Uncertainty-based tradeoff analysis methodology for integrated transportation investment decision-making.

Details

• Creators:
  Bai, Qian ; Labi, Samuel
• Corporate Creators:
  Purdue University
• Corporate Contributors:
  NEXTRANS Center (U.S.) ; United States. Department of Transportation. Research and Innovative Technology Administration
• Subject/TRT Terms:
  Highway Departments Highway Departments--Management Infrastructure Infrastructure (Economics) Transportation--Planning Transportation Planning
• Publication/ Report Number:
  020PY01
• Resource Type:
  Tech Report
• Geographical Coverage:
  Indiana
• Corporate Publisher:
  NEXTRANS Center (U.S.)
• Abstract:
  Transportation agencies strive to maintain their systems in good condition and also to provide
  
  acceptable levels of service to users. However, funding is often inadequate to meet the needs
  
  of system preservation and expansion, and thus performance- and budget-constrained
  
  optimization continues to be an issue. Adding complexity to this issue is the increasing visibility
  
  of different stakeholders who advocate for consideration of a multiplicity of diverse
  
  perspectives in the highway decision-making process. Thus agencies are grappling with the issue
  
  of how best to incorporate multiple performance objectives in their decision-making processes.
  
  Some of these objectives conflict with each other, and therefore a need arises for decisionmakers
  
  to find optimal solutions that examine the tradeoffs and provide a reasonable balance
  
  between the different objectives. Furthermore, there is the issue of uncertainty: outcomes of
  
  projects are never exactly what the decision-makers envisage; if such inevitable uncertainties
  
  are not duly accounted for, the final decision that may seem optimal may actually be associated
  
  with high risk. Finally, at most agencies, the management of highway assets is divided into
  
  several sub-areas such as pavements and safety assets. In this management structure, optimal
  
  management decisions are carried out separately for specific types of highway assets or
  
  management systems but do not always guarantee a global optimal strategy for all the
  
  management systems combined. Thus, a decision-making framework that integrates all asset
  
  types is needed to enhance decision-making and to ensure more efficient use of scarce funds.
  
  Clearly, a need exists for a multi-objective decision-making problem that integrates the various
  
  management systems, duly incorporates uncertainty, and helps decision-makers assess the
  
  tradeoffs between the performance measures. This study addresses that need.
  
  
• Format:
  PDF
• Collection(s):
  University Transportation Centers US Transportation Collection
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha256:60359a2961f50f6b6c7b1c1f69203c354051aa47dcaea9e79110fd0bab43f07b
• Download URL:
  https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/17341/dot_17341_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 1.98 MB ]