Enhanced freight sketch planning tool for assessing multimodal investment strategies

In recent years, there have been dramatic changes in the volume and movement of freight within the US and internationally. Traditional distribution systems have been replaced by just-in-time driven processes and freight transportation patterns have become much more complex. Innovations in containerization as well as changes in trade geography have directly influenced international trade movements. NAFTA and the deregulation of rail, trucking and air in the latter part of the twentieth century also had a large impact on freight movement. Given these changes, it has become increasingly necessary for transportation planners to look to modes other than traditional highways as solutions for congestion and other transportation problems. However, public agencies have been challenged to demonstrate and contrast the benefits of these modal investments with traditional highway spending. In 2002 the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) contracted the Center for Transportation Research at The University of Texas at Austin to develop a sketch planning methodology to quantify and evaluate the benefits associated with multimodal freight investments. During the first phase of the research a spreadsheet based tool, entitled Multimodal Analysis Freight Tool (MAFT) was developed to quantify and evaluate the benefits associated with multimodal freight investments. However, the tool needed to be further developed to accurately account for the rail and barge components and data regarding these modes was not readily available during the first phase of the project. Additionally, given the uncertainty of assumptions made in the tool, a sensitivity analysis to determine the critical input values is needed. A critical examination of the output from several case studies will also be studied to determine the overall effect of these factors on the results. An assessment of the oversimplifications in the tool, due to its sketch planning nature, will be undertaken and possible solutions identifiedCivil, Architectural, and Environmental Engineerin