Publications

Summary:
What does an equitable and just freight system actually look like? We asked UFL members this question at the summer 2022 quarterly meeting. Their responses, shown in the graphic below, cover a wide range of ideas and topics. Some define equity in terms of equal access to the numerous benefits a freight system brings; others call for a reduction in freight costs — like pollution, noise, and traffic — to historically marginalized people. Members differ on who the appropriate stakeholders...

Summary:
As of June 2020, the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has infected more than eight million people worldwide. In response to the global pandemic, cities have been put under lockdown, closing non-essential businesses and banning group gatherings, limiting urban mobility, and issuing stay-at-home orders, while nations closed their borders. During these times, logistics became more important than ever in guaranteeing the uninterrupted flow of goods to city residents.

Summary:
Community resilience depends on the resilience of the lifeline infrastructure and the performance of the disaster-related functions of local governments. State and federal resilience plans and guidelines acknowledge the importance of the transportation system as a critical lifeline in planning for community resilience and in helping local governments to set recovery goals.

Summary:
The outer coast of Washington State is exposed to significant seismic and tsunami hazards. A Cascadia Subduction Zone (CSZ) event is expected to cause high earthquake intensities and tsunami inundation resulting in considerable infrastructure loss, inundation of developed land, and degraded functioning of coastal communities. One area of particular concern is Pacific County, located in southwest Washington, where over 85% of the population is expected to experience severe shaking intensities.

Summary:
The safety effects of cooperative intelligent transport systems (C-ITS) are mostly unknown and associated with uncertainties, because these systems represent emerging technology. This study proposes a bowtie analysis as a conceptual framework for evaluating the safety effect of cooperative intelligent transport systems. These seek to prevent road traffic accidents or mitigate their consequences.

Summary:
Freight transport is a challenging economic sector, as it is essential for the functioning of production and distribution systems but and the same time is at the origin of many nuisances such as congestion, greenhouse gas emissions, pollution and noise. When responding to these issues, planners dispose nowadays of a growing body of freight data that can be used for the implementation of policies towards achieving smart mobility.

Summary:
This report documents the use of the National Performance Monitoring Research Data Set (NPMRDS) for the computation of freight performance measures on Interstate highways in Washington state. The report documents the data availability and specific data quality issues identified with NPMRDS. It then describes a recommended initial set of quality assurance tests that are needed before WSDOT begins producing freight performance measures.

Summary:
This report discusses the travel costs associated with the closure of roads in the greater Centralia/Chehalis, Washington region due to 100-year flood conditions starting on the Chehalis River. The costs were computed for roadway closures on I-5, US 12, and SR 6, and are based on estimated road closure durations supplied by WSDOT. The computed costs are only those directly related to travel that would otherwise have occurred on the roads affected by the flooding closures.

Summary:
The effective and efficient movement of freight is essential to the economic well-being of our country but freight transport also adversely impacts our society by contributing to a large number of crashes, including those resulting in injuries and fatalities.

Summary:
Electronic door seals (E-seals) were tested on shipping containers that traveled through ports, over borders, and on roadways. The findings showed that using these RFID devices could increase supply chain efficiency and improve the security of containerized cargo movements, particularly when E-seals replace common mechanical seals. Before the benefits of E-seals can be realized, several barriers must be addressed.

Summary:
The management of transportation systems for resilience has received significant attention in recent years. Resilience planning concerns the actions of an organization that reduce the consequences of a disruption to the system the organization manages. Little exploration has been made into the connections between resilience planning and the actions of a state department of transportation (DOT) that contribute to resilience of a freight transportation system.

Summary:
The economic viability and well-being of Washington State is significantly influenced by the freight transportation system serving the region.

Summary:
In the face of many risks of disruptions to our transportation system, including natural disasters, inclement weather, terrorist acts, work stoppages, and other potential transportation disruptions, it is imperative for freight transportation system partners to plan a transportation system that can recover quickly from disruption and to prevent long-term negative economic consequences to state and regional economies.

Summary:
In the face of many risks of disruptions to our transportation system, this research improves WSDOT’s ability to manage the freight transportation system so that it minimizes the economic consequences of transportation disruptions.

Summary:
This paper describes the development and use of a network model using publicly available industry data to analyze the resilience of two important Washington state industries. Modeling of freight activity in support of the potato and diesel industry in Washington state demonstrates how individual industries utilize the road network and how they are affected by a transportation disruption.