Transportation SystemsManagement and Operations:

Why It Matters

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What Is Transportation Systems Management and Operations (TSM&O)?

TSM&O represents new approaches to reducing congestion and delay that are not addressed by adding capacity.

Transportation Systems Management and Operations: Why It Matters

Strategies include• incident management,• freeway operations,• synchronized traffic signals,• message signs and alerts, and• work zone management.

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What Do We Know About Congestion?

3Transportation Systems Management and Operations: Why It Matters

TSM&O approaches• Make the system more reliable.• Address 60% of all congestion

by reducing unpredictable and nonrecurring disruptions.

Why Does TSM&O Matter?

Reliability has become as important as travel time.• Businesses rely on predictable travel for their goods.• People must be able to reach available jobs on time.

Building our way out of congestion is not possible. • Adding capacity does not address more than 50% of congestion

causes.• Infrastructure is costly and takes many years to plan and fund.• Operating the system effectively will reduce congestion and delay.

TSM&O makes the most out of the roads that are built, meeting the needs of all travelers in the short term.

Transportation Systems Management and Operations: Why It Matters

How Can TSM&O Address Congestion?

By offering lower-cost solutions • Adding lanes to a highway can be more than 10 times the yearly

cost of effective management. • Operational strategies are estimated to save $6.9 billion and

reduce hours of delay by 6% nationally.

By responding to incidents• Management and clearance of disruptions and emergencies reduce incident duration up to 40%.• Every minute stuck in a traffic jam due to an incident increases the risk of being rear-ended.

Transportation Systems Management and Operations: Why It Matters Photo: © Shutterstock.com/S_E (35500000)

How Can TSM&O Improve Safety?

Work zone management: Providing dynamic, traffic-responsive traffic controls in construction zones improves safety to drivers and construction workers with a 300% reduction in dangerous merges.

Information systems: Real-time weather updates and other information can reduce traveler delays and lower crash rates by 45% on average.

Freeway management: Controlling traffic flow based on actual traffic conditions minimizes traffic disruptions and safety hazards with up to 15% reduction in delay.

Transportation Systems Management and Operations: Why It Matters

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How Can TSM&O Minimize Delay?

By providing information to travelers• Advanced information regarding disruptive weather conditions

minimizes traveler delay and improves efficiency of weather-related roadway maintenance.

7Transportation Systems Management and Operations: Why It Matters

With traffic signal optimization• Traffic signal optimization can decrease delays

by up to 94%.

• In the Bay Area improvements for 339 traffic signals resulted in mobility and emissions improvements at a benefit/cost ratio of 80:1.

Photo: © Kevin Lee, Kittelson & Associates, Baltimore, MD

What Can You Do?

Leadership is the key to maximizing the benefits of TSM&O1. Make a commitment to established policy. 2. Create formal programs.3. Supply the resources to support staff efforts.4. Bring partners to the table.5. Create accountability and measure and report performance.

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