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1 The objective of this synthesis study was to document resilience efforts and how they are organized, understood, and implemented within transportation agenciesâ core functions and services. Core functions and services include planning, engineering, construction, mainte- nance, operations, and administration. The information gathered details the motivations behind the policies that promote highway resilience; definitions of risk and resilience and the relationship between these two fields; and how agencies are incorporating resilience practices through project development, policy, and design. The findings of this report reflect information gathered through three primary sources: a literature review, a survey of state DOTs, and five case examples developed through inter- views with infrastructure agencies incorporating resilience into their programs. A review of national policies found that although resilience policies are becoming well established, there is a lack of integration of resilience into practice within transportation. With the recent requirements for risk-based asset management plans, it is possible that state DOTs have yet to fully complete those requirements and are struggling to address an unmandated management approach. Also lacking is strong guidance correlating a relationship between risk and resilience, which would be helpful to allow agencies to understand how their risk assessments can help support their system resilience analyses. In addition, although policy touts the need for resilient systems, the lack of monetary assessment of the value of system resilience makes it challenging for agencies to stretch limited dollars in another direction when already faced with challenges related to new performance metrics such as safety, infrastructure condition, and operational reliability. The relationship between each of these metrics and system resilience, in the transportation sector, has not yet been fully developed in an easy-to-use guidance or modeling tool to assess resilience. Because of this, implementation and understanding of performance metrics and resilience will continue to be a challenge at state DOTs. The literature review identified shortcomings in the definition of resilience, the quantita- tive relationship between risk and resilience, and metrics to measure resilience. Much of the focus of resilience definitions is on the ability to recover post event; however, a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) study was reviewed that helped to define key discriminators for resilience definitions to address the full range of time periods in which resilience is needed to be focused on by asset managers and owners and reflect four goal areas (maintain- ing continuity of function, graceful degradation, recovery of function to desired function in designated time, and inhibit basic state of change). The reflection of definitions against the key discriminators provided by DHS for infrastructure systems may be of use to state S U M M A R Y Resilience in Transportation Planning, Engineering, Management, Policy, and Administration
2 Resilience in Transportation Planning, Engineering, Management, Policy, and Administration DOTs as they move forward with their resilience programs as a way to help identify resilient practices and policies that address a broader range of activities that can be implemented to provide more than quick recovery post event to transportation assets. Resilience metrics also appear to be lacking in quantitative measures that can be readily calculated and assessed. Much of the published peer-reviewed literature focused on using existing operational metrics normally related to system reliability as surrogates to reflect recovery time as a measure of system resilience. Some researchers have attempted to mea- sure characteristics such as the angle of deterioration and recovery triangles during weather events on interstate systems. This approach appears to have promise with the availability of historical traffic performance data at the micro- and meso-scales. In general, however, it appears that agencies are struggling to measure system resilience as was reflected in the state survey reviewed in chapter 4 of this report. The survey of 40 state DOTs (80%) revealed that most respondents are working to incor- porate resilience into their management programs; however, a closer look at their responses to questions related to information needed, revealed that agencies are seeking information on resilience metrics and assessment methods, criticality assessment models, asset vulner- ability, and the expected benefits from mitigation measures. Given the lack of documented metrics for resilience in the literature review and the request of additional data from states on how to measure and assess resilience, this appears to be a pressing need to fully address resilience in transportation systems. It is also noted that a wide range of agency divisions responded to the survey, including asset management, operations, design, planning, emer- gency management, and maintenance. This range of agency divisions that are working to address resilience may imply the need for a framework to assist agencies with determining roles and responsibilities of the appropriate offices and programs within highway agencies to address resilience throughout the project life cycle. Five case examples were developed: three for state DOTs (Arizona, Colorado, and Dela- ware), one for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, and one for the Genesee Transportation Council, a metropolitan planning organization (MPO) in the State of New York. The case examples document what each agency is doing to address resilience within their agency. The three state DOTs included in the case examples started resil- ience analysis at different points: Arizona DOT (ADOT) was involved in FHWAâs climate change pilot programs and has focused efforts on establishing a unique relationship with the United States Geological Survey to improve their understanding of the potential flow and path of extreme rain events and how those flows may affect ADOT assets. Using this information, the agency is seeking candidate locations to apply a newly developed process to economically validate resilience investments referred to as the Resilience Investment Economic Analysis. Colorado DOT (CDOT) is building on lessons learned from the dev- astating 2013 flood event, which damaged over $750 million in highway assets. Using ASMEâs Risk Analysis and Management for Critical Asset Protection framework, CDOT is proactively conducting an all-hazards risk-and-resilience assessment of the I-70 corri- dor from border to border. The goals of the project include developing a repeatable pro- cess, establishing a model for assessing asset criticality, determining the most risk-prone locations on the corridor, and developing mitigation plans for some of the locations. Delaware DOT, also an FHWA climate change pilot site, has focused their efforts on incorporating resilience into their policies and planning areas. Much of their resilience assessments are focused on sea-level rise and coastal flooding, given the state has the lowest average elevation in the country and 381 miles of shoreline. The two remaining case examples were included to demonstrate how similar entities (a port authority and an MPO) are addressing resilience.
Summary 3 Based on the information gathered through three distinct sources of data (a literature review, state DOT surveys, and case examples), the three primary challenges for state DOTs for incorporating resilience into their management programs appear to be the following: ⢠A lack of understanding on how resilience is related to risk assessment and management; ⢠A lack of metrics to measure system resilience and the benefits expected from resilience investments; and ⢠A lack of clear direction as to how system resilience and mandated transportation performance measures such as safety, infrastructure health, and system operations can affect each other. Finally, much of the information related to highway system resilience appears to be disjointed in that climate change, risk assessment, asset deterioration as reflected in asset management plans, operational performance, and safety performance have yet to be fully integrated to demonstrate how each affects the other. In addition, the lack of clear metrics to measure system resilience leaves agencies to struggle with appeasing policy makers who react to national mandates without the tools to implement resilient practices. Finally, data to support such analyses, such as the expected performance or benefit derived from mitigation measures implemented to improve system resilience, make it very difficult for agencies to justify such investments as compared to model and data-rich areas like operational or safety performance when competing from the same limited pool of funding. Simply stating that a design or maintenance activity will improve system resilience is not enough to support the argument when considering the funding allocation process when other management areas have well-established data sets, metrics, and models to forecast expected performance. National research could shed further light on addressing the integration of resilient practices into highway programs.
