Over the past decade or more, U.S. business and commerce have become increasingly reliant on and integrated with the global economy. This change to the underlying nature of trade and goods movement patterns has had and will continue to have profound effects on U.S. transportation systems. Within this environment of global competition, supply-chain management is now defined by reliable just-in-time transportation across multiple modes, passing through numerous geopolitical boundaries. During roughly the same time frame state transportation agencies re-engineered the statewide transportation planning process to provide greater community involvement, decentralize project development decisions and be more inclusive across transport modes. However, achieving a more open, decentralized and inclusive process has proven to be slow, inflexible and disjointed compared to the private sector's market-driven needs and expectations. To meet the transportation demands created by the predicted strong continued growth in the U.S. economy will require state transportation agencies to again re-engineer their statewide planning processes.

The objective of this research is to seek out and examine the planning practices in states were efforts have been made to understand goods movement in their planning processes, and integrate state transportation policy to state economic development policies.