Talking Traffic

An amusing headline from Washington:

Parking Meters Out to Destroy the Human Race

As mentioned previously, I’ve been doing some research into the portion of the Transportation Stimulus that will end up in Georgia. I’ve come up with some numbers that leads me to believe that the Georgia Department of Transportation contract office is going to be a madhouse in a few months.

ENORMOUS CAVEAT! All numbers here are WAGs¹ at best and downright assumptions at worst.

Here’s what I’ve got. According to GDOT, here’s the preliminary list of projects that might be included in the stimulus. That list and some assumptions about what might be ready lead to these conclusions:

1. $1 billion in stimulus funds for Georgia Transportation
2. $500 million to be spent by July 8, 2009 (120 day shovel-ready provision)
3. 75 projects on the books that would probably be ready and that meet the $500 million dollar goal which leads to…
4. 1.3 Contracts per business day in order to meet the deadline
5. Some really busy letting months of May and June

With respect to item number five, it seems likely that if the goal of 75 projects let by July 8 is to happen, the majority of the bidding will occur toward the late part of the 120 day period. That means the months of May and June. I honestly have no idea if the administrative, contract and engineering staffs of GDOT and the other agencies involved are capable of this sort of output. I hope so, because I’d hate to leave some of the money on the table.

Things that would help:

• Fewer contracts - with only a few exceptions, the projects on that list linked above are “small” i.e. less than $10 million. A few more large contracts in the $25-$75 million range would even things out nicely. Unfortunately, those would be difficult to drum up in the 120 days.
• Combined contracts - I haven’t examined the list in detail, but having contractors bid on bunches of projects at the same time would reduce the workload
• Longer timeframe - a change to the law that would allow for a longer time-to-project than the 120 days. I’m rating that as “unlikely”
• Cooperative agencies - a great deal of the delay in reaching the letting stage of a project contract occurs during agency reviews. If these review periods were shrunk, more projects could be ready in time.

I’ll be discussing some of this in my podcast due out on Monday morning but remember, I’m only working with my own research and what I read in the papers. For all I know, there’s already a plan that is set and rolling.

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¹: “WAG”: Technical term standing for Wild-Ass Guess. Usually used in the context of “this is better than a guess, worse than having real data, and based on experience”.

I’m putting out an episode next week about the transportation stimulus. In preparation, I looked up the text of the stimulus¹ in order to determine how much of the $26.725 billion will be ending up in Georgia:

…50 percent of the funds made available under this heading [$26.725 Billion: ed] shall be apportioned to States using the formula set forth in section 104(b)(3) of title 23, United States Code, and the remaining funds shall be apportioned to States in the same ratio as the obligation limitation for fiscal year 2008 was distributed among the States in accordance with the formula specified in section 120(a)(6) of division K of Public Law 110-161:…

The formula in USC 23 Section 104(b)(3) is relatively easy to find and understand. I’ve seen it before. It talks about how the money for each fiscal year’s highway trust fund investment is broken out between the states and it boils down to how many lane miles of interstate and state highways each state has compared to all the other states.

Unfortunately, that second bit, about Division K of Public Law 110-161: section 120(a)(6)? Well…let me just quote it for you:

(4)(A) distribute the obligation limitation for Federal-aid highways, less the aggregate amounts not distributed under paragraphs (1) and (2), for sections 1301, 1302, and 1934 of the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users; sections 117 (but individually for each project numbered 1 through 3676 listed in the table contained in section 1702 of the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users) and 144(g) of title 23, United States Code; and section 14501 of title 40, United States Code, so that the amount of obligation authority available for each of such sections is equal to the amount determined by multiplying the ratio determined under paragraph (3) by the sums authorized to be appropriated for that section for the fiscal year; and…

I have a life that does not involve spending the umpteen hours needed to decipher this, run down all the references, do the math, and then probably still get it wrong. So I cheated. I looked up the fiscal 2008 apportionment to Georgia² and just assumed that it would be the same percentage, or close. This came out to approximately $998 million, which is close to the round $1B. That’s what I’m working with right now, until the newspaper tells me different.

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¹: Do a search on “Highway Infrastructure Investment” at http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h1/text?version=enr&nid=t0:enr:31 to find the related text. It’s an education in patience.
²: If you go to the link, look at the bottom under table 7 for your state’s fiscal 2009 apportionment. Tables 3, 4, 5 and 6 will tell you how much money your state is losing because of failure to comply with federal regulations.

A story from Pennsylvania is misusing their words. This is a typical misuse, though, and everyone (sort of) knows what they mean:

Gettysburg’s new synchronized system of traffic signals has caught more than just commuters by surprise.

I discussed the difference between “synchronized” and “coordinated” in the very first podcast. Unfortunately, they’re using the term in an egregious manner in this story.

When the square is gridlocked, the system activates green lights for traffic heading out of town. But in the meantime, traffic heading toward town can be sitting at a red light wondering whether oncoming traffic is breaking the law.

So the signals aren’t synchronized at all! Alas, we should all be used to reporters misusing terms under the pressure of deadlines.

It seems like PennDOT is using an adaptable signal system to coordinate a number of signals on a grid network in order to optimize flows through Gettysburgh. This is not a simple task. In fact, it’s a downright difficult one. Right now, they’re receiving a lot of complaints from drivers about “gridlock” and other issues. I’m willing to bet (from my chair here in Marietta) that PennDOT is still doing the tweaking and massaging phase of the system installation. If they are given the chance, and drivers pay attention to the traffic signals instead of relying on memorized timings, the traffic flows in Gettysburgh will get much better compared to the previous conditions.