managing travel for planned special events - FHWA Operations ...

ered as the first step in planning for the nextplanned special event. The program planningphase utilizes lessons learned andevaluation results from one planned specialevent to develop products, such as policiesand regulations and permanent infrastructuredeployment, for improving travel managementfor all planned special events occurringin a region.No matter how thorough the traffic managementplan, chances are excellent not everythinghappened as expected. Maybe it wasan oversight or an unexpected glitch. Perhapssome elements worked better than expected,and it turns out that all the resourcesallocated were not needed. Whatever thecase, the evaluation phase is where the planshould be compared with what actually happenedand appropriate decisions be made asto what to do differently the next time. Evenif the same planned special event was handleddozens of times previously, there areadjustments that can be made based on themost recent experience.counter on an exit lane serving a parkingarea at a fair. Figure 10-3 shows a trafficmanagement team member maintaining alog of freeway service patrol motorist assistsduring the day-of-event. Data collectionactivities also include surveying of eventpatrons and the public to get their perspectiveon how well elements of the trafficmanagement plan worked.Figure 10-2Electronic Vehicle Counter Installation (1)EVALUATIONFRAMEWORKOverviewThe first steps in the evaluation of the trafficmanagement plan implemented for theplanned special event take place during theevent operations planning phase. Knowingahead of time that a post-event evaluationwill occur allows participants to make provisionsfor the review. In particular, thismeans collecting data during the event,which can be used as part of the review process.At a minimum, this would includedata indicating how the system performedand a log of what took place during theevent. For example, Figure 10-2 showstechnicians installing an electronic vehicleFigure 10-3Maintenance of Freeway Service PatrolAssist LogTable 10-1 summarizes key post-event activities.10-2