Evaluation, Comparison and Improvement Recommendations for Caltrans Financial Programming Processes and Tools

The California Transportation Improvement Program System (CTIPS) is the main tool used by Caltrans’ Division of Financial Programming to support the business of transportation programming. It is a multi-agency joint-use project programming database system applied to develop and manage various state and federal transportation programming documents. The goal of this project is to evaluate CTIPS and explore various new options that will maintain the current functionality of CTIPS, meet legislative guidelines for ADA compliance, ensure security of the system, and have sufficient scalability and capabilities for integration with other systems in the future. The research is based on the review of current and historical documents, interviews, and surveys of the customers of the Division of Financial Programming; the survey of programming systems used by the other 49 states and District of Columbia (DC) in the U.S.; an interview with the CTIPS service support provider; and interviews and surveys of the software companies that provide services and products similar to CTIPS. This research identifies risks associated with CTIPS and opportunities for improvements; compares the processes in California with currently recognized best practices and with those used in the other states in the U.S.; and makes recommendations for the improvement of CTIPS. Research results could help Caltrans better capture current data needs and future analytics requirements and make an informed decision about modernizing and upgrading an essential programming database.