MTI Report 01-10
Best Practices in Developing
Regional Transportation Plans
August 2001
Donald N. Rothblatt
Steven B. Colman
a publication of the
Mineta Transportation Institute
College of Business
San Jose State University
San Jose, CA 95192-0219
Created by Congress in 1991
Introduction and Literature Review 5
LITERATURE REVIEW and annotated bibliography 7
Study Approach and Methodology:
Plan Documentation and Questionnaire
Development 13
REVIEW PROCESS OF TRANSPORTATION PLAN
INITIAL HYPOTHESES AND ASSUMPTIONS 15
DEVELOPMENT OF SURVEY INSTRUMENT 17
RESULTS OF SURVEY INSTRUMENT 17
Review of Regional Transportation
Plan Documents 19
Interview Survey Results and Analysis 25
PREVIOUS PLANS AND ACTIVITIES 25
MPO ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES 25
PLANNING ISSUES AND THE REGIONAL
TRANSPORTATION PLAn DOCUMENT 25
DATA SUFFICIENCY AND ANALYTICAL TOOLS 27
RESOURCE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE RTP 29
AGREEMENT ON PROJECT PRIORITIES 30
Non-Parametric Correlations 33
Institutional Roles and Analysis 35
THE EVOLVING ROLE OF THE METROPOLITAN
TRANSPORTATION PLANNING ORGANIZATION:
HISTORY AND PRESENT 35
WHO PAYS FOR REGIONAL TRANSPORTATION
CITIZEN AND STAKEHOLDER INVOLVEMENT IN THE
REGIONAL TRANSPORTATION PLANNING PROCESS 41
RELATIONSHIP TO THE STATE TRANSPORTATION PLAN
WHAT INGREDIENTS MAKE FOR A SUCCESSFUL
REGIONAL TRANSPORTATION PLAN? 43
Observations and Recommendations 57
METROPOLITAN TRANSPORTATION PLANNING IN
Pre-Publication Peer Review 77
appendix a: Questionnaire for RTP Study 79
appendix b: Description of Simple and Partial Correlations 89
appendix c: Description of Kendall's Tau 93
The purpose of this study is to compare Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) Regional Transportation Plans (RTP) and planning processes in California with selected regions. A total of 17 MPOs were included to provide a balance of geographic location, growth rate, transit orientation, size, density, and air quality conformity status. The MPOs' planning processes and documentation were compared in terms of the past history and current progress in regional transportation planning, approaches toward addressing the transportation impacts of land-use decisions, methods and degree of citizen involvement in the process, the project evaluation process used, and the databases available in each MPO to support evaluation. MPO directors (or their designees) were asked to provide self-assessments of their planning processes, including how or if MPOs affect transportation outcomes in a region.
The methodology includes a comprehensive literature review supplemented with telephone interviews of individuals involved in metropolitan transportation planning. The product is this report, which, it is hoped, will be useful to all those involved in regional transportation.
The Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act of 1991 (ISTEA) and the 1998 Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century (TEA-21) have resulted in major improvements in the quality of regional transportation planning. In most cases, the size of the MPOs (in terms of geographic boundaries) appears to be about right, and modest efforts are being made to broaden the representation of stakeholders in the RTP process. For example, many MPOs now include representatives of freight and nonmotorized advocacy groups.
Some of the conclusions that emerge from the study that indicate areas in which improvement could take place are as follows:
Public participation needs to be improved so that it is meaningful and broad-based. This is an issue that most MPOs are aware of, and many are working to improve. New ways need to be found to involve the general public, not just the organized stakeholders. The RTP public process is often dominated by more narrowly focused advocacy groups, such as business or environmental groups, or modal advocates who do not always represent the majority opinion of the pubic at large.
Coordination with state DOTs appears to be seriously lacking in most of the plans. We speculate that this may be due to differences in missions between the MPOs and state Departments of Transportation (DOTs). Closer coordination between the two agencies should help the regional planning process.
Better multimodal evaluation and scoring criteria for projects are needed. The development of this process is still evolving, and additional research would be valuable in this area to assist MPOs. In many cases, the present processes still rely heavily on subjective scores provided by the evaluator, and may not always relate well to the performance measures and standards used elsewhere by the MPO.
More participation in the land use and development process can be made than is presently occurring with the MPOs, even though only Portland has direct land use powers. Although nearly every agency interviewed had no direct land use powers, MPOs do hold an indirect power over land development. They are able to target investments toward areas where new development is desirable, delay or withhold investments in areas where new growth is undesirable. However, few agencies seem to explicitly recognize this power in their decision making.
There is a potential for the RTP to be updated less frequently than it is now (every three years) and still be a good planning document. RTPs must be updated in air quality nonattainment areas at least every three years, and some MPOs voluntarily update their documents more frequently. The update process can be expensive; therefore, it is worth examining ways to make the process more efficient.
RTPs should not be sanitized. There is a tendency in many RTPs to gloss over areas where significant disagreement on approach and priorities are concerned. Although it is desirable to keep RTP documents as short as possible, we think the documents would be improved by recognizing and paraphrasing issues related to proponents and opponents of particular polices or projects.
MPOs need to make the transition to a system management and operations focus, which is somewhat different from their traditional role as allocators of resources and investment managers. They will continue to be investment managers, but they also need to become proficient in monitoring the system and identifying performance measures and feedback, and adept at developing and implementing low-cost projects to improve overall performance of the transportation system.
Ranges of inputs should be considered for major inputs to the RTP process. Most RTPs indicate that they used single "most likely" numbers for key inputs to their planning process. Using ranges of values for these key inputs would allow development of contingency plans that would make the RTP a much more flexible document, and might allow for it to be updated less often (see above comment on the update requirement, as well).
MPOs should work to improve coordination with ports and airports. These agencies had the lowest levels of cooperation with the MPOs. MPOs should focus on more closely involving them in the RTP process.
The quality of planning data in certain areas needs to be improved to make the RTP a more useful and reliable document. In particular, the specific planning data most in need of improvement included data on use of nonmotorized modes, long-term structural shifts in lifestyle and travel behavior, and the availability and price of energy. Several studies at the federal level are going on now to improve this data, at least on a national scale. The Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS), created by ISTEA, has made notable progress in developing data at the national level.
Introduction and Literature Review
One of the important features of the ISTEA legislation was the requirement that metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs) enhance their transportation plans, coordinating their efforts with the state's responsibilities under the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990. MPOs must undertake a continuous planning process and develop a Transportation Improvement Program (TIP) to be reviewed by the U.S. DOT. TEA-21 collapsed the state and metropolitan planning factors to just seven, although the original ISTEA factors constitute a good framework for evaluating and comparing the RTPs:
Preservation of existing transportation facilities and, where practical, ways to meet transportation needs by using existing transportation facilities more efficiently.
The consistency of transportation planning with applicable federal, state, and local energy conservation programs, goals, and objectives.
The need to relieve congestion and prevent congestion from occurring.
The likely effect of transportation policy decisions on land use and development and the consistency of transportation plans and programs with the provisions of all applicable short- and long-term land use and development plans.
The programming of expenditure on transportation enhancement activities.
The effects of all transportation projects to be undertaken within the metropolitan area.
International border crossings and access to ports, airports, intermodal transportation facilities, major freight distribution routes, national parks, recreation areas, monuments and historic sites, and military installations.
The need for connectivity of roads within the metropolitan area with roads outside the metropolitan area.
The transportation needs identified through use of the management systems.
Preservation of rights-of-way for construction of future transportation projects, including identification of unused rights-of-way that may be needed for future transportation corridors and identification of those corridors for which action is most needed to prevent destruction or loss.
Methods to enhance the efficient movement of freight.
The use of life cycle costs in the design and engineering of bridges, tunnels, or pavement.
The overall social, economic, energy, and environmental effects of transportation decisions.
Methods to expand and enhance transit services and to increase the use of such services.
Capital investments that would result in increased security in transit systems.
Other criteria that were used in this study to evaluate the RTPs include:
Has the plan been updated in a timely manner?
Does the plan make the most efficient use of existing transportation facilities to relieve vehicular congestion and maximize the mobility of people and goods?
Does the plan include appropriate proposed transportation enhancement activities?
Does the plan include appropriate coordination with Clean Air Act agencies?
Was there appropriate participation by interested parties?
How, and to whom, was the transportation plan distributed (draft or final)?
Does the TIP show the priority of projects?
Is there a supporting financial plan that demonstrates how the RTP and TIP can be implemented; indicates resources from public and private sources that are reasonably expected to be made available to carry out the plan; and recommends any innovative financing techniques to finance needed projects and programs, including value capture, tolls, and congestion pricing?
The purpose of this study is to compare Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) Regional Transportation Plans (RTP) and planning processes in California with selected regions. A total of 17 MPOs were included to provide a balance of geographic location, growth rate, transit orientation, size, density, and air quality attainment status. The MPOs' planning process and documentation were compared in terms of the history and current progress in regional transportation planning, approaches toward addressing the transportation impacts of land use decisions, methods and degree of citizen involvement in the process, the project evaluation process used, and the databases available in each MPO to support evaluation. Ultimately, we attempted to determine how and if MPOs affect transportation outcomes in a region.
The methodology includes a comprehensive literature review supplemented with telephone interviews of individuals involved in metropolitan transportation planning. MPO directors (or their designees) were asked to rate the quality of the RTP process and procedures. The reader should keep in mind that these are self-evaluations, and therefore subject to a number of potential biases and interpersonal comparisons. The reader should be cautioned that the conclusions reached here may be different from those an outside peer-review panel might reach. The product is this report, which, it is hoped, will be useful to all those involved in regional transportation planning.
LITERATURE REVIEW and annotated bibliography
The first task in our study was a review of the literature on metropolitan transportation planning. The University of California's MELVYL system was used to obtain a list of books and articles with the words "metropolitan transportation planning," which yielded fewer than 38 useful items. Furthermore, many of the items found are more than 15 years old and, therefore, of less relevance. What follows is a review and summary of the relevant literature that was selected from that available, and an annotated bibliography of some of the more important literature available.
Considering the importance of the regional transportation planning process, we were surprised at the sparseness of relevant literature. Most of the literature tends to fall into categories: either guidelines and requirements (for example, Caltrans 1999; U.S. DOT 1995); or critiques written of the plans or processes as implemented (see Lewis 1999; Innes 2001; Lewis and Sprague 1997). In the former case, most of the material tends to read like a "how to do it" handbook, whereas the critiques often have been put out by specific advocacy groups unhappy with the current process and seeking changes that would be favorable to the authoring group. Relatively neutral and forward-looking studies tend to be rare.
A third approach was taken by the U.S. Department of Transportation in the mid-1990s, in which multidisciplinary peer review teams made multiday site visits to the agencies and wrote extensive reports evaluating various aspects of the transportation planning process. Several of these have been cited under U.S. DOT in the bibliography. These reviews had the advantage over many studies (including ours) of being able to interview many different parties involved in the planning process.
The literature in general metropolitan processes is much richer, and the interested reader may wish to review the bibliography for titles that were reviewed for this study.
California Department of Transportation, Final Draft Regional Transportation Plan Guidelines, September 9, 1999 .
This recent report provides background on the regional transportation plan (RTP), including its history, purpose, legal requirements, components, and procedural issues. At the time of writing, it was expected that the final version would be adopted in early 2000. Chapter headings cover regional planning, the policy element, the action elements (analysis and conclusion), the financial element, environmental considerations, and supplemental information and appendices. These guidelines are intended for application in California, which has a somewhat different structure and process for RTP preparation than exists in other states.
The report is available on the Internet at www.dot.ca.gov/hq/tpp/Offices/ORIP/rtp.htm; Adobe Acrobat is required to view it.
California Department of Transportation, Regional Transportation Plan Guidelines, effective January 1995.
This is the current version "in force" of the above document. It is shorter and lacks the extensive appendices in the proposed revision of the document.
Paul G. Lewis and Mary Sprague, Federal Transportation Policy and the Role of Metropolitan Planning Organizations in California, April 1997 .
In September 1997, the law governing federal transportation policy and funding--the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act of 1991 (ISTEA)--expired. ISTEA was a significant source of revenue for California and represented a large component of the discretionary transportation funding available to metropolitan areas. As Congress was writing a new transportation law, there was considerable debate surrounding changes in ISTEA. The intent of this report is to help inform that debate. The report makes three main contributions:
It provides a brief overview of postwar transportation policy at the federal and state levels, focusing in particular on the evolution of metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs). MPOs have played a major role in urban transportation planning since the early 1960s, and they gained significant decision making powers under ISTEA.
It examines California's implementation of ISTEA, recent transportation-funding decisions of MPOs throughout the state, and the effect of intergovernmental relations on transportation planning in California.
It considers how rewriting the federal law may affect transportation in California. For example, ISTEA favors a metropolitan approach, which often involves coordination across multiple counties. At least one of the proposals under consideration for replacing ISTEA calls for a reduction in the federal presence and a greater devolution of responsibility to the states. The authors express concern that such an approach could undermine the regional aspect of transportation planning in California and significantly increase the fiscal challenges faced by mass transit systems.
Although this report focuses specifically on transportation policy, its findings also illuminate a central issue in the devolution of government responsibility--namely, that incentives and outcomes may vary considerably, depending on the level of government making the decisions.
Professor Sherman Lewis, "Report on MTC Planning," June 23, 1999.
This is a critique of the planning process of the Metropolitan Transportation Commission of the San Francisco Bay Area (MTC), written in the form of a long letter, by a former director of the Bay Area Rapid Transit System (BART) and chair of the Sierra Club of California. The comments were made as part of the U.S. DOT's recertification review of MTC as the MPO for the San Francisco Bay Area. The author contends that:
MTC's planning process is largely driven by the needs of its major constituent agencies (cities and counties), along with Caltrans and BART.
The agency lacks a "regional vision" compared to "better" MPOs, such as in Portland.
Planning decisions are biased by political considerations.
Land use implications of new highway capacity (and attendant growth and air quality impacts) are not being adequately studied.
MTC's project scoring criteria (for ranking projects for funding) has shortcomings, including "forced choices that do not fit some projects, no consideration of fatalities, features that do not advance the purported goal, and lack of clarity about how many `points' to enter."
Lack of meaningful alternatives in the RTP process.
Lack of responsiveness to public participation.
Joseph S. DeSalvo, ed., Perspectives on Regional Transportation Planning . Lexington, MA.: Lexington Books, 1973.
Although dated, this book provides considerable information on the early problems of creating metropolitan planning organizations, especially from a federal perspective. The chapters were based on papers developed from conference proceedings and dealt with basic issues such as:
How large a region represents the optimal size for defining MPO boundaries?
How should multistate metropolitan areas be handled?
What is the economic rationale (costs and benefits) for regional transportation planning?
Several authors note that a key rationale for transportation planning is that it can improve social welfare by achieving a more efficient resource allocation.
Several of the chapters in this book are referenced below:
Karl A. Fox argues that the most promising regions for transportation planning appear to be centered on about 24 major metropolitan areas, which he refers to as national metropolitan regions (NMRs). He argues essentially for what today might be called "Super-MPOs" that encompass several metropolitan areas, usually with one city acting as the NMR "capital." It appears to some extent that the Consolidated Metropolitan Statistical Areas (CMSAs) used by the Census Bureau since the 1990s embody some of these concepts. The NMR would be responsible for providing improved linkages between metropolitan centers within the NMR, especially air transportation and intercity rail, and with other NMRs. Within the NMR, the individual functional economic areas (Fox's term) would be responsible for the planning of travel facilities between homes, workplaces, and shopping and service facilities.
Ralph Gakenheimer, in his chapter, "Regional Transportation Planning Experience in the United States: A Critical Review of Selected Cases," argues that there is a trade-off between administrative coherence and functionality. He suggests that highly coherent groupings, such as states, offer much better means of implementation, more responsiveness to client users, and better opportunities for intersectoral collaboration. Functional regions (corridors and metropolitan areas), he asserts, provide greater leverage for developing analytical solutions and may be the only means of solving important problems, but they suffer unfortunate implementation disadvantages. He recommends that all the planning that can be done at the state level should be left there.
Another controversial point he advances is that it is probably better for a regional agency to be very functional or very coherent administratively, rather than to occupy a compromise position between the two criteria. Gakenheimer suggests the possibility of creating short-term, well-funded special agencies that would be charged to solve specific regional problems and then be dissolved--in essence, a "task force" concept with a specific mission that might span several years. He cites the Northeast Corridor Project--then active in making dramatic improvements to the intercity passenger rail system--as an example of this sort of organization at the multistate, corridor-level project.
Judith Innes and Judith Gruber, "Bay Area Transportation Decision Making in the Wake of ISTEA: Planning Styles in Conflict at the Metropolitan Transportation Commission," April 2001.
From 1995 until 1999, the authors closely followed the activities of the Bay Area Partnership formed by MTC as a collaborative forum for addressing transportation planning issues in the San Francisco Bay Area. Some of their observations and comments on the work of the Partnership were that:
In transportation, no one is in charge--no agency or player feels empowered to try to solve the transportation problems about which the public cares most, such as congestion, use of transit, and ready access to activities and services needed by the public around a region.
Unlike many collaborative policy making processes the authors have observed, Partnership members did not develop much understanding of each other's interest and their own interdependencies.
Members all pushed for their parochial interests even more strongly at the end of the process than at the beginning.
Lack of transparency in the decision making process is contributing to the external critiques MTC is facing.
The authors recommend a number of actions that they feel will improve transportation planning in the region, such as greater reliance on performance measures, moving away from project-based transportation planning, reducing the use of formula-based funding allocations, and implementation of innovative collaborative processes that reward innovation and the inclusion of stakeholders.
The remainder of this report is divided into three major areas: a description of the study approach and methodology concerning plan documentation and questionnaire development; a discussion of the survey results and analysis with regard to the regional transportation plan; and the institutional roles and relationships of the MPOs with their external environments. The section on institutional issues deals with agency roles, who pays for the MPO, control of the MPO, and citizen involvement. The technical issues section deals with five key aspects of the state planning process and how they have been approached differently by the 17 MPOs included in this study. Finally, we conclude with a summary of what has been learned, including some characteristics that appear to be shared by successful MPOs. We believe that these recommendations could be useful to the California Department of Transportation, to lawmakers considering revisions to the ISTEA legislation, and to MPOs outside California that may be considering revisions to their statewide transportation planning process.
Study Approach and Methodology: Plan Documentation and Questionnaire Development
REVIEW PROCESS OF TRANSPORTATION PLAN DOCUMENTS
We began our study with Phase I (Winter 2000) by conducting preliminary interviews of the staff of the four largest California Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs) and those of a selected sample of 13 other state MPOs designated for regional planning under ISTEA and TEA-21. To provide a balance of geographic location, size, and other factors, the 17 states included in our study represented each region of the country: Northeast--Massachusetts; Southeast--Florida and Georgia; Midwest--Illinois, Minnesota, and Wisconsin; Southwest--Arizona and Texas; and West-- California, Oregon, Nevada, and Washington. We also arranged to receive the most recent Regional Transportation Plan (RTP) for each MPO.
Our choice of which RTPs to include was admittedly subjective, but was based on the following criteria:
We wanted to include the large MPOs in California--Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, and Sacramento--as a basis for comparison with the other MPOs. This was four of the 17 agencies selected.
Because California is experiencing considerable growth pressure, we wanted to include MPOs that were facing significant growth pressure now and in the future. Nine of our selected MPOs met this criterion: Tucson, Phoenix, Miami, Atlanta, Las Vegas, Portland, Houston, Dallas, and Seattle.
We wanted agencies that were also facing transportation and air quality problems, as are many MPOs in California. At least five MPOs outside California are in significant nonconformity with the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990. We hypothesized that this would make their planning processes richer and more complex, with a greater variety of stakeholders in the outcomes.
We wanted agencies that (subjectively) have reputations for innovative planning, such as Portland, Oregon, and the Twin Cities in Minnesota.
We wanted geographic dispersion of agencies among various national regions; therefore, the Pacific Northwest, the Southwest and Sunbelt, Florida, the Midwest, and the Northeast are all represented by at least one MPO.
Our preliminary review of the 17 RTPs1 and examination of reports of other related studies of state planning, such as the California Statewide CMP/Air Quality Coordination study, provided us with an informative overview about the nature of ISTEA/TEA-21 regional planning and related issues. Based on this preliminary review, we decided that the best contribution our study could make to understanding the ISTEA/TEA-21 regional program would be to focus on the following major aspects of RTPs:
How well have metropolitan transportation organizations managed the transition to multifunctional agencies?
How have the stakeholders been involved in the development of the regional transportation plan?
What degree of cooperation has there been with local, regional, and state agencies?
How are environmental factors considered, especially air quality?
What level of agreement is there on goals and priorities with various community interests?
What kind of performance measures have been developed in order to make cross-modal comparisons of projects?
What kind of programs have MPOs developed to assess the impacts of land use decision making on transportation facilities and performance?
What resources have been made available for the regional transportation planning process?
What are the institutional characteristics of MPOs?
What is the relative success in improving the quality of transportation?
Accordingly, we developed an information matrix that described each MPO with respect to these aspects. First, we attempted to complete our matrix from a detailed review of each MPO regional plan. This process was helpful in that it familiarized our study team with the activities of each MPO, but did not provide all the information we needed for our matrix. For example, few regional plans provided information about the composition of MPOs, their advisory committees, and annual budgets.
The next phases of our study involved generating a questionnaire that would help us to complete our information matrix and help us develop and test several hypotheses concerned with the relative success of MPOs. Tables 1 through 8 (which are presented in Appendix See Summary Tables) show a final version of our information matrix.
INITIAL HYPOTHESES AND ASSUMPTIONS
In Phase II (Winter-Spring 2000), we not only determined the data needed to complete our information matrix, but also identified the output measures of success related to the regional planning process and the factors or input variable that might influence these outcomes. The measures of success we used were based on MPO staff judgments with respect to the following factors:
Overall effectiveness of the MPO organization to meet objectives.
Improved coordination between local governments, transportation and land use activities, and transportation and air quality activities.
Degree of cooperation between the MPO and other significant regional transportation-related agencies.
Reduction of traffic congestion.
Effectiveness of the MPO planning process in improving transport mobility and air quality.
Based on previous research (Glickfeld and Levine, 1992; Wachs, et al. 1993; Donaghy and Schintler 1994), we determined the factors or input variables likely to influence the desired outputs to be of two kinds. First, there are contextual variables that have important influences on the outputs but are essentially given for each region and cannot be easily changed. Because of their importance, these variables needed to be accounted for, or controlled, through such techniques as multiple regression or partial correlation analysis (see Appendix B), which tries to determine the influence of each variable while holding the others constant. Examples of contextual variables for each region are per capita income, education (percent college graduates, age 25+ of the 1990 population), total population, population density, number of local governments, and, to a somewhat lesser extent, population change and state highway miles per capita.
The other factors influencing the desired outputs are the characteristics of the participating MPOs, which can be changed through conscious public policy. These characteristics, or policy variables, include the number of MPO functions, extent of citizen participation, extent of group participation, percent budget for operation and maintenance planning budget, MPO budget per capita, time used to complete the RTP, and number of MPO governing board members.
Like any serious research study, this work began with a set of expectations and hypotheses by the investigators, formed from prior research on and experience with the MPOs and by attending MPO meetings. The expectations are important because they governed the nature and orientation of the questions asked in the MPO survey. Some of these expectations were verified by the MPO interviews; others were disproved or only partially supported. Among the basic expectations were:
Generally, we expected that the contextual variables that would suggest intensity of development and growth, such as population, population change, and density, would be indicators of congestion and have a negative impact on our output variables; and that measures of socioeconomic status, such as income and education, would be related to successful transport policies and be positively associated with our outcome measures.
With regard to our policy variables, we expected that the desired outcomes would be greater as the MPOs were more focused, more inclusive (in terms of broad consensus building processes), and had more resources available. Thus, we expected a negative association between number of MPO functions and outputs, and positive relationships between indicators of the extent participation and abundance of resources (financial and physical) with desired results as expressed by indicators of MPO effectiveness.
Some additional specific expectations were that:
MPOs would attempt to simplify the process to the greatest degree possible in order to minimize costs and maximize the impact of available staff resources.
States would prefer to use an agency or institution existing prior to 1998 as the planning agency, rather than creating a new agency.
DEVELOPMENT OF SURVEY INSTRUMENT
Questions concerning each output variable or measure of success were devised and put into the form of a questionnaire schedule. As Appendix A indicates, questions related to these measures of success were designed to yield an ordinal score in accordance with semantic differential scales (where 1 equals "poor," and 10 equals "excellent").
Generally, questions involving the input variables were devised employing scales similar to those used for the output measures of success. Questions concerning missing data for our information matrix and questions of an exploratory and open-ended nature also were included in the questionnaire.
During Phase III of our study (Spring 2000), the questionnaire was constructed, pretested, and revised. The pretest involved interviewing several MPO senior staff as well as the staff of air quality districts and regional transportation agencies. Their feedback was very helpful for improving the final questionnaire. In Phase IV (Spring-Summer 2000), the structured questionnaire was administered by telephone to all the MPO Transportation Planning Directors or their designees. Generally, this individual had the title of senior transportation planner or supervising transportation planner. Each interview required about one hour to complete.
After the data were collected, scores from questions concerning each variable were entered on computer files for tabular, graphic, and statistical analysis in Phase V (Fall 2000). First, simple correlation coefficients were computed in order to make a preliminary examination of the relationships between variables. This procedure also acted as a technique for screening input variables with marginal influences on dependent variables. Other statistical techniques, such as t-tests and analyses of variance, were used to test differences between mean scores of subgroups of the MPOs (for example, high-density vs. low-density metropolitan areas). Partial correlation coefficients were employed primarily to test for expected relationships between input and output variables in the entire sample (see Appendix B for computational details). In some cases, multiple regression analysis was used to test the combined impact of the input variables expected to influence each output variable.
Because of the exploratory nature of this study, only tentative expectations of the relationships among the variables examined were used; thus, two-tailed t-tests of significance seemed most appropriate. Of course, it is recognized in the social and other applied sciences that it is desirable to obtain at least a 95 percent probability of no error due to chance (p<0.05) before granting any theoretical importance to the relationships uncovered. However, in order to call the attention of the reader to potentially important areas for future research, results are reported with a somewhat lower 90 percent probability of no error due to chance (p<0.10).
The questionnaire is shown in Appendix A and the survey results are presented in verbal and numeric form in Tables 1 through 8 (Appendix See Summary Tables).
Review of Regional Transportation Plan Documents
All the RTP documents collected were read by the research team. Some of the key observations from this review were as follows:
The update interval (generally every two to three years) seems to be about right, but few (if any) agencies produce an annual report on the status of plan implementation.
Lack of state Department of Transportation (SDOT) coordination seems to be an important issue. More effort needs to be expended on coordinating state and regional plans, at both the state and MPO agencies. Many agencies seem to have gone part of the way in including a state DOT representative on their governing board (NCTCOG includes two), but does the RTP merely mimic what is in the state highway plan? Should the state plan be an amalgam of the regional plans, plus highway planning for rural counties?
There are important data needs that the U.S. DOT could focus on. Some, such as the need for travel data on nonmotorized modes, are already being addressed. Others, such as long-term lifestyle changes and impacts of technology on passenger and goods movement, have not been well studied.
There is little use of ranges for important input assumptions, such as population or employment, or energy costs. Although they would increase the costs of plan preparation, they would help make the plan a more useful, long-lived document that avoids the problem that has traditionally plagued long-range planning: that of extrapolating near-term trends too far into the future. Two different approaches to the RTP document might be to:
Prepare the RTP less often, but use ranges to plan for a wider range of contingencies; or
Update the plan as often, or more often than now, making changes each time.
Lack of land use authority is nearly universal among MPOs. Portland was the only MPO we found that had limited land use authority. Although highly controversial, some additional power to regulate land use would assist MPOs in doing their jobs. California congestion management agencies have punitive powers over cities that approve land uses that cause traffic levels to exceed service standards today but have been reluctant to use such powers in the decade that they have had them. How such powers would be implemented by an MPO is beyond the scope of this study, but might include review and consultation over large-scale projects and the ability to veto or modify large projects that create significant negative impacts on the regional transportation system.
This chapter explores the relationship of the 15 ISTEA factors as they relate to the RTP documents. The original 15 metropolitan planning factors, which were later condensed to seven factors in TEA-21, are discussed individually below, along with comments relative to our review, mentions of agencies showing best practices in considering the factor, and, in some cases, recommendations. The 15 planning factors are shown in italics.
Preservation of existing transportation facilities and, where practical, ways to meet transportation needs by using existing transportation facilities more efficiently. This factor appears to be largely met in the documents reviewed in this study. Most documents reveal the evolving emphasis, at both the federal and state level, of management and operations of the transportation system. This generally is well reflected in the documents reviewed, especially considering that the MPOs are not operating agencies themselves, but only have power over funding and investment decisions. Many of the MPOs are spending upwards of 75 percent of their total transportation budgets on operations and maintenance of their transportation systems. Regions with significant transit networks (for example, Chicago and San Francisco) tend to spend larger percentages of their funds on O&M because transit tends to be more a more labor-intensive mode than the highway mode.2 We did not find any of the RTPs to be exceptional in addressing this planning factor, although San Francisco appears to have been conscientious in developing as accurate cost estimates as possible.
We recommend that the U.S. DOT, in cooperation with the Association of Metropolitan Planning Organizations (AMPO) and the MPOs, work toward developing a uniform system of classifying and aggregating operating and maintenance cost accounts, similar to the way the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) has done under its Section 15 reporting requirements for transit O&M costs. This will allow for more meaningful and fairer comparisons between regions.
The consistency of transportation planning with applicable federal, state, and local energy conservation programs, goals, and objectives. This objective appears to be minimally satisfied. Most agencies, until recently, have not paid much attention to energy conservation with the plentiful supplies and low real prices of the 1990s dictating much of the attention given to this factor. Tucson (PAG), Phoenix, and San Diego have done a better than average job in addressing this factor.
The need to relieve congestion and prevent congestion from occurring. Most RTPs focus on this as one of, if not the, primary issues for the region. This fits in with their historic role as transportation investment managers for the region. Several MPOs addressed this factor through using data, analysis, and conclusions generated from their congestion management system (CMS). MPOs were originally required (by ISTEA in 1991) to have a CMS approved by U.S. DOT, but Congress has since changed the law to make this an optional task. However, many states and MPOs have continued to recognize the value of the CMS by continuing to maintain it. In California, congestion management programs to some degree act as a surrogate for a CMS. San Francisco and San Diego stand out as examples of a comprehensive approach to addressing this factor.
The likely effect of transportation policy decisions on land use and development, and the consistency of transportation plans and programs with the provisions of all applicable short- and long-term land use and development plans. Most plans address this to some degree, but without direct land use powers to approve or deny development, most MPOs can address this factor only in a general way. Some RTPs have considered whether projections of future land uses and demographics are compatible with the existing or projected future availability of transportation capacity. One problem that growing MPOs face is the "spillover" effect into agent counties that are not part of the MPO, and thus do not participate in many of the convening opportunities provided by the MPO. Some MPOs (for example, Dallas) deal with this issue by including many surrounding rural counties in their MPO. In San Francisco, however, the nine-county Bay Area is surrounded by 10 mostly rural counties whose development may be significantly impacted by MTC's growth over the next 20 years. Portland (Oregon) Metro stands out as an agency with more land use powers than most.
The programming of expenditures on transportation enhancement activities. This is generally considered as part of the funding portions of the plans. This program funds many smaller projects, such as bicycle and pedestrian facilities, preservation of historic and archaeological resources, and amenities and environmental improvements. In some cases (for example, Arizona) enhancement projects are selected at the state level. We recommend that all enhancement projects be selected at the MPO or lower level.
The effects of all transportation projects to be undertaken within the metropolitan area. This is essentially a cumulative impact analysis that is usually handled through the transportation system-modeling task. Generally, it has been well handled, with the possible exception of the feedbacks on the land uses and economic activity levels in the region (see comment on 4 above). This planning factor also overlaps heavily with planning factor 13 below.
International border crossings and access to ports, airports, intermodal transportation facilities, major freight distribution routes, national parks, recreation areas, monuments and historic sites, and military installations. These have been covered to varying degrees in the documents. The importance of this factor clearly depends on the location of the metropolitan area, and not solely on its location near international borders. For example, Dallas is at the intersection of several key trunk interstates and rail lines, and so is impacted by trade to and from Mexico. This factor overlaps with planning factors 11 (freight routes), 13 (recreational routes), and 14 (transit). See also the recommendations section related to improving coordination with ports and airports in the RTP process. Seattle has developed a metropolitan freight transportation system.
The need for connectivity of roads within the metropolitan areas with roads outside the metropolitan area. Portland's MPO has developed a set of street connectivity standards that might be helpful to other regions (Chapter 6 of their RTP).
The transportation needs identified through use of the management systems. These management systems included congestion, bridges, intermodal, public transportation, transportation demand management, intelligent transportation systems, and safety. The management systems have been deleted as a requirement of TEA-21, but are now optional and continue to be used in many states and metropolitan areas. RTPs addressed these issues with varying levels of detail; overall, the greatest emphasis seems to have been put on the ITS management system since considerable TEA-21 funds have been targeted at ITS implementations.
Preservation of rights-of-way for construction of future transportation projects, including identification of unused rights-of-way that may be needed for future transportation corridors and identification of those corridors for which action is most needed to prevent destruction or loss. Right-of-way preservation has become more difficult in the past 30 years, for two reasons:
Ample highway budgets in the 1950s and 1960s allowed for significant property acquisitions well in advance of need. Such funds are no longer available.
In California, significant right-of-way acquisition for a transportation corridor is not permitted under the state's environmental laws until an environmental impact report for the project has been adopted.
Both of these factors significantly retard the ability of MPOs to acquire right of way in advance of need. However, it is easier to preserve an existing corridor (such as railroad lines or Caltrans undeveloped property) than it is to purchase a new right of way for future needs, even when such purchases can demonstrably reduce the costs of project implementation in the future. The Minneapolis-St. Paul MPO is an example of an agency applying best practices in this area (RTP policy 14).
Methods to enhance the efficient movement of freight. This is a shortcoming of most of the plans. This factor also overlaps with the development of an intermodal management system. Boston, Chicago, and San Diego have done a good job of addressing this issue, and San Francisco has created an ongoing (not time-limited) freight advisory council.
The use of life cycle costs in the design and engineering of bridges, tunnels, or pavement. Few RTPs gave much attention to this issue, perhaps because it represents a detailed engineering level of evaluation, and because many MPOs and SDOTs have been considering this factor (perhaps with incomplete data) for many years. No MPO stood out as "best," but Phoenix was an example of an MPO that paid better than average attention to this factor. This factor was dropped in 1997 when the 15 planning factors were condensed to seven.
The overall social, economic, energy, and environmental effects of transportation decisions. This is an extremely complex factor, which addresses several different issues. Therefore, in most RTPs, the results are only summarized. The California MPOs tend to consider this factor in some detail in their state-mandated EIRs. Portland is a good example of an agency providing summary information in their RTP document. Several other agencies went to the trouble of analyzing the costs imposed on, and benefits received by, different income groups in their region because of transportation investment decisions.
Methods to expand and enhance transit services and to increase the use of such services. The Atlanta and San Francisco RTPs devote considerable attention to this factor, as one might guess in two regions where transit plays a major role in travel, especially commuter trips. Most RTPs talked about expansion of existing rail and bus services, with much less emphasis on developing nontraditional or innovative services, or increasing ridership on the existing system.
Capital investments that would result in increased security in transit systems. This factor is probably appropriately deleted as a requirement for inclusion in RTPs in the future (as it was in TEA-21). This factor is often handled by individual transit operators, and is often a consideration in their short-range transit plans (SRTPs). Transit security as a major issue also varies widely between areas (sometimes even within a single MPO region), so probably is more appropriately handled at the transit operator, or municipal, level. We could cite no "best practices" for this factor, although the Twin Cities probably considered it better than most in their RTP.
Interview Survey Results and Analysis
Our survey included 17 respondent MPOs,3 with a mean time since formation of 27 years; that is, most of the MPOs had been formed in the early 1970s, which reflected the beginning of federal grants supporting regional transportation planning agencies (RTPAs).4 In certain respects, it is difficult to find a precise "age" for the agencies, since many of them had predecessor agencies. Atlanta dates its MPO back to the 1940s. In the San Francisco Bay Area, the Bay Area Transportation Study Commission (BATSC) was created in the 1960s to prepare studies and plans, but was only statutorily designated as the MPO in 1970. In Seattle, the Puget Sound Regional Council identified itself as being only eight years old, although the Puget Sound Council of Governments preceded it for several decades.
MPO ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES
Most surveyed MPOs had a large number of constituent cities, with a mean of 69 cities. There was considerable range in this value, from just five cities in the Tucson and Las Vegas MPOs to 184 in southern California. The most populous city in the MPO, which was not necessarily the central city, also varied widely in population. One of our initial hypotheses was that the size of the most populous city in the MPO might play an important role in the decision making process and might have a strong influence over the level of consensus on projects and intergovernmental relations. The percent of MPO population in the most populous city ranged from a low of 10 percent in the Boston MPO to 60 percent in Houston, with a mean value of 30 percent.
PLANNING ISSUES AND THE REGIONAL TRANSPORTATION PLAn DOCUMENT
Air Quality : Particularly since the passage of the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 (CAAA), MPOs have played a key role in analyzing the impacts of mobile sources on air quality and demonstrating conformance to the federal National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS). Areas that fail to show reasonable progress in attaining these goals can have a significant portion of their federal highway funds withheld and must show that new transportation projects will not worsen the air quality in the area.
Because most of the MPOs we studied were large (mean population of 4.24 million in 1997), it is not surprising that approximately half were not in conformance with the federal ambient air quality standards for at least one of the three key tailpipe pollutants: carbon monoxide (CO), ozone, or particulate matter (PM10). It should be noted that air quality basins, which are usually a function of topography and population density, are not always coterminous with MPO boundaries, which more often are drawn using municipal or county boundary lines. However, the MPO is often the most important player in demonstrating conformance to the NAAQS with respect to transportation.
Cooperation scores were evaluated qualitatively using a simple semantic differential scale, with 1 indicating no cooperation and 10 indicating extremely good cooperation. Clearly, there are limitations to this kind of question: the responses are subjective and are influenced by interpersonal differences between respondents; respondents may give biased answers in order to support their own agency; and the data collected are mainly ordinal. These issues have been well documented in the literature.5 Rankings (ordinal data) are still valuable; in fact, there is some controversy over whether such data can be used as interval-level data, which provides a broader range of valid statistical techniques for analysis. Nevertheless, this seemed to be the best available tool to document the levels of interagency cooperation, and clearly a rating scale (like the Likert scale) provides more information from the respondent than a simple ranking would.
Respondents generally provided scores in a fairly narrow band, between 6.8 and 7.6. Counties were given the highest score for their cooperation in the RTP process, with a mean of 7.6. This could be because counties already have regional or subregional authority to varying degrees; because they are geographically closer in scale to MPOs; and perhaps because in most regions they are a more distant unit of government than cities, so they may not have had as great a stake in the outcomes, especially land use.
Airport authorities were found to have the lowest degree of cooperation with the MPO. Although respondents were not asked to provide a causal explanation, we posit at least two reasons why this might occur. The first is that airports are often run as autonomous agencies, with full vertical integration of all responsibilities, from long-range planning to daily operation to providing for financing of capital improvements. They are often enterprise agencies, highly respondent to their clients (airlines) and expected to break even (and sometimes create a surplus) at the end of the year. Capital funding for improvements is often obtained through indebtedness rather than reliance on federal funding sources.6
The second reason is that airports often focus on relatively short-term time horizons compared to the typical RTP's 20-year forecast. Long-range air passenger and cargo forecasts have been highly volatile (and inaccurate) in the past, and the response by airport planners and managers is often to plan only two to five years in the future (about long enough to complete a major capital project). Airports like to be nimble in responding to the needs of their client constituencies, which means that they often do not like being bound to lengthy planning studies and plans that are difficult to amend. There is anecdotal evidence that some airports consider these studies irrelevant, although ground access is clearly an issue at many of the larger airports. These inherent conflicts between the MPO and the airport's mission may provide relatively few incentives for cooperation in the RTP process.
High scores of MPO cooperation were found among local governments (7.3), air quality districts (7.0), cities (7.5), transit operators (7.3), the U.S. DOT (7.9), and marine ports7 (7.0).
DATA SUFFICIENCY AND ANALYTICAL TOOLS
Respondent scores on the availability and quality of planning data (Table 5, Appendix See Summary Tables) varied more than the responses to other questions. On a 10-point scale, respondents were asked to rate the quality of planning data they had available for the RTP, from 1 (poor or non-existent) to 10 (excellent).
MPOs seemed most satisfied with the three traditional types of data needed for long-range transportation planning: land use and demographic information (7.5), vehicular traffic projections (7.4), and air quality (7.6). We expected to find that the three California MPOs in our sample (San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego) would be more satisfied with their air quality data than other areas, because of the state's longstanding concern for mobile-source air emissions. This was not borne out by the responses; it could also be a result of the effective standards and level of analysis being higher in California. This would mean the benchmark for comparison might be higher.8
Agencies seemed somewhat less, but still, satisfied with the quality of transit projections (6.6) than the other data. Transit ridership forecasts involve more assumptions and more complicated modeling and are usually subject to more official (and unofficial) scrutiny than are highway travel projections.
With respect to several other data items, MPOs were much less satisfied with the quality of data available to them for the RTP. These areas included forecasts of the long-term impacts of lifestyles and structural changes (4.8), nonmotorized modes of travel (4.7), the long-term impacts of new technology on travel demand (4.5), freight and goods movement (5.5), and safety/accident data (5.9). All these factors have become increasingly important in the last 10 years, first with the passage of ISTEA (1991) and then TEA-21. Impacts of technology and lifestyle changes are particularly important for assessing long-term changes in travel demand. Planners in the 1960s and 1970s sometimes missed important trends, such as increased labor force participation by women and increasing migration to Sunbelt cities that had important impacts on both the volume and character of travel demand.9 Information technology is also just beginning to have a major impact on both household and workplace location. "Call centers" may be located thousands of miles from where a business's customers are located and allow some workers to be relatively free of the location constraints that traditionally have bound them to their work location.
There has been some discussion of whether the planning time horizon (typically, 20 years) for the RTP is too long or short. Twenty years has typically been a compromise position, based on the length of time it often takes to deliver a major transportation project (from system planning to construction completion). FHWA typically has required that traffic projections be made for a period of at least 20 years from the projected opening day of the facility. A few areas (notably Portland Metro) have attempted to make projections for a 40-year period, but past efforts in this regard have met with little success.10 Historically, such very long-term projections have been used to justify large and costly projects that could not otherwise be rationalized within a 20-year time horizon. We found it interesting, then, that there was universal agreement among our sample that the 20-year timeframe was "about right."
We were also interested in whether agencies were using ranges of forecasts (such as low, high, most probable) as input assumptions to their RTP. The obvious use of ranges would be total population and jobs in an area, or possibly prices (for example, for gasoline, parking, or fares). Only five of our respondents said they used such ranges in their RTP, and only one was in California. MPOs were more likely to examine alternatives based on the impact of funding assumptions (Does a transportation sales tax pass or not? Are federal transit operating subsidies eliminated?) than other types of socioeconomic variables. It may be that using varying assumptions increases the generalized cost11 of the plan without a commensurate increase in the utility of the plan.
RESOURCE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE RTP
The complexity of the RTP process (of which the final document is only a part) means that it is neither a simple nor an inexpensive process. The mean time needed to complete the RTP was 2.5 years, ranging from a low of one year to as much as four years. Schedule requirements were dependent on whether the RTP was merely being updated or undergoing a major rewrite. RTPs must be updated every three years. Most MPOs indicated that their most recent RTP was an update; the only ones that had prepared a major revision or an entirely new RTP were SCAG, ARC, NCTCOG, and Portland Metro.
Respondents were also asked, "Considering the federal requirements for the RTP, do you feel that too many, or too few, resources are expended on the development of the RTP?" Responses were based on a semantic differential scale: much less, somewhat less, about right, somewhat more, and much more. Seven of the ten MPOs responded that the resources being spent now were "about right." Two MPOs thought somewhat more resources should have been applied, and one indicated a desire for somewhat less.
AGREEMENT ON PROJECT PRIORITIES
Respondents were asked, "What level of agreement was reached on the final project priorities shown in the RTP or TIP?" A rating of 1 indicated no agreement at all; a rating of 10 indicated total agreement. This question elicited an average response of 7.2, ranging from a 5 to 10. Agreement seemed to be more difficult when there was a larger number of governments (per 1,000 population).
Beyond simple descriptive statistics, we also wanted to look at simple correlations12 between contextual variables and outcomes. Resulting values range from 1 (perfect linear correlation) to -1 (perfect inverse linear correlation), with 0 indicating no correlation (random correlation). Contextual variables included land area, population, income, governmental structure, and other similar items. The outcome variables included level of cooperation, the quality of planning data and the quality of outreach, the level of final agreement reached, and other similar "outcomes" of the RTP process. Complete details are shown in Table 9, Appendix See Summary Tables.
Surprisingly, neither 1997 population nor absolute population change were closely correlated with any of the outcome variables. However, population growth rate was moderately but negatively correlated with several important variables, such as the degree of cooperation with air quality districts (-0.67) and several "level of agreement" variables:
An obvious, albeit speculative, explanation for this is that higher population growth rates may put additional strains on the transportation system and may create more opportunities for conflict in balancing transportation, air quality, economic development, and other types of goals. Higher average population density in an MPO, in contrast, produced almost the opposite result, with MPOs reporting greater levels of agreement and cooperation with local government and environmental and pro-business groups. This may be due to an underlying relationship between population growth rates and density; the lowest-density metropolitan areas are generally growing faster than higher-density areas.
Educational attainment was measured by the Census Bureau's estimate of the percent of the population over 25 years of age who had graduated from college. There were positive correlations here with level-of-agreement variables with local governments (0.87), environmental groups (0.64), business groups (0.84), and highway agencies (0.62).
Per capita income had a mixed relationship to the other variables. It was negatively correlated with agreement on project priorities (-0.65) and quality of the outreach process (-0.66), but positively correlated with level of agreement with business groups (0.79) and transit operators (0.60).
Several variables had no significant correlation with other outcome variables. They included the following:
Number of governments in the MPO;
Number of lane-miles of highway;
Number of highway lane-miles per capita;
Number of governing board members;
Current number of agency functions;
Quality of planning data on nonmotorized modes
Quality of safety/accident data
Quality of data on other "management systems;"13 and
Percentage of funding budgeted for operations and maintenance.
As noted earlier, we initially expected that the percent of MPO population in the most populous city would be correlated with several outcome variables. This turned out to be untrue; the only variable it correlated with was degree of cooperation with counties. Even then, it was a fairly weak positive correlation (0.60) that may have little practical significance.
Most MPOs have several advisory committees that allow citizen representatives greater opportunity to participate in the MPO process and may help diffuse opposition to particular projects. The number of advisory committees did seem to play a positive but modest role in increasing the level of agreement with local governments (0.65) and environmental groups (0.63).
Several of the "quality of data available" questions appeared to be closely related to outcome variables. The quality of land use/demographic data was correlated with the degree of cooperation with the U.S. DOT, but not with other outcomes. The quality of traffic projections seemed to be the most influential variable, with significant correlations with the degree of cooperation with all other agencies except counties and transit operators. Developing credible traffic (and transit) forecasts requires broad agreement on input assumptions and devotion of considerable MPO resources to the travel demand forecasting function. Another interesting result was that the quality of transit projections was not correlated with the degree of cooperation of transit operators (r of just 0.20) or the level of agreement of environmental advocacy groups (r=0.10).
Other conclusions from the simple linear correlations include:
Quality of data on lifestyle/structural change data was correlated with the quality of the outreach process (0.83), state DOT cooperation (0.68), and success in improving the quality of transportation (0.73).
Better economic projections were related to the degree of cooperation with cities (0.62), state DOTs (0.68), and the quality of the outreach process (0.79).
Better demographic projections were correlated with the degree of cooperation with transit operators (0.61) and marine ports (0.91).
Quality of data on the impacts of technology was correlated with several outcomes, including the cooperation with local governments (0.62), cooperation with air quality agencies (0.79), cities (0.72), California congestion management agencies (0.90), and airports (0.68).
Quality of freight/goods movement data was correlated with only one variable: the degree of cooperation with marine ports (0.83).
Better air quality data resulted in several positive results: better cooperation with local governments (0.77), with cities (0.76), with state DOTs (0.68), and marine ports (0.81). It also was correlated positively with the quality of the outreach process (0.71).
Not unexpectedly, the greater the relative importance of adding highway capacity in the future, the less the degree of cooperation there seemed to be with transit operators (-0.84). An unexpected result was that greater emphasis on added road capacity also was correlated with reduced cooperation with street and highway agencies (0.69).
Cooperation with counties seemed improved with the number of official public meetings held (0.77) and the relative amount of time used for developing the vision statement (0.79), but these two inputs were not correlated with other variables.
Non-parametric correlations between variables were analyzed in order to confirm some of the correlations found with the simple (Pearson's) correlations. The method chosen, Kendall's Tau, is described in Appendix C and does not require that the underlying measurement units be interval in nature; ordinal (ranked) data are acceptable. This section highlights some of the results from analysis of the non-parametric correlation analysis.
Few variables were correlated with 1997 population.
This was a somewhat surprising conclusion, since it was expected that several variables, such as time needed to complete the transportation plan (-0.168), agreement on project priorities (-0.462), and quality of data (ranging from -0.032 to -0.396) might be correlated with the population of the area. The general expectation was that the time needed to complete the plan would be greater, the agreement on project priorities lower, and the quality of data greater in more populous areas. The only statistically significant correlation was the quality of the outreach process: It appeared to be inversely correlated with the population of the area at the 95 percent confidence level (p<. 05).
Quality of the outreach process and agreement on project priorities.
There was a modest correlation here (0.574, which is significant at the 95 percent level, p<.05) between the quality of the outreach process, and agreement on project priorities. Although again not demonstrating a cause-and-effect relationship, it appears that greater investment in the public and stakeholder outreach process may have a beneficial effect on the agreement on project priorities.
Reported quality of planning data seems to have little role in manufacturing consensus.
Generally, the level of correlation was low between the quality of different data used in the transportation planning process and the environmental and business groups' level of agreement. Surprisingly, there was a moderately high (0.59, significant at the 95 percent level, p<.05) correlation between environmental and business groups' level of agreement on the RTP. This could also be indicative of the survey respondent's intrapersonal rating system as well, that is, a tendency for an individual respondent to offer responses that were all very high or all very low because of his/her own biases.
Institutional Roles and Analysis
This chapter deals with some of the institutional issues of preparing the regional transportation plan, including the processes involved and resources required. Among the questions we attempt to answer in this section include:
The historical context of how MPOs were created.
Who pays for regional transportation planning and what resources are required?
What citizen and stakeholder involvement is there in the RTP?
How does the MPO relate to the state Department of Transportation (SDOT) long-range transportation plan?
THE EVOLVING ROLE OF THE METROPOLITAN TRANSPORTATION PLANNING ORGANIZATION: HISTORY AND PRESENT
The designation of metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs) was first required by the 1973 Federal Aid Highway Act.14 MPOs were the result of a combination of the nation's energy crisis, increasing traffic congestion, and strong concern for air quality and the environment. MPOs were identified and designated in areas with a population of over 50,000 people. The MPOs would comprise elected officers and participating local government officials. The initial goals and objectives of the MPOs were to develop a regional consensus on the most cost-effective approaches for solving transportation problems. This included the balancing of roads and mass transit and addressing environmental, economic, and community concerns. This led to the downsizing of highway plans and increasing the emphasis on short-range, operationally oriented improvements. Such plans prompted the development of regional transportation plans (RTP), transportation systems management (TSM) programs, transportation demand management (TDM) programs, short-range three- to five-year transportation improvement programs (TIP), and many similar programs.
Prior to that, considerable history led to the requirement for the designation and requirements for metropolitan planning, evolving from a series of historical events and earlier legislation. The United States traditionally has had a multitude of political jurisdictions (states, counties, cities, and special-purpose districts). Regional economies commonly transcend local government boundaries and sometimes state lines. The federal government has recognized the diverse nature of these regional economies by identifying more than 300 metropolitan areas with populations over 50,000 people. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, each metropolitan area consists of "a core area containing a large population nucleus, together with adjacent communities having a high degree of economic and social integration with that core." The federal government also recognizes that the integrity and vitality of these areas are dependent on the large-scale circulation of goods and people over regional transportation networks. However, the fragmented political authority in most metropolitan areas makes it difficult to address regional transportation impacts and needs.
To help address the impacts of regional urban growth and changing economies, the federal government enacted a series of laws beginning in the late 1930's. President Roosevelt implemented his New Deal conservation programs, which promoted regional planning. The Public Works Administration helped state and local governments develop the planning capabilities needed for large-scale infrastructure projects. One such program was the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA). The TVA addressed not only water resource issues, but also energy, agricultural improvement, housing, and economic development. Planning was to be in accordance with national standards as a condition for the receipt of federal infrastructure aid. This requirement also set the pattern for future inter-governmental relations. The federal government used financial aid as leverage for promoting national goals and for local governments to cooperate outside their political boundaries.
During the later years of World War II, government and industry leaders began to make plans for the postwar period. This included preparation in 1944 of the Interregional Highways Report (National Interregional Highways Committee 1944), which became the blueprint for the Interstate Highway System. In 1956, legislation was signed to fund the Interstate System through a federal gasoline tax; in 1959, President Eisenhower created the Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations (ACIR) to explore new government structures and policies to address suburban growth problems and improve coordination of the increasing number of federally aided projects and programs. Legislation in the 1960's followed to help carry out many of the ACIR recommendations for replacing regional commissions with stronger, more permanent metropolitan-based organizations.
The 1962 Federal-Aid Highways Act required that metro areas follow the "3C" process of providing a "continuing, comprehensive, and coordinated" planning of transportation facilities in order to be eligible for federal grants. The Ten Basic Elements of the 3C Planning Process15 were the forerunners of the planning factors included in both ISTEA and TEA-21:
Economic factors affecting development;
Transportation facilities, including those for mass transportation;
Terminal and transfer facilities;
Zoning ordinances, subdivision regulations, building codes, etc.;
Social and community-value factors, such as preservation of open space, parks and recreational facilities; preservation of historical sites and buildings; environmental amenities; and aesthetics.
This act also required that states spend a minimum of 1.5 percent (later increased to 2 percent) of the federal funds for planning and research. This memorandum and its future addendums covered all aspects of organizing and carrying out the 3C planning process with technical assistance from the U.S. Bureau of Public Roads (BPR), predecessor to the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA).
Until the enactment of the 1991 Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act (ISTEA), there was still controversy regarding the lines of authority between the state, counties, local governments, and the MPOs. MPOs appeared to be more of an advisory committee and a means of meeting federal requirements rather than a facilitator of urban growth management. ISTEA-mandated MPOs share responsibility for implementing the Clean Air Act and its amendments. In doing so, this empowered the MPO to manage a broad band of urban growth issues such as environmental conservation, growth management, improvement of educational institutions, welfare reform, health care access, and public safety.
The duties of the MPOs were reinforced again in 1997 by passage of TEA-21 and ISTEA. TEA-21 used seven "planning factors" for both MPOs and statewide transportation planning. Planning factors for the MPOs were the following:
Support the economic vitality of the metropolitan area, especially by enabling global competitiveness, productivity, and efficiency.
Increase the safety and security of the transportation system for motorized and nonmotorized users.
Increase the accessibility and mobility options available to people and freight.
Protect and enhance the environment, promote energy conservation, and improve quality of life.
Enhance the integration and connectivity of the transportation system, across and between modes, for people and freight.
Promote efficient system management and operation.
Emphasize the preservation of the existing transportation system.
These pieces of legislation provided additional authority, funding, and objectives for the MPOs. ISTEA's earlier features included 15 planning factors with more specific consideration of transit and other non-auto modes, consideration of land use impacts/relationships for the first time, and greater public participation in transportation planning decisions.
WHO PAYS FOR REGIONAL TRANSPORTATION PLANNING?
Each MPO uses its own discretion to determine the resources it applies to development of the RTP. The RTP is one of the more important activities that an MPO undertakes, but it is by no means the only one--in fact, many MPOs (as noted earlier) have broader planning responsibilities than just transportation. The RTP does have the advantage of being eligible for PL funds, which are a percentage of certain federal grants provided under TEA-21 for the specific purpose of transportation planning, although not necessarily for the RTP. This results in a variety of approaches to developing and maintaining the RTP.
In our survey, the time needed to prepare an RTP ranged from one to four years, with a mean of 2.5 years, and a modal value of three years. The total schedule time, of course, does not directly indicate the resources invested, although it may act as a proxy for the resources required and for the opportunity for input from a wide range of constituent groups. On the other hand, too long a time schedule could be indicative of difficulty resolving disagreement or obtaining consensus on important issues. There was a modest difference--about 14 months additional time--depending on whether an agency was updating its RTP or preparing an entirely new plan. Again, note that this does not indicate the level of activity during the time period, only the agency's self-reported time to complete the plan. Since RTPs must, by law, be updated at least every three years, it is not surprising that most agencies were able to complete the process in slightly less than that amount of time, on average.
Respondents were also asked, "What was the cost (in dollars or equivalent person-months of effort), required to complete the RTP?" There were five nonresponses to this question; the responses ranged from about $500,000 for a simple update and staff costs only to $15 million. The latter plan was a completely new plan in one of the most complex urban areas of the country. Costs on the order of $3 to $5 million were not uncommon, even among medium-sized MPOs. As expected, updates tended to be less costly. Clearly, the MPO process is expensive, and appropriate value must be extracted for the agency to recoup its return on investment.
The question of whether more or fewer resources should be devoted to the RTP is discussed in Chapter 3 of this report. Most agencies answering this question indicated that they felt the resources being devoted to the RTP were "about right."
As befits their disparate origins, MPOs have adopted a variety of approaches to structuring their governing boards and their voting mechanisms. Most agencies reported relatively inclusive boards, often including large transportation agencies (airports, ports), the state or federal departments of transportation, or other important agencies in their jurisdiction (for example, the Department of Defense). Some included multi-tiered boards. They range in size from relatively compact boards (14 members) such as MTC, which represent counties and groups of cities, to large councils like SCAG or Dallas, which include 70 or more members. Larger boards usually have an executive board and/or several subcommittees to address specific issues.
Most boards include all the local governments in an area. Areas with many local governments (usually the largest MPOs) use a two-tier system, in which all agencies are represented but a smaller body is selected to make executive decisions. Although some areas include many cities, most areas included only a relatively small number of counties (the largest number being in the Dallas-Fort Worth area--16), and some areas include only a single large county (for example, Las Vegas, San Diego, Miami-Dade), which means that the variety of views represented by cities is generally greater than the differences between counties.
Transit operators participate in the MPOs in different ways. In Tucson, transit operations are run by the MPO. In most areas, they participate on committees of the MPO. Only two cities in our sample, Tucson and Houston, included more than half of the MPO's population. At the other extreme were Atlanta, Boston, and San Francisco/San Jose, where the largest city had only 13%, 10%, and 13% of the metro area's population.
The appointment of MPO board members varies significantly between areas; the common procedures include appointment by:
The mayors of cities, or largest cities, in the MPO;
A larger group (such as a general assembly); or
In most cases, the boards are made up of elected officials, who are assumed to have greater legitimacy than strictly appointive members might otherwise have.
CITIZEN AND STAKEHOLDER INVOLVEMENT IN THE REGIONAL TRANSPORTATION PLANNING PROCESS
One of the difficulties with long-range transportation planning--and long-range planning in general--has been the difficulty in gaining appropriate and timely input from citizens and stakeholders into the process. Most people are motivated to respond when change is well defined and proximate in both time and space; RTPs often represent the exact opposite. RTPs deal with diffuse policy issues as much as well-defined projects; the projects are often spread over thousands of square miles and in many cases will not occur for 10 or 20 years (if at all). Planners often are frustrated when citizens' involvement coalesces around a project as it nears the construction phase, even though opportunities for their input had been provided at many points previously in the planning process. One of the questions we wanted to ask, therefore, was how MPOs were able to motivate citizen involvement in the process in a timely and appropriate manner.
Some of the key questions asked in this portion of the questionnaire were:
How were interested parties notified of their ability to be involved in the RTP process?
How many noticed public meetings were held?
Were these held in different parts of the region?
What methods were used for outreach?
What was your rating of the overall quality of the RTP public outreach process?
Did you use outside help for this purpose?
Did the process result in any changes to the RTP?
Did you use the Internet for disseminating information? If not, why not?
Table 7 (Appendix See Summary Tables) provides a matrix summary of the answers to these questions, along with the narrative below.
Most agencies used fairly traditional outreach processes, such as newsletters, mailings, and newspaper advertisements. Several used their agency Web page (discussed below), a few used radio, and at least two used television. There did not appear to be a correlation between the manner of meeting notification and the self-rated quality of the outreach process.
Nearly every MPO held meetings in different locations in their region; sometimes these were based on one meeting per county, in every major city, or other criteria. The number of official meetings held ranged from about six to as many as 68 in the Seattle area. In some cases, workshop presentations were held as well as public meetings in which comments from the public were taken.
Outreach to groups historically underrepresented in the regional transportation planning process typically took the form of ads in community or minority newspapers, involvement in community fairs, and mailings. Advisory committees also were used frequently, as discussed elsewhere in this report. These groups included not only minority groups and low-income neighborhoods, but also groups such as trucking firms and taxicab operators.16 Dallas, for example, used a mailing list generated from a local trucking association to notify truck operators of the preparation of the RTP. San Francisco's MTC included a freight advisory council as part of its continuing transportation planning process.
Generally, most agencies seemed pleased with the quality of their outreach process, with eight agencies giving themselves a "7" or higher rating. Two agencies gave themselves a "5" or less on this scale.
A little more than half the respondents (seven agencies) used an outreach consultant for at least some of the public outreach process. Overall, the MPOs that used outreach consultants for at least some tasks seemed significantly more satisfied with the quality of their outreach process than did those that did not. The mean score for agencies using consultants was 8.0, whereas the mean score for those not using consultants was 5.8. Although use of an outreach consultant did not always guarantee better results in this portion of the RTP, it did seem to improve scores overall.
Every agency contacted provided meeting notices via the Internet, which by now has become a rather routine source of communication. Nearly all included a summary of the RTP on their Web site; and more than half (eight agencies) provided the full document (either in HTML or as a downloadable document) on their Web site. Agencies that made minimal use of the Internet indicated that cost, the large files involved for full documents (and consequent difficulty in downloading), and shortness of time were factors in not using it as a communication medium.
RELATIONSHIP TO THE STATE TRANSPORTATION PLAN AND STATE DOT
In theory, the state and metropolitan transportation plans should be closely coordinated because state agencies fund many of the transportation projects of regional importance in a metropolitan area and are usually responsible for much of the development, design, and operation of high-performance highways within the metro region. Our key conclusions in this area were that:
This appeared to be a sensitive question. Three agencies declined to answer it. However, there did not appear to be a correlation between whether an agency answered this question and the rated degree of cooperation with the state's DOT.
There did not seem to be a high level of satisfaction with the results of the coordination process. Many MPOs responded by saying, in variations of these terms, "the state as the responsibility for coordinating the RTPs."
In Oregon, there is a more formal process in which the state must find the RTP consistent with the Oregon Transportation Plan.
Las Vegas indicated that the Nevada Transportation Plan is included in their RTP.
Generally, this seems to be an issue that MPOs could better address in the future. Part of the problem may be caused because states have been required to prepare multimodal transportation plans only since the passage of ISTEA in 1991. Prior to that time, many agencies (including Caltrans) had only adopted highway plans that, in many cases, were no more than lists of projects and maps of general route alignments for highways--more like a present-day TIP than a true transportation plan. It may take some time, including several update cycles of the state and MPO plans, for the two to be better coordinated with each other.
WHAT INGREDIENTS MAKE FOR A SUCCESSFUL REGIONAL TRANSPORTATION PLAN?
In attempting to determine the ingredients that make for a successful MPO, we first identified the output measures of success related to the goals of the ISTEA and TEA-21 regional planning program, as well as the factors that might influence these desired outcomes. Then, we collected the relevant information by interviewing the staff and examining every RTP in our study and gathering related demographic data from the U.S. Census and highway statistics from the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA). After appropriate analysis, we have reported our findings on the MPO characteristics most associated with the desired outcomes.
The area served by transportation agencies in our study ranged from 3,154 square miles in the Miami area to 33,966 square miles in the Southern California Association of Governments, with a mean value of 10,310.
In keeping with our expectations, we found mostly negative relationships between size of service area and cooperation with local government, air quality districts, and the U.S. DOT (all p < 0.10). As Table 10 (Appendix See Summary Tables) shows, virtually all the significant relationships with area size were negative in nature. Similar to the effects of the number of governments in the service area, the larger service areas had the most difficulty in building a consensus about balancing regional and local interests regarding transportation goals and objectives with respect to local government (p < 0.005), environmental groups and street highway agencies (both p < 0.05), and the business community (p < 0.01).
As shown in Table 1 (Appendix See Summary Tables), the 1997 population varied greatly among MPOs--from a low of 666,700 in the Tucson area to a high of 14,532,000 in the Southern California Association of Governments. The mean MPO 1997 population was 4,241,000.
In accordance with our expectations, Table 11 (Appendix See Summary Tables) shows that population size varied negatively with degree of cooperation with cities and transit operators (both p < 0.10) and quality of outreach process (p < 0.05). There also were negative relationships between population size and agreement of goals/objectives with local government (p < 0.10) and street highway agencies.
These findings are corroborated by those of other studies that show, for example, that the most populous communities in California are most likely to be impacted by development and to enact growth management measures (Glickfeld and Levine 1992).
We expected increasing population change to reflect more development pressure and traffic congestion and thus have negative influences on our desired indicators of program outcomes.
As Table 12 (Appendix See Summary Tables) shows, the only significant positive relationships between 1990-97 percent population changes were cooperation with transit operators (p < 0.50) and agreement on project priorities (p < 0.10). Virtually all other significant relationships with percent population change were negative, as expected, in measures of effectiveness as degree of cooperation with air quality districts (p < 0.005), congestion management agencies (p < 0.05), and airport operators (p < 0.10); and agreement on goals and priorities with local government and environmental groups (both p < 0.005) and the business community (p < 0.05). Similar results were found when examining the impact of absolute population change.
Although these findings clearly support our expectations concerning the negative transportation influences from rapid population growth on metropolitan transportation planning, our data did indicate a growing willingness of MPOs to cope with the transportation implications of growth through greater cooperation with transit, state, and federal transportation agencies. Such adaptive positive adjustments could be essential for MPOs to obtain the necessary cooperation and additional resources needed to cope with rapid growth.
Gross population density, which is a measure of intensity of development, or degree of urbanization, varies greatly among our study areas from a low of 32 persons per square miles in the Reno area to a high of 1,247 in the very urban Chicago region, with a mean value of 572. As Table 1 (Appendix See Summary Tables) shows, only five of the original 17 MPOs in our sample (San Francisco, Miami, Chicago, Boston, and Milwaukee) had an overall residential density greater than 750 persons per square mile, which is below the U.S. Census criteria of 1,000 for defining the boundaries of urban areas.
Our expectations about the influence of population density were supported by the significant (p < 0.10) positive partial correlations with degree of cooperation with air quality districts and transit operators (see Table 13, Appendix See Summary Tables). Although there were some negative relationships, such as the quality of the outreach process, there were many other positive linkages to density on the agreement of goals and objectives with local government, environmental groups, and street and highway agencies (all p < 0.05) and the business community (p < 0.005).
As Table 1 shows, educational attainment also varied substantially among our study regions. In terms of the percentage of college graduates age 25 plus of the 1990 population, the level ranged from 13.8 percent in Las Vegas to 30.9 percent in the San Francisco Bay Area, with a 22.7 percent average.
In keeping with our expectations, education levels had positive relationships with desired outcomes. As Table 14 (Appendix See Summary Tables) indicates, the percentage of college graduates age 25 or over in the 1994 population had positive correlations with agreement on goals and objectives with local governments (p < 0.05), environmental groups (p < 0.10), and business community and street and highway agencies (both p < 0.005). Although there were some negative partial correlations with educational attainment, such as the degree of cooperation with transit operators and state DOTs, there were several significant positive relationships with other forms of cooperation with air quality districts, cities, counties, and congestion management agencies (all p < 0.05).
These generally positive findings were corroborated by the Glickfeld and Levine (1992) study of California growth management and the Rothblatt and Colman study (1995) of the California congestion management policy, which found that jurisdictions that had a higher proportion of college-educated persons tended to enact more growth management measures and be more supportive of congestion management programs. These results may be due to the high public regard for collective areawide improvement, often generated in better-educated communities.
The level of affluence also varies among the MPOs in our sample. Table 1 shows that 1994 mean per capita income varied from a low of $8,575 in the Tucson Area to a high of $28,322 in the San Francisco Bay Area, with a mean of $23,125. Thus, the potential resources available for dealing with community problems in more affluent areas could be a positive factor in the field of transportation.
As with level of education, Table 15, Appendix See Summary Tables, shows that increases in per capita income yielded only positive relationships with agreement on goals and objectives with local government (p < 0.10), environmental groups and street and highway agencies (both p < 0.05), the business community, and transit operators (p < 0.10).
Contrary to our expectations, Table 15 shows that increases in per capita income yielded only negative relationships with degree of cooperation with air quality districts and cities (p < 0.05) and marine ports (p < 0.10). Similar to the Pearson correlations cited earlier, there were significant negative linkages of per capita income and agreement on priorities (p < 0.01) and quality of outreach process (p < 0.05). While other studies have shown that socioeconomic characteristics, such as income, were not good predictors for the voter passage of growth management ordinances (Knaap, 1987; Baldassare, 1990), our research yields some strong negative associations of income with indicators of policy effectiveness. Perhaps other factors such as greater scrutiny and higher expectations of governmental activities by more affluent suburban environments may be at work.
Number of Local Governments Involved in the MPO Service Area
Given the great diversity of the MPOs, it is not surprising that the number of local governments involved in the MPO service area ranged from 5 in the Reno area to 260 in the Chicago region. The mean is 85.
In contradiction to our expectations, we found significant positive relationships between the number of local governments involved in the MPO service area and the effectiveness indicators of the degree of cooperation with air quality districts, counties, and airport operators (all p < 0.10); and agreement of goals with local government (p < 0.05) and environmental groups (p < 0.10). However, other output variables, such as agreement on priorities (p < 0.05) and quality of outreach process and success in improving the quality of transportation (both p < 0.10) were negatively related to the number of governments. These findings, shown on Table 16 (Appendix See Summary Tables) suggest that, unlike less formal citizen participation, extensive formal local government involvement may not always foster an increase in cooperation with regional planning activities and mobility improvements.
When we tried to normalize our data with regard to population and examine the impact of the number of local governments per capita, we found stronger positive across-the-board results than those found with absolute number of governments, with only one significant (p < 0.05) negative correlation with respect to agreement with goals and objectives of transit operators (see Table 17, Appendix See Summary Tables). This finding suggests that counties with many local governments with small and relatively homogeneous populations may receive only modest participation and support for MPO activities because these governments receive little in ISTEA/TEA-21 funding. Again, increased funding and resources were among the most often cited recommendation to improve the regional transportation planning process.
Our expectations for positive relationships between the amount of non-state highway miles per capita and effectiveness indicators were modestly borne out. As Table 18 (Appendix See Summary Tables) reveals, the correlations were mixed and few were statistically significant. When we extended our examination to study the influence of the amount of nonstate highway miles with respect to the square root of land area, we obtained similar results.
As Table 18 indicates, the major positive relationships with increased highway supply were a higher degree of cooperation with air districts (p < 0.10) and the major supplier of regional highway capacity, the state DOT (p < 0.05). The only significant negative linkage with increased highway miles per capita was with the agreement of goals/priorities with the competing transportation suppliers and transit operators (p < 0. 05).
These findings indicate that the relative supply of existing highway resources are generally of equal utility among the metropolitan areas, and that when significant differences in the supply of state highway facilities are provided, they probably represent a late and inadequate response to already over-congested traffic situations.
The age of the MPO (that is, years since its formation) varied from 10 years for the Tucson area to 53 years for the Atlanta Regional Commission,17 with an average of 27 years.
We expected that the older and more established MPOs would have the time, experience, and institutional relationships to generate higher levels of output measures of effectiveness than their younger peers would. As Table 19 (Appendix See Summary Tables) shows, our study observed mixed results, with the MPO age having expected positive relationships with the degree of cooperation with counties (p < 0.05) and state DOTs (p < 0.10), and unexpected negative influences on agreement of goals and priorities with the business community (p < 0.10) and transit operators (p < 0. 005).
Perhaps these results reflect a possible increase of MPO influence in articulating and setting goals and priorities under ISTEA/TEA-21 planning processes, which may have come into conflict with those held by some of the major regional interest groups.18
Number of MPO Governing Board Members
Given the great diversity of MPOs in our study, it is not surprising that the number of MPO governing board members ranges from 6 in Las Vegas to 152 in the Dallas area. The mean is 57.
In accordance with our expectations, we found significant positive relationships between the number of board members involved in MPOs and the effectiveness indicators of success of the degree of MPO cooperation with several agencies, such as cities (p < 0.05), counties (p < 0.01), state DOTs (p < 0.01), U.S. DOT (p < 0.05),