Human Factors Guidelines for Transportation Management Centers

10764870322018PDFTech ReportFHWA-HRT-16-060HRDS-30/11-18(WEB)ETraffic control centersHuman factorsUnited StatesUnited States. Federal Highway AdministrationRobinson, EmanuelBarragan, DanielaDembowski, DougSzymkowski, ToddMiller, SherylGolembiewski, GaryFerezan, SoniaLeidosWestat, Inc.Lakeside EngineersExcalibur Associates, Inc.United States. Federal Highway AdministrationChu, JimmyPhilips, Brian H.Federal Highway AdministrationTransportation management centers (TMCs) have traditionally served as the real-time interface between motorists and transportation agencies. Their mission has broadened to encompass a variety of goals and management approaches. This document presents a set of human factors guidelines to be used by organizations interested in developing, evaluating, or modifying their TMCs. The guidelines herein provide human factors considerations based on empirical research, meta-analyses, usability testing, and standards to create the optimal work environment for TMC operators, managers, and supervisors in attempts to improve decisionmaking and mitigate human errors. The goal is to provide human factors guidelines that will bring together comprehensive, state-of-the-art information on human factors aspects in TMCs in a format that will be readily usable to a wide range of practitioners.This report is divided into several chapters, each focused on a particular type of human factors issue within the TMC. The first chapter begins with the TMC operator, describing an operator\u2019s strengths, limitations, and biases when interfacing with technology. Next, chapter 2 describes how operators interact with automated systems, including issues of staying in the loop, trust in system automation, and monitoring. Chapter 3 provides an overview of TMC infrastructure, physical layout, organizational structure, workflow, and how the locations of TMC elements (onsite or offsite) affect performance. Next, chapter 4 describes the systems and tools used within a TMC. Finally, chapter 5 includes information about communications with the public, colleagues, and agencies and addresses content and delivery mechanisms for messages along with recommendations for facilitating communication across organizations.81