Document Library

The Guidelines How to Prepare and Execute Performance Based Contracts for Road Asset Management - Interactive PDF For Basic PBC & Advanced Users, offer a comprehensive tool to support the introduction of PBCs. Taking into consideration the wide range of sector maturity across regions, the Guidelines are organized into two workstreams—basic and advanced—so they can be easily adapted to a particular country’s or subregion’s level of preparedness. The present Guidance Note is intended to provide a roadmap for practitioners seeking to customize PBCs to local sector maturity.

This guide explains that safety is not just about the trains themselves, but also about how people get to and from stations . Problems often come from poor sidewalks, missing sign age, bad lighting, and busy roads near stations. Children, older adults, and people with disabilities are especially at risk. In some locations, crossings lack proper barriers or signals, increasing the chance of road crashes. Reliable data on crashes is also often missing, making it difficult to pinpoint where the greatest problems lie.

This document supports implementation of system-level transportation asset valuation, helping agencies translate asset inventories and condition data into meaningful measures of asset value. The resource provides case studies, worksheets, and outreach materials that demonstrate how agencies can apply asset valuation methods to support financial reporting, communicate infrastructure needs, and evaluate investment strategies.

Practitioners will gain practical guidance on using asset valuation to track system condition trends, demonstrate the impact of funding decisions, and strengthen transportation asset management (TAM) programs. The materials complement the AASHTO Asset Valuation Guide and include tools that help agencies integrate asset valuation concepts into planning, performance management, and investment decision-making.

This synthesis examines how State DOTs fund, manage, and coordinate the maintenance of Complete Streets infrastructure, including bicycle, pedestrian, and other active transportation facilities. As agencies expand multimodal networks, the report highlights practical challenges such as equipment compatibility, staffing capacity, and ongoing maintenance funding.

Practitioners will find examples of maintenance policies, interagency cost-sharing agreements, and partnership models involving local and tribal governments. The report also identifies strategies for workforce training, equipment procurement, and operational coordination that can help agencies sustain Complete Streets investments over time.

Wrong-way crashes are rare but often severe events. This brief serves as an update to previous Foundation work examining these crashes from 2010 to 2018. Using FARS data, updated wrong-way crash numbers are provided, previously cited risk factors were examined in relation to the more recent crash data, and potential new risk factors were explored.

The American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) and the American Welding Society (AWS) provide extensive guidance documents that govern the welding of steel bridge members; however, none of the documents provide guidance regarding the number of times a welding nonconformance can be repaired without penalty or rejection, leading to uncertainty in the fabrication industry and potentially costly member rejections. While a few studies have investigated the effects of multiple weld repairs, none have studied the effects of multiple repair welds on members and practices common in the steel bridge industry. As such, there is currently insufficient data to determine whether multiple repair welds affect the material properties or the fatigue life of welded joints on bridge members. The goal of the current study is to investigate the effects of multiple repair welds on complete joint penetration (CJP) butt-splice welds and suggest an appropriate limit to GDOT and the steel bridge industry on the number of repair welds that can be performed at a single location. To accomplish this goal, the current study is comprised of three main research thrusts: (a) gather existing industry data and knowledge on welding nonconformances and repairs through a literature review and survey, (b) generate novel experimental data through a suite of material characterization tests on CJP joints with up to five weld repairs, and (c) generate novel experimental data through large-scale fatigue life tests on CJP butt-splice joints with up to five weld repairs. The results of this research show that up to five weld repairs can be performed at a joint without significant changes to the material properties or fatigue life of the CJP joint. The significance of these findings is that the data suggest: (a) there are no mechanistic or fatigue life indications that a CJP butt splice joint with up to five weld repairs will perform significantly differently than a CJP joint with no repairs, and (b) the repaired joint should still meet all applicable strength and fatigue design requirements.

NCHRP Research Report 1149: Estimating Benefits of Closing Gaps in Active Transportation Networks: A Guide provides practical methods for evaluating the benefits of projects that improve connectivity in walking, bicycling, and rolling networks. Active transportation systems—including trails, sidewalks, bike lanes, and connected roadways—play a critical role in supporting safe, convenient travel for both recreation and everyday trips, yet many communities face fragmented networks with significant gaps. This guide offers accessible analytical approaches that can be applied across diverse geographies and project types, using publicly available datasets and research-based multipliers. Designed for broad usability, the methods rely primarily on national-level data sources to help agencies consistently estimate economic, safety, health, and mobility benefits.

NCHRP Web-Only Document 426, which accompanies the report, documents the development of the guide and summarizes the full research effort behind the recommended methodologies.

NCHRP Research Report 1164: The Business Case for Knowledge Management: A Guide provides state departments of transportation and other transportation agencies with practical tools to assess and measure the value of knowledge management (KM) initiatives. As experienced staff retire and collaboration across disciplines increases, agencies face growing challenges in preserving institutional knowledge and ensuring effective knowledge transfer. The guide outlines approaches for evaluating how KM practices contribute to improved business processes, workforce development, and organizational performance. It helps agencies articulate the return on investment of KM activities and integrate them into broader performance management strategies.

Accompanying the report, NCHRP Web-Only Document 437: Assessing and Measuring the Business Value of Knowledge Management documents the research effort and provides additional detail supporting the guide’s development.

NCHRP Synthesis 659: Automated Traffic Signal Performance Measures: Management, Operation, and Maintenance examines how state departments of transportation are using high-resolution traffic signal controller data to monitor, manage, and improve signal performance. Automated Traffic Signal Performance Measures (ATSPMs) enable continuous, data-driven oversight of traffic operations and maintenance, supporting more proactive and efficient decision-making. While the benefits of ATSPMs are well documented, adoption across state DOTs varies due to challenges such as funding constraints, equipment and technology upgrades, staffing capacity, and organizational readiness. The synthesis highlights current practices, including the use of both controller-based and crowdsourced signal performance measures. It also explores implementation barriers, funding strategies, staffing considerations, and examples of how agencies integrate ATSPMs into day-to-day operational and maintenance workflows.

Recommended Resource: NCHRP Report 1170: Evaluating the Safety Effects of Automated Traffic Signal Performance Measures provides methods and supporting research to help agencies evaluate the safety impacts of Automated Traffic Signal Performance Measures (ATSPMs).

This publication explains how the FHWA Long-Term Pavement Performance (LTPP) database underpins modern pavement performance modeling and performance-based investment decisions. For practitioners, it outlines how LTPP data are used to calibrate and validate Pavement ME design procedures, establish national data collection standards, and support statistically robust performance comparisons under real-world conditions. Agencies interested in strengthening pavement performance forecasting, improving lifecycle cost estimates, or validating local design assumptions will find this a useful overview of available data tools and access points.

Highway construction projects frequently require detours and haul roads that divert traffic, including heavy trucks, onto local roads not originally designed for such loads. These temporary routes can accelerate pavement deterioration, reduce service life, and impose significant maintenance costs on local agencies. Current compensation practices, such as Minnesota’s Gas Tax Method and Equivalent Overlay Method, offer partial solutions but do not fully capture the variability of damage across different pavements and traffic conditions. This study investigates the structural and economic impacts of detours and haul roads on Minnesota’s roadway network and develops a framework for improved evaluation and planning. A comprehensive literature review of empirical and engineering-based approaches to estimating pavement damage is first conducted, along with a survey of compensation practices across U.S. states. Field data are next collected from five detour routes and two haul roads using Falling Weight Deflectometer (FWD), and Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR). The results are then used to estimate Remaining Service Life (RSL). Due to significant variability in FWD testing, MnDOT’s calibrated pavement performance curves are applied to estimate damage, with a case study demonstrating that a three-month detour could reduce service life by more than two years. Additionally, a multiclass traffic assignment model is implemented to predict vehicle-type-specific flows under closures, and optimization techniques using genetic algorithms are developed to identify detour routes that minimize truck-related pavement damage while maintaining network efficiency. While the findings provide some practical tools and recommendations for more equitable compensation and improved detour planning, more research is needed to validate the results obtained in this study.

NCHRP Research Report 1167: Interdependence of Federal, State, and Local Transportation Funding and Ownership, produced by TRB’s National Cooperative Highway Research Program, is designed to provide an overview of interdependent funding in the transportation community, the strategies used to manage it, and the outcomes of funding interdependences. Policy- and decision-makers can use the report to help calibrate contextual decisions about generating and using transportation funding in an interdependent environment. The report also gives decision-makers an understanding of both broad approaches and specific strategies that agencies at all levels of government are using to navigate interdependent transportation funding.