Traffic congestion : issues and options : conference summary

mmpPDFProceedingsTraffic congestionConferencesTransportation policyFederal aidFederal lawsUnited StatesUniversity of California, Los AngelesSciara, Gian-ClaudiaUniversity of California, Los Angeles. University Extension. Public Policy ProgramUniversity of California, Los Angeles. Institute of Transportation StudiesNTL-OPERATIONS AND TRAFFIC CONTROLS-CongestionNTL-LAWS AND REGULATIONS-Federal LawsNTL-LAWS AND REGULATIONS-Federal Standards and RulesNTL-PLANNING AND POLICY-PLANNING AND POLICYUS Transportation CollectionIn 2003, elected officials on Capitol Hill will outline the national transportation legislation that will define and fund transportation investments throughout the country for the next six years, directly affecting how metropolitan regions will respond to traffic congestion, one of the most enduring and vexing public policy issues facing the nation. With a focus on the policy issues relevant to the upcoming TEA-21 reauthorization, the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) organized a conference on Traffic Congestion: Issues and Options in Washington, D.C. on June 26 - 27, 2003, to assess the severity of the congestion problem, to discuss its causes and consequences, and to explore feasible technical, institutional, and policy strategies for mitigating congestion. The conference brought together transportation agency and industry leaders, policymakers, opinion leaders, practitioners, and researchers to debate how congestion and its impacts may be quantified most accurately, and what congestion related goals are realistic: reducing congestion, emphasizing increased reliability over increased speeds, simply preventing worsening of congestion, or simply learning to live with it. This summary presents the conference proceeding session by session, capturing the major threads of each session and the discussions that followed, and emphasizing the key issues underlying the debates. The discussions demonstrate the complexity both of congestion as a physical phenomenon, with myriad causes, consequences and solutions, as well as of the metropolitan contexts where decision makers ultimately must choose what to do about it. The conference was convened by the UCLA Extension Public Policy Program and the UCLA Institute of Transportation Studies. UCLA worked closely with a number of sponsoring and cooperating organizations in planning and presenting the conference. Sponsors were: the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO); American Public Transportation Association (APTA); American Road & Transportation Builders Association Transportation Development Foundation (ARTBATDF); Federal Highway Administration (FHWA); National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP); U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA); and University of California Transportation Center (UCTC). Cooperating organizations were: the Association of Metropolitan Planning Organizations (AMPO); Eno Transportation Foundation; PB Consult, Inc.; Transportation Research Board (TRB); and UC Berkeley Institute of Transportation Studies. 3 Appendices, 51 p