| Congestions Management Strategies |
| Park-and-Ride Lots as Congestion Management
Tools |
| By Rob Spillar, Houston, TX, 1-713-785-1139, spillar@pbworld.com |
| Park-and-ride lots are an important form of travel
demand management because of their ability to encourage a modal shift.
|
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Rob completed the 1995 William Barclay Parsons Fellowship
Monograph No. 11, entitled “Park-and-Ride Planning and
Design Guidelines,” which is now available for distribution.
The monograph is a state-of-the art analysis of planning and
design techniques for park-and-ride facilities and similar multimodal
transit centers. The report presents planning techniques and
design examples collected from successful transit agencies in
both North America and Europe. The monograph focuses on six
specific planning and design topics associated with park-and-ride
facilities. These include:
• Defining the park-and-ride facility, a discussion of
industry terminology and definition of various types of park-and-ride
facility based on their location, orientation, and associated
markets
• The park-and-ride planning process, a detailed analysis
of both the system planning and site planning process
• Making the facility location decision, a discussion
of “best practices” used by transit agencies throughout
the U.S. in determining optimum locations for new park-and-ride
facilities
• Suburban park-and-ride demand estimation techniques,
a look at various statistical means for estimating park-and-ride
demand
• Design requirements for park-and-ride facilities, a
collection of design examples, turning templates, and design
considerations used by transit agencies in the development of
park-and-ride facilities
• Architecture, landscape and art, a discussion of these
integral parts of the park-and-ride facility including the reasons
for incorporating artistic elements in the design of a park-and-ride
facility, and numerous examples of art coupled with the design
process.
If you are interested in technical support on park-and-ride
and transit center projects, please contact me at 713-785-1139,
or spillar@pbworld.com.
For copies of the monograph, please contact Josie Rivera,
of the Business Services Group in the New York Office (212-465-5552)
or riveraj@pbworld.com.
|
Congestion management can be achieved by managing the demand for travel
(TDM), by maximizing the efficiency of the transport system (TSM),
or by implementing a combination of the two systems. The traditional
park-and-ride (P&R) lot provides congestion relief primarily because
of its ability to shift travelers from the private auto to transit
and carpool modes (albeit only for a portion of the trip). This ability
to encourage a modal shift is an important form of transportation
demand management.
P&R Lots and ITS Technology
The ability of the traditional P&R facility to provide significant
systems management capabilities has been limited in large part because
of the functional relationship between the P&R facility and the
urban highway system. In other words, once the traveler has chosen
his or her primary mode of travel and is en route, there has usually
been no opportunity for information exchange between the transit system,
highway network, and traveler to encourage a spontaneous change of
mode. This lack of communication limits the ability of the P&R
facility to provide a key systems management role (i.e., the ability
to divert travelers from the highway network to alternate modes of
travel in response to changing travel congestion conditions within
the system).
With the emergence of intelligent transportation systems (ITS), however,
the P&R facility is taking on a completely new role as an effective
congestion management tool in terms of both TDM and TSM. These new
“smarter” P&R facilities will define the future of
P&R development. (See also “Using
ITS Technology to Manage Congestion at Parking Facilities”
by Ron Pati.)
Smart Park Project in California
The Santa Clara Valley Transit Authority (VTA), which serves the San
Jose, California area, is sponsoring a study that seeks to integrate
the traditional P&R concept with the rapidly advancing world of
ITS. The Smart Park concept developed for VTA can be defined as an
intermodal facility or system of P&R lots capable of exchanging
dynamic information with the regional transportation control system.
Key information to be exchanged will include:
- Data on downstream congestion
- Availability of parking spaces at individual
Smart Park facilities
- Transit performance.
Smart Parks will provide a full range of traveler services and will
be coordinated with surrounding urban development patterns, thus providing
opportunities for joint development and privatization. This project,
for which PB is developing three prototype Smart Parks, is described
in detail in “Smart
Parks: The Next Generation in Park-and-Ride Facilities,”
in PB Network Issue No. 42, pages 13-14. |
|
Notes: To find out more about Smart Parks
and the Santa Clara Valley Transit Project, look for “Smart
Parks,” a technical paper presented at the 1997 Technical Exchange
Seminar on the PB wide area network (Houston Directory); or contact:
Peter Gertler, project manager (415-243-4616 or gertler@pbworld.com);
Scott Danielson, lead architect (414-243-4617 or danielson@pbworld.com);
or Robert Spillar, lead P&R planner for the VTA Smart Parks project.
For previous PB Network articles by Rob, see 3rd
Quarter ‘98, Issue #42, pp 13-14; Summer ‘95, Issue
#31, p 34 (co-author). |
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