AP-G84/04 Best practice in road use data collection, analysis ... - WIM

Accessed by AR - ARRB TRANSPORT RESEARCH on 04 Feb 2005
7 STAKEHOLDER CONSULTATION
Austroads 2004
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Best Practices in Road Use Data Collection, Analysis and Reporting
Many technical issues have been addressed in previous sections. This section is a summary
section that serves to illustrate key components of a best practice road use data program. It must
be emphasised again that many activities require road use data and a diverse group of road use
data stakeholders are involved. These stakeholders can be internal or external to a RA. Examples
of external stakeholders are road safety agencies, Local Governments and planning authorities.
As such, road use data is a corporate asset that requires its share of corporate planning and
management. The following model developed by Mihai (2004) for Main Roads WA is used for
illustration and is shown in Figure 17.
The governance structure in Figure 17 aims to bring together all parties interested in road use data
collection, and ensures their needs are considered. District or regional interests within a RA must
be represented. A good governance structure should facilitate securing corporate support. Such a
structure would include the following three groups:
Business reference groups that includes expert practitioners, strategic planners external and
internal to a RA;
A steering committee that includes an RA’s corporate executives; and
Cross-regional team that includes representatives from regions and districts in a RA.
With a governance structure in place, a road use data planning and management process can be
put into operation. Such a process consists of six key elements as shown in Figure 17. The
process is an on-going process with regular reviews and updates. Some of the elements have
been mentioned in previous sections and brief descriptions are given below.
(a) Stakeholder consultation – a register of stakeholders should be kept and their needs in terms
of data types and formats periodically updated. Main Roads WA conducts comprehensive
stakeholder consultation every five years. The needs can have priorities set at various levels
to determine funding priorities.
(b) Data planning – necessary activities include the review of needs, review of existing data
collection sites, setting (five-year) goals, estimation of costs and benefits, setting and
updating of policies on issues such as the level of coverage (Section 4.3), defining a uniform
traffic section (Section 4.3) and data quality (Section 6).
(c) Budget and programming – this task includes preparing estimates of capital equipment costs
and on-going maintenance costs, rolling programs over, say, five years according to different
scenarios (outsourced, in-house or a combination), data processing costs, and costs of
monitoring counting sites periodically.
(d) Data management – this process is as described previously on the collection, validation,
processing, integration and storage.
(e) Data delivery – after data management, the key issue is facilitating the efficient and effective
delivery of data to users. The tasks of data reporting and accessibility have been discussed
in earlier sections. In particular, a public-private partnership could be an important means to
make data more accessible. Training sessions on data usage should be provided.
(f) Review and audit – reviews and audits of the data under management are part of a corporate
process. Feedback in the form of stakeholder surveys should also be considered.