capacity. Part of this included understanding both the usage of existing spaces and the parking that is in unofficial areas (overflow) such as ramps and shoulders. This provides states with intel on where parking is overcapacity and the magnitude of unofficial parking, and this helps identify how much capacity is needed. Further, it helps identify if the solutions are brick and mortar capacity expansions or a Transportation System Management Operations (TSMO) solution such as turning on and off auxiliary parking.

MDOT quickly found their beta version of this dashboard useful in working with MPOs and local governments so that local governments could understand how their freight generators were driving parking in areas not designated for trucks. The information in visual form and the interactive capabilities of the dashboard proved useful in conversations with local officials and their constituents. Further, the dashboard allows for integration of geospatial data such as land use to see where parking is occurring in residential areas or other non-commercial locations. The MDOT tool is further along than the TxDOT tool, but in developing the TxDOT tool, TTI found that the data can show the ripple effect of different types of freight generators and that it is useful in understanding and visualizing issues related to emergency parking and border crossing operations.

The truck parking dashboards are in beta testing with the states beginning with Maryland, but full build out is occurring in May 2022 for Maryland and later for TxDOT. Maryland tool: https://green-forest-0f6671a10.1.azurestaticapps.net/

SPEAKER BIOGRAPHY

Dr. Nicole Katsikides is a Research Scientist and project manager for TTI. She has 20 years of transportation, policy and economic development and planning experience with significant accomplishments in freight policy, planning, and operations. Her areas of research include freight mobility and supply chain analytics, data for decision-making, public policy analysis, railroad and aviation planning, policy and operations, land use and economic development. Prior to TTI, she served as Deputy Director for the Maryland Department of Transportation (MDOT) State Highway Office of Planning and Preliminary Engineering responsible for data collection, analysis and strategic planning divisions. She was the Freight Performance Program Manager for FHWA’s Office of Freight Management and Operations, and prior to that, she served as MDOT’s Director of Freight and Multimodalism responsible for freight planning, policy and oversight of the state’s short line railroad. She also has many years in community planning, economic development, logistics, and policy analysis.

PRESENTATION FILE