Assessing the experience of mandated collaborative inter-jurisdictional

transport planning in the United States

Brian D. Taylora,*, Lisa Schweitzerb

aInstitute of Transportation Studies, UCLA School of Public Affairs, 3250 Public Policy Building, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1656, USAbUrban Affairs and Planning, School of Public and International Affairs, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University,

205 Architecture Annex, Blacksburg, VA 24060, USA

Received 4 May 2004; revised 8 April 2005; accepted 19 April 2005

Available online 1 July 2005

Abstract

This paper explores collaborative transport planning among governmental authorities where jurisdictions overlap and the lines of authority

are ambiguous or unclear–an increasingly common situation in this era of waning trade and travel restrictions. We do this by examining the

experience of mandated collaborative transportation planning among state departments of transportation (DOTs) and metropolitan planning

organizations (MPOs) in the USA following a significant change to national surface transportation policy in the early 1990s. To understand

how state transport planning and plans changed following the inter-jurisdictional collaboration mandated by passage of the Intermodal

Surface Transportation Efficiency Act of 1991 (ISTEA), we examine recent statewide transport planning in 14 of the largest US states and

conducted interviews with 66 state and regional planners. We find that, despite the myriad topics that state DOTs tried to include within their

comprehensive statewide plans, these plans have had, at best, a limited influence on metropolitan transport planning and activities. Despite

this, we find that the mandated collaborative planning did help to increase inter-agency coordination on issues (1) where network or

environmental externalities transcend regional boundaries, (2) that require the political clout of a higher-level governmental authority to

enforce locally unpopular decisions, or (3) that take advantage of institutional economies of scale.

q 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Overview

Few would disagree with the need for collaborative

transport planning among higher-and lower-level govern-

mental authorities. By nature transport systems are dynamic

and inter-jurisdictional; road, rail, and bus systems link

neighborhoods, towns, cities, regions, and nations to one

another. While essential, however, planning among jur-

isdictions is often easier said than done.

This paper explores the question of collaborative

transport planning among governmental authorities where

jurisdictions overlap and the lines of authority are

ambiguous or unclear–an increasingly common situation

in this era of waning trade and travel restrictions. We do this

by examining the experience of mandated collaborative

0967-070X/$ - see front matter q 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

doi:10.1016/j.tranpol.2005.04.004

* Corresponding author. Tel.: C1 310 825 7442; fax: C1 310 206 5566.

E-mail addresses: btaylor@ucla.edu (B.D. Taylor), lschwei@vt.edu

(L. Schweitzer).

transportation planning among state departments of trans-

portation (DOTs) and metropolitan planning organizations

(MPOs) in the USA following a significant change to

national surface transportation policy in the early 1990s.

This trend toward increasing metropolitan authority over

transport planning is a broad one, and not at all unique to the

US (Cervero, 1998; Lee and Rivasplata, 2001). Although we

focus on inter-jurisdictional transport policy in the USA, the

lessons we draw illustrate the problems that can arise with

mandated planning within multi-level governance structures

in many political and institutional settings. Similar issues

have arisen, for example, in national-provincial-urban

transport planning in Canada (Kauk, 1984), in commercial

trucking planning in the European Union (European

Commission, 1995; European Commission, 1998), and in

goods movement planning in the North American Free

Trade Area (Bradbury, 2002; Sciara, 2002).

To understand how (or whether) inter-jurisdictional

collaboration changed after the Intermodal Surface Trans-

portation Efficiency Act of 1991 (ISTEA), we examine

recent statewide transport planning in 14 of the largest US

states. We begin with the changes to statewide transport

Transport Policy 12 (2005) 500–511

www.elsevier.com/locate/tranpol

B.D. Taylor, L. Schweitzer / Transport Policy 12 (2005) 500–511 501

planning mandated by ISTEA. We then review the relevant

intergovernmental relations literature to develop a frame-

work for explaining the institutional challenges of collabor-

ating planning in transport. Finally, we report the findings

organized around three issues: (1) the modes, activities, and

scale for which the US states plan, (2) the extent to which

both states and regional agencies use statewide plans, and

(3) whether and how state transport agencies have altered

their planning strategies in response to their initial post-

ISTEA planning efforts.

Despite the myriad topics that state DOTs tried to include

within their comprehensive statewide plans, their plans have

had, at best, limited influence on metropolitan plans and

activities. Interviews with regional practitioners, however,

revealed that the subjects on which states collaborated most

successfully with regional agencies conform to a framework

we propose here. Specifically, states have been most

successful collaborating with regional agencies on topics

that (1) have network or environmental externalities that

transcend regional boundaries, (2) require the political clout

of a higher-level governmental authority to enforce locally

unpopular actions, or (3) take advantage of economies of

scale.

1.1. State-, highway-centered transportation planning prior

to ISTEA

For nearly a century, surface transport policy in the USA

centered on highways developed through a partnership

between the federal Bureau of Public Roads (now the

Federal Highway Administration) and the 50 state depart-

ments of transportation (DOTs). To encourage the largely

autonomous state DOTs to develop integrated intercity

highways systems, the federal government developed a

system of matching grants. The federal matching share

was typically 50%, though to hasten development of the

marquee 70,000Ckm Interstate Highway System, the

federal matching share was most often 90%. Between

1912 and 1990, this model of using fiscal ‘carrots,’ as

opposed to regulatory ‘sticks,’ to influence state DOTs

characterized federal surface transport policy in the USA

(Brown, 2002; Brown, 2003; Taylor, 2000; Weingroff and

Richard, 1996).

While this federal/state partnership was behind the

creation of the largest highway network in the world, it

was not without its critics. In metropolitan areas in

particular, a federal/state highway planning model that

largely cut local officials, urban planners, and community

groups out of the highway planning process engendered

mounting criticism in the three decades prior to 1990. While

the federal government had significantly increased funding

of urban public transit systems between the 1960s and

1980s, highway planning as a rule both superceded and was

disintegrated from transit, bicycle, pedestrian, and land use

planning (Holtz Kay, 1998; Taylor, 2000).

1.2. The shift to collaborative, multi-modal transport

planning under ISTEA

This changed with the passage of the first post-Interstate

Highway federal surface transport legislation in 1991.

ISTEA was crafted by diverse set of interest groups to

increase the roles of regional agencies and non-highway

modes and decrease the primacy of the joint federal/state

DOT highway-centered partnership in transport policy and

planning.

ISTEA set forth 23 wide-ranging requirements for

statewide transport planning, including land use planning,

economic development, and environmental protection.

Specifically, ISTEA called for ‘the coordination of transport

plans and programs developed for metropolitan planning

areas’ (Federal Register, 1993). As federal priorities under

ISTEA and its successor legislation, the Transportation

Equity Act for the 21st Century (TEA-21), shifted the policy

emphasis from interstate highways to metropolitan transport

planning, newly empowered regional agencies have

increasingly set the transport planning agenda for a majority

of the US population (Lewis and Sprague, 1997; Garrett and

Wachs, 1996). Even so, states hold substantial funding

and power: in 2000, the 50 US states collected over $314

billion in gas tax revenues to distribute between state,

county, and municipal systems (Federal Highway Admin-

istration, 2002, MF1).

Despite their historically central role in transport

planning, little research has examined the rationale for

planning transport at the state level in the USA. In addition

to their political autonomy, US states vary enormously in

size, population, and level of urbanization–a variability akin

to the member countries in many trading blocs. Alaska (1.5

million square kilometers), for example, is almost 550 times

larger than Rhode Island (2,700 square kilometers), and

California (36,000,000) is home to 72 times more people

than Wyoming (500,000) (US Census Bureau, 2005).

Beyond statutory authority, neither transport systems nor

travel patterns are necessarily congruent with US state

boundaries.

Much recent research on comprehensive state transport

planning in the USA has focused on the changes in planning

practices after ISTEA (Rothblatt and Colman, 1997;

Ballofet and Associates, 1995). Other studies have

described how public agencies managed particular aspects

of statewide planning in deference to ISTEA requirements

(Kish and Meyer, 1996; Cunningham et al., 1995;

Smithmyer and Dikes (1997). Lockwood (1998) surveyed

all 50 state DOTs about post-ISTEA planning and found that

state transport agencies had (1) broadened their planning

activities to include a greater array of modes and activities

and (2) increased their efforts at inter-agency coordi-

nation—what Lockwood dubbed ‘partner-driven initiatives’

(Lockwood, 1998, p. 5). The preponderance of this research,

however, has focused on how to do statewide planning, not

whether it should be done at all.

B.D. Taylor, L. Schweitzer / Transport Policy 12 (2005) 500–511502

Most of the post-ISTEA studies of planning at the

regional level have looked at how metropolitan planning

organizations have managed the two dozen requirements

that ISTEA set for regional transport planning. The early

work from the Advisory Committee on Intergovernmental

Relations (1995, 1997) examined the existing capacity that

MPOs had to meet ISTEA planning requirements. Sub-

sequent research efforts focused on improving MPO

planning processes (McDowell, 1999). While these pre-

vious studies describe what higher-and lower-lever govern-

mental agencies have done to respond to ISTEA’s planning

mandates, they tell us little about either the benefits or the

costs of this collaboration.

Unlike the research on statewide transport planning, the

research on planning and governance at the regional level

has a long history (Mumford, 1961; Mitchell-Weaver &

Miller Deal, 2002). Soja (2001) has drawn on a large body

of recent research on regions to argue that metropolitan

areas have bypassed the authority of higher levels of

government in influencing global economic operations. In

their account of regionalism in New York through the

1980s and 1990s, Berg and Kantor (1996) describe how a

regional transport agency gained a political foothold in

decision-making and revenue-sharing before the passage of

ISTEA, when such regional agencies were still entirely

dependent on a state’s largesse. Both Howitt and Altshuler

(1993) and Wachs and Dill (2000) discuss how the

mismatch in state-level and local-level perspectives on

urban transport has led to conflicting goals and plans. In

particular, Howitt and Altshuler allude to how both ISTEA

and federal clean air laws and regulations reflect the

burgeoning political power of metropolitan regions.

In contrast to the literature on the logic of regional

planning, we found few specific justifications for

comprehensive transport planning at the state level–that

is, jurisdictional divisions that subdivide a nation, but are

generally larger than metropolitan areas. In its statewide

planning guidebook, the US Department of Transpor-

tation (1998, p. 2) argues:

ISTEA’s Statewide planning provisions are intended to

assist transport planners in organizing, gathering input,

and presenting information about transport needs,

impacts, and investment choices. In doing so, decision

makers can look at their State’s needs as a whole over the

long-term and understand transport in the context of their

State’s goals and priorities. They also must balance urban

and rural needs and the differing demands of the various

forms of transport. This is important because most

transport funding is provided by State governments or (in

the case of federal funds) through them.

While most would agree that state DOTs have long acted

as arbiters of transport resources between urban and rural

areas, it is less clear that states have transport needs that

differ from or supercede those of their constituent regions.

And while the state may hold a central role in collecting and

dispersing funds, that role does not itself suggest a need for

comprehensive statewide planning.

2. Analyzing collaborative state/metropolitan transport

planning in the USA

The intentional devolution of responsibility and authority

embodied in ISTEA illustrates the tensions in contemporary

planning situations involving multiple and overlapping

jurisdictions. That one set of these jurisdictions (the 50

US states) once enjoyed almost unilateral power over

metropolitan highway planning enriches the analysis,

because it shows how new, partially devolved governance

structures can emerge.

Throughout this analysis, we distinguish between the

planning activities that state DOTs undertake for their own

rural and inter-city highway systems, and comprehensive,

multi-modal statewide transport planning that both incor-

porate and supercede regional plans. We neither question

nor debate the need for the former; instead, we focus on the

role of state DOTs as they attempt to play new, less superior

roles as collaborators with MPOs.

2.1. Evaluation framework

While, as we note above, few previous studies have

examined the rationale for statewide transport planning,

some recent research on state-level or supra-regional

involvement in growth management offers a useful frame-

work for analyzing the issue. We identified four arguments

for higher-level government (in this case, statewide)

intervention in metropolitan transport planning:

1. To countermand or minimize negative spillover effects,

such as network or environmental externalities (May

et al., 1996; Bollens, 1992). The movement of people and

goods heeds few jurisdictional boundaries, and spillover

effects offer one rationale for supra-regional authority.

2. To provide state authority as a basis for legitimate and

credible planning decisions (May et al 1996; Innes,

1992). Democratic representation on regional bodies in

the USA is almost always indirect; metropolitan boards

and commissions are normally comprised of appointed

officials (or their designees) who were elected to hold

other, usually local offices. This lack of direct political

accountability can limit the ability of regional bodies to

enforce decisions that do not enjoy broad consensual

support. In such cases, state-level policies or regulations,

if enforced, can provide local planners and decision-

makers with the political reinforcement to make what

may be locally unpopular decisions.

3. To take advantage of economies of scale that accrue to

central-office administration or expertise. After the

Second World War, regions in the USA possessed

B.D. Taylor, L. Schweitzer / Transport Policy 12 (2005) 500–511 503

neither the financial wherewithal nor the technical

expertise to develop metropolitan freeway systems,

both of which were provided by the federally-finance

state highway departments (Rose, 1990; Seely, 1987).

Today, smaller MPOs may likewise lack resources and

skills to competently execute the broad range of transport

planning activities. In such cases, states can provide

centralized expertise or administration.

4. To establish and implement uniform planning processes

and procedures (May et al., 1996). This role was much

greater during early highway development, when

engineers created uniform signage, labeling and design

for increased safety (e.g. the uniform labeling and

packaging requirements for hazardous materials helps

emergency responders take advantage of centralized

information on what is being carried and when during

emergencies). In US surface transport now, uniformity in

planning processes and procedures is drawn primarily

from ISTEA and TEA-21, and secondarily from other

federal and state legislation. Thus, federal actions have

superceded states’ role in ensuring plan uniformity and

integration, at least in transport.

Thus, externalities, political legitimacy, institutional

economies of scale, and administrative uniformity may

all be legitimate reasons for state involvement in regional

transport planning. Nevertheless, this involvement may not

require the development of a comprehensive statewide plan.

Unfortunately US states received little guidance beyond the

general mandates in ISTEA on the areas for which they could

most effectively plan without conflicting with or duplicating

the goals and priorities established most sensibly within

regional planning. Given that statewide planning has been

required since the passage of ISTEA in 1991, we can for the

first time examine plans that have lived through multiple

revisions and planning processes that have matured from

initial collaborations begun a decade ago. It is to a review of

these plans and planning processes that we now turn.

1 Our goal was to be able to look at states with several major metropolitan

regions rather than examining plans where the state effectively is the region.2 Interviewee comments were transcribed by hand. Participants were

asked their permission to use their comments, but they were assured that

they would remain anonymous in name, job title, and specific affiliation in

order that they be able to discuss what they felt were problems with their

agency’s statewide planning process without the threat of repercussion.

2.2. Research approach

Our analysis of statewide transport plans and planning

processes was conducted in two parts. The first was a content

analysis that reviewed the statewide planning documents

prepared in 14 states since 1993. The analysis compared,

whenever possible, early experiences with statewide plan-

ning to more recent plan updates. The second part of the

research analyzed the implementation process of statewide

planning, including interviews with many involved in the

process, review of the minutes of statewide planning

meetings, and attending statewide planning meetings.

We requested plans from the 12 most populous states:

California, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michi-

gan, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio,

Pennsylvania, and Texas. These states are home to over

70% of the US population, and each of these states has

a least one major metropolitan area with a population of

over a million.1 In addition, Colorado, Maryland, Minne-

sota, Wisconsin, and Oregon state transport agencies were

also solicited for plans, based on the recommendations from

statewide planning practitioners interviewed from the dozen

largest states. In total, twenty-one plans from fourteen states

were reviewed. Unfortunately, planning documents from

Illinois, Massachusetts, and Georgia were not available in

time for our analysis.

The plan review consisted of two distinct steps, each

designed to glean information from the plans as system-

atically as possible. First, the plans were coded by modes

and activities (i.e. the topic was a major goal or action step);

the keywords were collected in HyperResearch software,

and the cross-references to each plan were entered under

each goal, topic, objective, or performance measure.

Second, specific implementation measures were coded

including whether the plans specified (1) policies by

geographic scale, (2) responsibility for implementation to

specific agencies (e.g. MPOs or DOTs), (3) timelines for

goal completion, (4) performance measures, and (5)

incentives or sanctions (or both).

The second data source for this analysis consisted of field

and telephone interviews. State DOT staff (25 in total) from

each of the states (except Massachusetts and Illinois) were

interviewed to gather their experiences with statewide

transport planning. Interviewees were state agency pro-

fessional (nonmanagerial) planning staff; depending on the

agency, these individuals were primarily situated within an

office of statewide planning or within planning and research.

Interviews with state practitioners were usually about

30 min to an hour in length, depending on the willingness

of the participant. The interviews were flexibly structured

discussions, though all interviews included the questions:

1. What barriers to implementation did your agency

experience in implementing the policies and programs

outlined in your statewide transport plans?

2. What is likely to be different in the statewide plan update,

based on your experiences?

The interviews were transcribed using extensive field

notes and cross-referenced with content data in HyperRe-

search. Four individuals working in state agencies declined

to be interviewed.2

To obtain multiple perspectives on the statewide

planning process, interviews with 41 regional transport

planners from the same states were also conducted by

B.D. Taylor, L. Schweitzer / Transport Policy 12 (2005) 500–511504

telephone. All transportation staff (nonmanagerial) within

metropolitan organizations listed on agency websites were

recruited for interviews; the target was for two interviews

from each regional agency, but in some cases (Ohio,

California, Minnesota, New York) interviewees directed the

research team to other key members of the regional agency.

As a result, those states have higher representation in the

interviews than the other states where regional planners

were less likely to recommend other interview subjects.

Again, the discussions were flexibly structured to allow the

interviewee to the set the tone of his/her comments. Two

questions, however, were asked of all interviewees at the

regional level:

1. Do you use the ‘title of statewide transport plan’ during

your own planning activities?

2. If so, how, and if not, why not?

Interviews with regional practitioners lasted about half

an hour, depending on the willingness of the participant.

Three practitioners refused the interview; two had time

constraints and were unwilling to reschedule, one claimed to

have had nothing to contribute to our study.3

3. Review of statewide transport plans

Table 1 summarizes the contents of the plans reviewed

for this research. Topics in Table 1 marked with an asterisk

are those that ISTEA mandated to be part of statewide

planning, including bicycles and pedestrians, aviation,

freight goods movement, scenic byways, preservation,

safety, transit, and pricing.

All of the plans we reviewed contained goals and action

steps specifically targeted to improve or develop each state’s

role in non-highway modes. The major modes—aviation,

bicycle, pedestrian, highway, transit, rail, and water—and

goods movement form the backbone of most plans. These

modes are discussed primarily as part of a state transport

system, even though a constellation of other agencies within

the states plan for and provide the preponderance of the

infrastructure for non-highway modes—such as airports,

harbor, and rail. Each of the plans reviewed was thorough in

describing these other agencies as partners and collaborators

in their statewide plan.

Perhaps less obvious are the ‘non-transport’ aspects of

statewide transport planning. Economic development,

environment, and land use goals are present in all plans,

as are pledges to observe and integrate community

values, forge planning partnerships with outside agencies,

and pursue innovative, flexible financial arrangements.

3 Again, interviewee comments were transcribed by hand, and

participants were asked their permission to use their comments. As with

the statewide interviews, regional planners were promised that they would

remain anonymous in name, job title, and specific affiliation.

These, too, are topics required by ISTEA. Like the transport

aspects covered in statewide plans, the ‘non-mobility’

aspects of the plans, such as economic development, were

remarkably uniform across the 14 states surveyed. Although

the specific projects or program names differed, the

overarching consistency within this generation of plans

(which were published between 1993 and 1999) stressed

access and mitigation of the traditional environmental

hazards associated with infrastructure. If these plans are

any indication, state departments of transportation across

the country clearly responded to both ISTEA and the

pressures from their own constituents to pursue multi-

modalism, land use, and environmental planning (Lock-

wood, 1998).

Unlike the marked similarity in general subject matter,

approaches to implementation varied greatly across state

DOTs. Incentives or, oppositely, sanctions take the form of

programs, grants, awards, or funding bonuses promised to

municipalities, communities, or regions that exemplify or

incorporate statewide policies. Just five states–Pennsylva-

nia, New Jersey, Maryland, Ohio, and Texas-proposed

incentive-based policies to promote land use coordination.

This likely reflects the fact that neither states nor MPOs

have much de facto control over land use planning in

metropolitan areas. Land use authority is a jealously

guarded power of local (towns and cities) governments in

the USA–power than both regional and state officials are

often loathe to challenge. Also infrequent in the plans were

timelines (Maryland, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania) and

specific funding allocations for individual goals or action

steps (Colorado and Ohio). This lack of specificity reflects,

perhaps, the ambiguous and advisory nature of the plans.

Some of the plans differentiated their objectives and

strategies among different geographic regions, demonstrating

a recognition that their agency’s roles vary among regions

within the state. Maryland and New York, for example, had

entire sections in their plans devoted to different strategies in

urban, suburban, and rural areas–though these policies treated

these urban, suburban, and rural areas rather generically. By

contrast, Colorado’s plan, formulated from district office

plans, which divided the state into regions defined by physical

geography rather than often arbitrary jurisdictional bound-

aries, presented and addressed vastly different topography and

socio-economic needs among the areas.

Performance measures were fairly common among the

plans. California, Colorado, New York, Pennsylvania, and

Wisconsin all included performance measures. Most

performance measures were specific to a relevant plan

objective, and most performance measures were

accompanied by procedures and time schedules for

performance monitoring. Several of those interviewed

suggested that Pennsylvania has been particularly active in

following up on its performance-based plan.

Finally, the Washington, New Jersey, and New York

DOTs each delineated specific partner agency responsi-

bilities. In each of these cases, agency partners—like

Table 1

Explicit priorities of statewide transport plans reviewed

California Colorado Florida Maryland Michigan Minnesota New Jersey New York Ohio Oregon PennsylvanIa Texas Washington Wisconsin

Airport ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !Bicycle/foot* ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

Border crossings ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

Freight* ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

Air ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !Road ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

Rail ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

Water/harbor* ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

Pipeline !Intermodal ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

Highway* ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

Carpooling ! ! ! ! ! ! !Congestion* ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

Incident man-

agement

! ! ! ! ! ! !

ITS ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !HOV ! ! ! ! ! !

Parking ! ! ! !

Pricing ! ! ! ! ! !

Preservation ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !Safety* ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

TDM ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

Technology* ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !Privatization !

Transit* ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

Bus (intercity) ! ! ! ! ! ! !

Bus (urban) ! ! ! ! ! !Rail* (inter

city)

! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

Rail (urban) ! !!

Ferry ! ! !Multi/Intermodal ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

Telecommuting ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

Universal accessf ! ! !

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B.D. Taylor, L. Schweitzer / Transport Policy 12 (2005) 500–511506

regional planning agencies—and private partners were

included. In New York’s plan, federal responsibilities

were also marked. An emphasis on roles and responsibilities

among various local, regional, state, and even federal actors

constitutes an explicit recognition among these plans’

authors of both the diminished authority of states in

transport planning under ISTEA, and in the necessarily

inter-jurisdictional character of the new era. Whether those

roles have either been pursued or even agreed upon by the

other institutional actors poses another question, however.

This review of statewide plans indicates that state

transport agencies have developed plans premised on the

multi-modal opportunities, access, choice, cooperation, and

mitigation goals set forth by ISTEA. Many plans included

performance and implementation measures as well. It

appears from this review that statewide planning agencies

responded to ISTEA’s mandate with wide-ranging plans

that were intended to be more than simply mandated

exercises. With their emphasis on multi-modalism, the plans

focused largely on metropolitan and regional mobility

questions, while the roles that remain the explicit domain of

state DOTs–inter-city and rural transport–garnered less

attention. This focus on the states’ roles in metropolitan

regions at a time of waxing authority of MPOs raises

questions about the role of these statewide plans in

metropolitan transport planning.

3.1. Implementation

Although the plans reviewed covered many topics,

interviews with statewide and regional planners conducted

for this research revealed that actual plan implementation

was quite limited. Of the 41 regional planners interviewed,

only seven (17%) reported ever using or referring to their

state’s transport plan during their own planning activities.

Even the state-level planners interviewed who reported

being enthusiastic about their own statewide transport plans

frequently described barriers and glitches that derailed

significant collaborative features of their states’ plans.

Despite these problems, both regional and state-level

practitioners agreed that, in general, statewide plans were

beneficial and productive, especially for identifying trans-

port needs and for public education. This was initially a

puzzling finding: regional practitioners who reported never

having used or referred to the comprehensive statewide

transport plans nonetheless found the plans to be useful to

their metropolitan area. Our review of the specific planning

experiences below, however, offers some explanation for

this ostensibly contradictory finding.

3.2. Barriers to inter-jurisdictional comprehensive trans-

port planning

3.2.1. Plan redundancy

Among regional planners, the most-cited reason for not

using the statewide plan in their own planning activities is

that the general priorities identified during regional public

involvement processes necessarily supercede those ident-

ified during statewide planning (37 out of 41 interviewees).

When pressed, regional interviewees commented that at the

planning stages, general goals about mobility, economic

development, access to employment, the environment—

most of the topics covered in Table 1–arise during regional

planning, and with greater specificity.

As one planner commented, no jurisdiction is going to

propose a project that undermines its own economic

development efforts, and no jurisdiction is going to write

a plan that does not acknowledge the central role of the

environment to quality of life. This comment was echoed by

planners at the both the state and regional levels. During the

writing of the plan, the ideas become diffuse in order to gain

consensus; the plans become all things to all constituents,

and at the abstract state-level planning phase, no trade-offs

have to be forced the way they are during project

development and implementation. Nevertheless, there is

some evidence that the statewide plan can offer a policy

rationale when making tradeoffs during local and regional

planning, as we discuss later.

Most regional planners reported that planning and

coordination among state-level and regional planners

mattered most at the project management level. Each

transport project has its own public involvement process,

which itself becomes the mechanism for setting priorities.

Similarly, coordination among state, regional, local, and

private actors occurs on an as-needed basis due to the often

complex mix of public involvement and financing arrange-

ments for each project.

The goal redundancy that regional planners described

suggests several conflicting dynamics within transport

planning. While our focus here is on the devolution of

transport decision-making from states to the regions in the

USA, community- and neighborhood-based activism has

exerted a significant influence on transport planning

in many countries in recent years, including NIMBY

activism as well as neighborhood-based coalitions

successfully arguing for fiscal equalization of transport

investments within the region (Taylor and Kim, 1999;

Lucas, 2004). Further, sub-regional groups and nongo-

vernmental agencies have taken a greater role in using

transport policy to further poverty alleviation policies at

the community level (Blumenberg, 2002). Finally,

transport finance trends in the USA have tended to

reinforce sub-regional devolution: the burgeoning reliance

on county-level local option sales taxes has in some cases

resulted in district/county facility management responsi-

bilities hitherto resident with the state or region (Crabbe

et al., 2001; Goldman et al. 2001). Given the power

exerted by sub-regional entities, tension arises between

planning scale and plan redundancy for statewide plans

within metropolitan regions, even beyond the duplication

of regional functions.

B.D. Taylor, L. Schweitzer / Transport Policy 12 (2005) 500–511 507

3.2.2. Legal, institutional, and fiscal barriers

The Texas (state) Department of Transportation

(TXDOT) experience illustrates several of the barriers to

expanding inter-jurisdictional planning. TXDOT’s 1994

plan contained no less than 199 separate action steps on a

wide variety of transportation-related fronts, many of which

(land management, economic development, environmental

regulation, and so on) were well outside the agency’s

traditional focus of roads and highways. In developing the

plan, TXDOT pursued a far more extended and inclusive

process of public and stakeholder involvement than it ever

had before. When it came time to begin implementation of

the many action steps, however, the plan began to draw fire

from critics in MPOs and other state agencies in Texas who

argued that the plan inappropriately inserted TXDOT into

areas too far outside of the agency’s scope of authority.

Even the parts of the plan not buffeted by turf battles with

other agencies were stymied when state DOT officials

discovered that the Texas constitution specifically forbade

spending vehicle-related revenues on anything other

than roads or highways. In other words, ISTEA-

mandated inter-modal, inter-jurisdictional planning efforts

by TXDOT could not be funded highway taxes and fees.

Chastened by these setbacks, TXDOT officials considerably

narrowed the scope of their planning in the first update of

this plan to concern only those activities directly or

indirectly controlled by the agency, albeit with a greater

level of collaboration with its MPOs than had occurred in

the pre-ISTEA era.

Statewide planning in Michigan provides an enlightening

contrast to the Texas experience. When Michigan com-

pleted its statewide plan in 1995, it proposed many new

responsibilities for the state DOT (MDOT). The state,

however, had not seen increases in motor fuels taxes for

about ten years such that the agency did not have sufficient

resources to adequately maintain the existing, deteriorating

state highway system. In a 1998 survey, Michigan residents

named the poor quality of Michigan’s roads as the most

pressing issue in the state. After increasing state motor fuels

tax revenues and the passage of TEA-21 in 1998, MDOT

focused entirely on highway renovation; the other effort and

activities listed in their plan were put on hold until the

problems with highway preservation were addressed. To no

small degree, MDOT succeeded in its preservation goal: a

survey administered in 2000 found that Michigan residents

no longer perceived roads as a problem.

So is the conclusion to draw from the contrasting

experiences of Michigan and Texas that state departments of

transport are better off sticking with their traditional

highway planning activities? The answer is probably ‘no,’

at least from the perspective of metropolitan areas.

Although one regional planner interviewed in Michigan

lauded the results of MDOT’s emphasis on system

preservation, he noted that all non-system-preservation

goals, particularly those involving metropolitan areas, were

placed on hold. Similar sentiments regarding the barriers to

comprehensive, inter-modal, inter-jurisdictional planning

were expressed by state-level practitioners in many states

studied, even among those who did not report (as in the case

of Texas) significant legal obstacles to collaborative

planning efforts. Unlike the specific, action-oriented Texas

case, however, most (10) of the state-level practitioners

interviewed characterized their state’s first plans following

ISTEA as fairly general policy plans. In these states,

officials typically reported that they were attempting in their

plan updates to develop more data-driven, systems-manage-

ment oriented plans centered on each of the transportation

systems (mostly highways inside and outside of metropo-

litan areas) directly controlled by the DOTs. According to

several interviewees, part of the motivation behind this

recent focus on data and performance-measurement in the

state plans is that the pavement and bridge management

systems (that were also mandated by ISTEA) have caused

DOTs to generate far more information on the condition and

performance of their transport networks than in years past,

which has enabled the promulgation of more data-driven,

systems-management oriented plans than in the past. It may

be easiest for state transport agencies to return to their

highway construction and maintenance roots, but it’s

certainly not congruent with the collaborative inter-

jurisdictional planning framework intended by ISTEA.

3.3. Implementation success

Given the sometimes rocky foray into collaborative inter-

jurisdictional planning following the passage of ISTEA in

1991, one might be surprised to learn that, in the debates

surrounding the reauthorization of ISTEA (as TEA-21) in

1998, practitioners from many counties, regions, and states

testified before the US Congress on the need for states to

remain involved and engaged in metropolitan transport

planning. Regional planners in favor of continued state

involvement in metropolitan transport planning frequently

cited their regional agencies’ growing reliance on DOT

technical expertise. On the other hand, statewide planners

most often argued that state DOTs could not function

effectively without close coordination with MPOs (Cooke,

1996; Mortel, 1996).

These coordination proponents, however, were generally

silent on what specific DOT and MPO activities require

coordinating, and why. What emerged from our interviews

with regional planners for this study was that, while MPOs

rarely made use of the ISTEA-mandated statewide transport

plans in their own planning, regional planners had come to

rely increasingly on state data, expertise, and political

authority as a result of their increased collaboration. Our

interviews revealed a surprising level of coordination and

collaboration among staff in state DOTs and regional MPOs,

though often informal and unrelated to mandated colla-

borative planning processes. Such coordination-without-

hierarchy is often found among mid-level staff in agencies,

‘below the radar’ of formal, official relations between

Table 2

Respondents reporting effective state-regional relations

Planning process Regional

practitioners (%)

State

practitioners (%)

Environmental

Expertise 42 3

Regulation 5 0

Land use

Remote sensing 37 0

GIS/Inventory 71 0

Growth management 16 31

Freight

Forecasts and data 88 69

Significant corridors 32 75

Cross-border procedures 12 58

4 The interdependence between regional and state agencies in the

environmental aspects of transportation planning may reflect differing

levels of devolution. Although some amount of devolution has occurred

from the federal government to the states, the enforcement of

environmental regulation still resides with governments at higher levels

of authority than regions. Much of the push for environmental enforcement

comes from nongovernmental environmental groups, placing agencies

attempting to build or expand infrastructure as the ‘pig in the middle.’

B.D. Taylor, L. Schweitzer / Transport Policy 12 (2005) 500–511508

leaders of the respective organizations (Chisholm, 1992).

Examples of such coordination cited in our interviews

included assistance with inter-regional (inter-MPO) plan-

ning, addressing network and environmental

externalities that cross MPO jurisdictional boundaries,

exploiting institutional economies of scale in the DOTs,

and providing regulatory support for potentially unpopular

MPO actions.

3.3.1. Environmental externalities and centralized expertise

Like economic development, environmental goals were

common to all of the statewide and regional plans reviewed

for this research, though these goals were not always

complementary.

The regional planners interviewed differed on how

useful they found the environmental goals in their

statewide transport plans. On one hand, federal environ-

mental regulation of transport planning preceded the

passage of ISTEA by at least two decades. Federal

regulations have long mandated comprehensive environ-

mental evaluation of every major transport project funded

with federal dollars. The structure of business interests,

environmental interests, and environmental regulators in

the transport sector is so well-established, argued some of

those interviewed, that state DOT efforts to extend

environmental planning efforts into metropolitan areas

had had little effect.

On the other hand, some of the regional planners

interviewed argued that congruent environmental goals in

state transport plans supported their regional environmen-

tal planning efforts. In New York, for example, the

regional planners interviewed all commented favorably on

their ability to use the environmental goals in New

York’s statewide plan in support of their sometimes

unpopular environmental planning efforts. One regional

planner in New York described how the environmental

policies at the state level empowered regional planners

and project managers to use context-sensitive design

principles, even when those designs added to the cost of

projects or deviated from AASHTO (American Associ-

ation of State Highway Transportation Officials) stan-

dards. Thus, environmental goals in the New York State

Department of Transportation (NYSDOT) statewide

transport plan have given regional planners a framework

from which to validate and enforce their own actions on

environmental protection. This experience in New York is

consistent with literature on statewide growth manage-

ment planning cited above, in which policies and plans at

the state level provide the political cover and authority

needed to make difficult decisions at a lower level of

government.

Further, some regional planners (17 out of 41)

commented that, although they did not find the statewide

environmental goals to be particularly useful, they did rely

heavily on the state DOT environmental staff because the

environmental planning expertise and resources within their

own agencies were extremely limited. Table 2 summarizes

the results of the comments of state-level participation in

urban transport planning made during the interviews. Over

42% of the regional planners reported that they rely on their

state DOT’s provision of data services and expertise in the

environment. The same is true of land use data and

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) technology

transfer. Other regional agencies had environmental

engineers and planners on staff, however, and described

themselves as less apt to draw on the state for those

resources.4

3.3.2. Network externalities and economies of scale: the

case goods movement

Most of the regional and state planners interviewed

emphasized their common interest in freight planning. In the

words of a New York state DOT planner: ‘We are only

beginning to understand the pivotal role our state plays in

freight transport of all origins.’ Over 88% of the regional

planners interviewed commented on how they looked to

their state’s DOT for freight data and forecasts. Only the

largest metropolitan planning organizations’ staff reported

gathering their own data for freight movement, and even

then they reported supplementing their efforts with state

data.

Most state (17 of 20 respondents) and regional planners

(32 of 41 respondents) agreed that freight-related changes in

transport demand will require state DOTs to expand and

clarify their roles as coordinators and facilitators between

governments and private businesses. How this will happen

remains unclear, although the regional planners interviewed

B.D. Taylor, L. Schweitzer / Transport Policy 12 (2005) 500–511 509

tended to believe that a state’s role in freight-related

activities would develop in a similar way to the way their

post-ISTEA interagency relationships—on an ad hoc, as-

needed basis.

The Minnesota Department of Transportation, for

example, recently completed a freight corridor update to

its 1997 statewide plan to coordinate goods movements

between disparate regions that have, within their jurisdic-

tions, freight (and passenger) corridors of statewide

significance. The plan draws on district plans and regional

trade center analyses to identify corridors that serve supra-

regional transport needs within that state.

Like environmental planning, goods movements affect

metropolitan areas greatly, but extend well beyond even the

largest metropolitan areas.5 Freight flows involve signifi-

cant network externalities, in which the surface transport

decisions made by one regional authority can affect other

regions significantly—a fact that regional planners

acknowledged throughout the interviews. But with their

larger scale and engineering-oriented staffs, state DOTs in

the USA are often able to provide goods movement

expertise to MPOs, especially in smaller metropolitan

areas, in both data gathering and modeling.

4. Conclusion

Metropolitan autonomy and authority over transport

planning is on the rise in much of the developed world

(Cervero, 1998; Lee and Rivasplata, 2001). Prior to the

passage of ISTEA in 1991 in the USA, state departments

of transportation (DOTs) enjoyed significant authority over

the actions and decisions of their constituent metropolitan

planning organizations (MPOs). The balance of power

between state DOTs and regional MPOs grew far more

equal after ISTEA, evidenced at least in part by federal

requirements that DOTs develop comprehensive, multi-

modal transport plans in collaboration with their MPOs.

While this shift in power was surely a traumatic one for

many DOTs, this analysis finds that the larger state DOTs

have, for the most part, collaborated in good faith with

MPOs in addressing a wide array of urban and suburban

transport issues that traditionally lay outside the scope of

state DOTs.

Several important lessons emerge from this analysis of

21 plans in 14 of the largest US states that are home to

about 3/4 of the US population. First, state-level

consensuses on transport priorities are often tenuous.

Like comprehensive plans prepared by many large

municipal governments, statewide comprehensive plans

struggle with geographic scale. While statewide agencies

5 Though, to be fair, in the current environment of withering trade

barriers, goods movements transcend state (in the US) and national

boundaries as well.

continue to plan successfully for their own systems, most

of the regional planners we interviewed reported that they

had never referred to the statewide plan in their own

work, even those who had actively participated in its

creation. Statewide goals and objectives tended to be so

general that the same ideas identified in state plans were

often part of regional transport plans as well. Though

because goals, objectives, and projects in regional plans

tended to be more context-specific, and because they were

more likely to have been vetted through a public

involvement process, most regional planners interviewed

viewed their plans as more relevant than the nominally

superior statewide plans.

Second, we found most states to have positive,

cooperative planning relationships with regional partners,

even though many states reported difficulty in actually

implementing their statewide comprehensive transport

plans. Post-ISTEA devolution of transport planning

authority to regions has occurred within a broader context

of establishing a balance that takes advantage of the

localized knowledge available to regional planners and the

advantages of centralized state government. This is a

logical, and in many ways heartening, finding. While

regions have taken on more responsibilities in transport

planning in the USA, state governments often retain

economies of scale in the provision of technical expertise

in data gathering and forecasting, and a political

advantage in managing (and mitigating) inter-jurisdic-

tional externalities, such as in environmental and goods

movement planning. In a sense, states have come to

oversee regions as arbiters of externalities and as sources

of both expertise and data.

We find, however, that these advantages have tended

to manifest outside of the ISTEA-mandated collaborative

process. Specifically, state DOTs continue to play

central roles in the construction and management of

metropolitan highway systems, and most metropolitan

DOT activities continue to occur during project manage-

ment and implementation. Thus, states have continued to

play an important role in metropolitan transport after

ISTEA, just not via their comprehensive planning

processes per se.

To no small degree, this examination of mandated

collaborative planning between higher- and lower-level

jurisdictions is a story of unintended beneficial con-

sequences. Collaborating on what, in many states, proved

to be largely inconsequential comprehensive transport

plans helped to establish new, less hierarchically

structured relationships between transport staff in state

and regional agencies similar to those reported by

Chisholm (1992) in his research on intra-regional

planning. These redefined relationships have fostered

other avenues of coordination and collaboration, specifi-

cally on topics that have network or environmental

externalities that transcend regional boundaries, require

the political clout of a higher-level governmental authority

B.D. Taylor, L. Schweitzer / Transport Policy 12 (2005) 500–511510

to enforce locally unpopular decisions, or take advantage

of institutional economies of scale. These are tangible and

significant benefits arising from mandated collaboration,

though perhaps not the benefits envisioned by those

establishing the mandates.

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