Sarah Searcy

Quality Assurance and Quality Control Processes for a Large-Scale Bicycle and Pedestrian Volume Data Program

Phase 1 of North Carolina’s Non-Motorized Volume Data Program (NMVDP) was conducted in the North Carolina Department of Transportation Divisions 7 and 9 in the Triad–Piedmont region of North Carolina. Continuous count stations (CCSs) were installed to monitor bicyclist and pedestrian traffic at 12 locations and began collecting data in late 2014. These stations covered a mix of sites across different land uses, travel patterns, and volume groups. Sites performed automated detection of pedestrians on sidewalks, bicycles and pedestrians on shared-use paths, bicycles in bicycle lanes, bicycles on sidewalks, and bicycles in mixed traffic. This paper summarizes the programmatic elements developed and implemented to select, install, and ensure high data quality for the 12 CCSs. These elements include agency coordination, site selection, equipment procurement and setup, equipment validation, equipment maintenance, data handling, quality assurance and quality control checks, and data reporting and analysis. After piloting this program in one region, the research team identified several changes to test when the NMVDP was expanded to a new region of the state to improve the quality of data collected: conduct weekly inspections of the data and perform validation to promptly identify maintenance issues, investigate the development of hourly data checks to implement, use a simpler interquartile range check, and consider developing automation to check data.

Relating Public Opinions of Roadway Assets to Field Data with Survey and Focus Groups

In recent years, transportation policy in the United States has increasingly focused on measuring and tracking performance outcomes. However, identifying how quantifiable outcomes—such as international roughness index ratings—influence less tangible outcomes—such as user satisfaction with a roadway—can be challenging. This paper outlines a method that enables researchers to compare stakeholder perceptions of assets with actual field-measured data for roadways. More than 350 residents in six locations in the state of North Carolina were surveyed about how those residents perceived and prioritized the roadway assets managed by the North Carolina Department of Transportation. Using a method termed “roadway reviews,” researchers asked participants about state-maintained roads as the participants were driven on those roads in real time; these surveys were supplemented with focus groups. In addition to identifying how well asset conditions on roadway segments aligned with the basic expectations of roadway users, researchers determined how these ratings compared with field measurements for the segments and captured how participants ranked the importance of specific roadway assets for overall condition, safety, and appearance. The findings will be used to improve asset management practice and will be integrated into the North Carolina Department of Transportation’s annual Highway Performance Monitoring System reports.

Behavioral Effects of Completing a Critical Link in the American Tobacco Trail

This study responded to a unique opportunity to determine behavioral changes that resulted from the construction of a critical link of the American Tobacco Trail (ATT) in Durham, North Carolina. Observational data were collected both before and after construction of a bicycle-and-pedestrian bridge that linked two separate segments of the regional greenway. Before construction of the bridge and trail connections, the two segments of the ATT were separated by Interstate 40. Heavy traffic on local streets as well as a lack of bicycle and pedestrian facilities in the area provided additional barriers to active travel between the two ATT segments. The Institute of Transportation Research and Education conducted intercept surveys and manual counts on the two trail segments before and after construction of the bridge. The before-and-after data were compared to determine the changes that occurred in the use of the ATT and the accompanying social, public health, transportation, and economic effects.