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About Highway Data Services
The Highway Data Services unit was formed in November 2007 as part of the Program
Planning and Administration Division reorganization. The restructuring combined
the previous Roadway Records and Statistics work area with the Highway Performance
Monitoring System (HPMS) work area and positioned them under the direction of the
Geospatial Transportation Information (GTI) Section. This move was necessary in
order to maintain continuity with the present DOH implementation of GIS technology
to manage the roadway network as well as prepare for the 2010 mandate by FHWA requiring
the states to submit the Highway Performance Monitoring System via a Geodatabase
format with minimum GIS network requirements.
The primary responsibility of the Highway Data Services unit is to perform the functions
necessary to support quality data needed to deliver the annual Public Certified
Mileage Report and the Highway Performance Monitoring System (HPMS) submittal as
per FHWA requirements and guidelines. The HPMS submittal is an expanded representation
of the Certified Mileage and the data are used extensively by FHWA in the analysis
of highway system condition, performance, and investment needs that make up the
biennial Condition and Performance Reports to Congress. These Reports are used by
Congress in establishing both authorization and appropriation legislation, activities
that ultimately determine the scope and size of the Federal-aid Highway Program,
and determine the level of Federal highway taxation.
The unit processes addition, change or abandonment requests from the Districts and
updates the roadway inventory records as Commissioner Orders are issued. Improvements
are also updated to the Roadway Inventory File as received either from the Districts
in the form of PJ-101, PJ-103 or by way of field notes generated by the regular
field crew inventories. Other roadway history records dating back to 1933 including
maps, scroll records, microfilmed documentation, correspondence files and official
Commissioner Orders are also maintained in the work area. A Local Name Listing is
updated as needed in coordination with the Districts and their respective County
911 organizations that have authority over the local name determination. This file
is currently undergoing an upgrade to a more modern system that will accommodate
the GIS Roadway Key so this information can be joined with the roadway network.
The Annual Inventory Tables is an annual publication that has been generated since
the late 50’s and provides pavement data used by the Maintenance Division as a partial
factor for generating the maintenance organizational budgets.
The unit performs the various tasks needed to support the HPMS program at the highest
level possible. This includes a Standard Sample Management Program and employing
a process to produce stratified random selections for adding samples and the subsequent
field reviews to collect the data. The process further entails staying abreast of
the administrative type data items by working with other sections/units like Traffic
Analysis to acquire the substantial amount of traffic related data items or the
sections responsible for assigning federal aid functional classifications and urban
area boundary modifications just to name a few. In the final submission process
after the standard sample and universe data are merged into the FHWA HPMS software,
validated and run through the standard edit checks, summary information must be
added within the software that includes annual population growth estimates, daily
travel information, traffic activity and urbanized travel totals. Statewide Comment
Summaries must be prepared to accompany the data submittal to explain justified
anomalies or other types of problems.
It is the goal of this unit to enhance the statistics that have been generated in
the past to a more robust resource that can be used to improve the decision making
process of the Division of Highways. Additionally, efforts to improve outdated methods
in acquiring and updating information will be initiated as appropriate to improve
productivity while providing the best data quality possible to the users.
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