As agencies seek to improve transportation safety and mobility, effectively operating transportation facilities and networks is critically important. A well-operated system can improve safety and resiliency, as well as the ability to move people and goods. There are hundreds of Transportation Systems Management and Operations (TSMO) strategies that could be deployed on a facility or network. Knowing which TSMO strategies are more likely to be effective at addressing safety and operations issues enables agencies and practitioners to make data-driven decisions to effectively use limited funding. Better evaluation methods will support agencies in assessing their own use of TSMO strategies, and developing a clearinghouse enables sharing  strategy effectiveness information to improve efficiency and decision-making. Evaluating TSMO strategies is often complicated by unique characteristics of TSMO strategies, such as deployment in combination with other strategies; intermittent or flexible use based on prevailing conditions rather than continuous use; and widespread effects across a network. Having better evaluation methods and assessing the feasibility of a potential operations equivalent of CMFs would enable more effective and efficient investments in TSMO strategies.

The objective of this project is to create evaluation methods and a clearinghouse of TSMO strategy evaluations so there is one place where practitioners can go to learn about the potential effectiveness of TSMO strategies and enable practitioners to better assess the likely impacts of their own potential deployments.

The clearinghouse will contain an organized, searchable, sortable collection of TSMO strategy evaluations (published and unpublished) that provides a “one-stop-shop” for information about the potential effectiveness of TSMO strategies. The clearinghouse will assist agencies with data-driven decision-making and help them assess the likely impacts of their own potential deployments.  Research findings and an introduction to the clearinghouse will be made available via the technical report, technical presentations, and webinars.