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Beyond the Short Term: Transportation Asset Management for Long-Term Sustainability, Accountability and Performance

Table of Contents

• Message from the Director
• Executive Summary
• Asset Management: Linking Accountability and Sustainability
  • Leadership Driven
  • Performance Focused
  • Transparent
  • Data–Driven
  • Formally Structured
  • System Based
• Chapter 1: Overview of Asset Management
  • Asset Management Is a Strategic Approach
  • Asset Management Breaks Down ‘Silos’
  • Asset Management Relies on Good Information and Analytic Capabilities
  • Asset Management Practices Are Flexible
  • Asset Management Works at Multiple Levels
  • People, Processes, Plans and Products
• Chapter 2: Key Agency Roles in Asset Management
  • Policy, Strategy and Planning Establish Direction for Asset Management
  • Project Delivery Reliability is Key to Timely Asset Treatments.
  • The Importance of Maintenance Should Not be Overlooked in Asset Management
  • Information and Analysis Rises in Importance in Asset Management
  • Leadership and Communication Link Strategy and Action in Asset Management
  • North Carolina Dot – A Case Study In Leadership, Performance Management, Accountability And Asset Management
  • Setting Direction
  • Review and Continuous Improvement
  • Clear, Simple Common Mission and Goals
  • Communication and Common Understanding
  • Restructure and Realign
  • Collaboration from Cradle–to–Grave
  • Focus Resources in Strategic Planning and Asset Management
  • Office of Asset Management
  • The North Carolina Multimodal Investment Network (NCMIN)
  • Being Strategic in Selecting Projects and Services
  • Role of Data in Quality Processes
  • Data Collection and Dissemination
  • Aging Assets, Long Term Decisions and Asset Management
  • Streamlining and Instituting On–site Project Scoping for Bridge Projects
  • Performance Tied to Mission and Goals
  • Lagging Metrics to Adjust Target for Leading Activities
  • Performance Management, Accountability and Asset Management
  • Effectiveness of Cascading Performance Measures
  • Role of Leadership Emphasized
  • Improving Assets through Changes in Preservation and Maintenance Strategies
  • Outcomes of Better Asset Information and Forecasting
  • Summary: Leadership and Accountability Contribute to Successful Management of Transportation Assets
• Chapter 3: Structures and Strategies for Asset Management
  • Structure or Process?.
  • The Critical Role of the Leader in Asset Management
  • Interlocking Decisions.
  • Resource Allocation Processes.
  • Utah DOT Case Study – Embracing New Structures and Strategies for Asset Management.
  • Utah's Asset Management Beginnings.
  • Performance Management Linkage.
  • Creating an Asset Management Structure.
  • Lessons Learned: Engagement and Evolution.
  • Strategies for Adaption.
  • Toward Comprehensive Asset Management
  • Lessons
• Chapter 4: Information Needs for Asset Management
  • Organizational Direction Information.
  • Organizational Competency Information.
  • Organizational Asset Data.
  • Analysis for Asset Management
  • Summary of Asset Management Development in Oregon.
  • Achieving Organizational Direction.
  • Change Management and the Asset Management Communication Plan.
  • Organizational Competency Information.
  • Implementation Plan to Close the Competency Gap.
  • Developing Organizational Asset Data.
  • Asset Management Steering Committee.
  • Decision Support: People and Tools.
  • A Way of Doing Business.
  • 'Words of Wisdom' in Developing an Asset Management Process
• Chapter 5: Asset Management as A "Quality" Framework
  • Development of "Quality Systems"
  • Asset Management and Other Quality Systems.
  • Short–Term and Long–Term Perspectives.
  • Asset Management as a Form of Performance Management
  • Asset Management And Similarities to the Baldrige Process.
  • The Balanced Scorecard Can Complement Asset Management
  • Six Sigma as a Subsystem Within Asset Management
  • ISO, International Organization for Standardization.
  • Summary.
  • Examples of Asset Management Practices Complementing "Quality" Systems in leading Transportation Agencies
  • New Zealand.
  • Swedish Road Authority.
  • Queensland, Australia.
  • New South Wales.
  • Florida Department of Transportation Office of Materials
  • Missouri DOT Performance Management Case Study
  • Complementary Systems.
  • MoDOT's Story – Changing a Culture to Embrace Accountability.
  • Tracking Performance.
  • Keeping It Simple.
  • Resource Optimization.
  • The Role of Maintenance.
  • Increased Efficiencies as an Investment Strategy.
  • Lessons Learned from MoDOT
• Chapter 6: Summary and Conclusions
  • Maryland State Highway Agency Case Study
  • Pavement Performance and the Organization.
  • Allocations and Project Selection.
  • Performance Measures and Asset Management Results.
  • Information and Analysis.
  • Decision support: People and Tools.
  • Collaborative Decision Making and Support
  • Achieving Organizational Commitment
  • Ownership and Accountability.
  • A Way of Doing Business.
  • Communication with Stakeholders.
  • Future Initiatives.

List of Figures:

• Figure 1: The 'Plan, Implement, Evaluate, Act' cycle is inherent in 'quality systems' and essential in asset management.
• Figure 2: The asset management process includes a continuous and systematic setting of goals and evaluating of results.
• Figure 3: The ability to illustrate future trends and the results of current practices allows Asset Management practitioners to demonstrate the consequences of current decisions.
• Figure 4: The Strategic Planning Office reports to the Deputy Secretary.
• Figure 5: Highway management systems are coordinated under the Asset Management Office.
• Figure 6: The hierarchy of state and local interest.
• Figure 7: The Performance metrics relationship chart.
• Figure 8: The relationship between the NC DOT's mission, goals and assets.
• Figure 9: Performance measures cascade from the top of the organization.
• Figure 10: Similar goals and metrics are used at all levels of the organization, which creates a common focus on priorities.
• Figure 11: Pavement condition trends.
• Figure 12: Pavement conditions will decline if current trends continue.
• Figure 13: NC DOT forecasts that overall conditions will decline if funding levels remain as forecasted.
• Figure 14: Leadership and data provide essential coordination of other functions in an asset management environment. Leadership points the way and common data systems keep all divisions communicating effectively.
• Figure 15: ODOT performance measures relate to all areas of preservation, operations and capital improvement.
• Figure 16: Oregon DOT links plans, people, processes and products in its asset management framework.
• Figure 17: The major steps within Performance Management provide clear targets and a clear process for measuring accomplishment of those targets. The later steps of reviewing results and updating strategies achieve the institutional learning process common in all of the "quality" frameworks.
• Figure 18: The Balanced Scorecard allows tradeoffs between competing needs, as does Asset Management.
• Figure 19: A Six Sigma approach to pavements would focus upon what causes pavements to perform exceptionally well or poorly. Lessons from that analysis would be used to improve pavement processes.
• Figure 20: Missouri DOT has used its performance management system to focus on key indicators, such as fatal crashes.
• Figure 21: MoDOT has made substantial progress on pavement conditions on major routes.
• Figure 22: Limited resources compelled Missouri to make the difficult tradeoff of accepting lower conditions on the minor highways in order to increase investment in the major ones. MoDOT benchmarks its conditions against Georgia's.

List of Tables:

• Table 1: The table provides definitions for the management systems commonly referenced in this report.
• Table 2: Weights for accountability
• Table 3: All functions should contribute to asset management.
• Table 4: Baldrige similarities to asset management.

List of References:

• 1. Haas and Hudson, 1994, pg. 4.
• 2. Lindblom, Charles E., The Science Of Muddling Through, in Public Administration Review, Vol. 19, pp. 79–88, 1959.
• 3. FHWA, "Transportation Asset Management In Australia, Canada, England, and New Zealand" 2005.
• 4. Hammer, Michael and James Champy, "Re–Engineering the Corporation," 2001
• 5. International Infrastructure Management Manual, Version 3.0, 2006, pg. 2.10
• 6. http://www.oregon.gov/ODOT/CS/PERFORMANCE/
• 7. ODOT Asset Management Program Plan, March 19, 2008, accessed at http://library.state.or.us/repository/2009/200905131613413/index.pdf
• 8. Osborne, David, and Ted Gaebler, "Reinventing Government, How the Entrepreneurial Spirit is Transforming the Public Sector," 1993, Penguin Publishing, pps. 349–359.
• 9. Likierman, Andrew, "The Five Traps of Performance Management," in the Harvard Business Review, Oct. 2009, pps 96–101.
• 10. Kaplan, Robert S., and David P. Norton, "The Balanced Scorecard – Measures That Drive Performance," Harvard Business Review, as reprinted in "Measuring Corporate Performance," Harvard Business Review, 1998 pps. 123–145.
• 11. An as yet unpublished report to be produced by the Federal Highway Administration, AASHTO and NCHRP. Advanced copies were released in limited quantities at the 2010 Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting.
• 12. Interviews with SRA officials as part of the "Linking Transportation Performance and Accountability Scan."
• 13. New South Wales Government Asset Management Committee documents accessed at http://www.gamc.nsw.gov.au/tam/ and interviews with NSW RTA officials.
• 14. Part 13, Queensland Treasury, Department of Transport and Main Roads, Summary of Departmental Portfolio Budgets, 2008, in the Service Delivery Statement and interviews with QDTMR officials.
• 15. An as yet unpublished report to be produced by the Federal Highway Administration, AASHTO and NCHRP. Advanced copies were released in limited quantities at the 2010 Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting.
• 16. Interviews with SRA officials as part of the "Linking Transportation Performance and Accountability Scan."
• 17. New South Wales Government Asset Management Committee documents accessed at http://www.gamc.nsw.gov.au/tam/ and interviews with NSW RTA officials.
• 18. Part 13, Queensland Treasury, Department of Transport and Main Roads, Summary of Departmental Portfolio Budgets, 2008, in the Service Delivery Statement and interviews with QDTMR officials.

FHWA-HIF-10-009