Chapter 9: Transportation
Transportation
Introduction
The Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) is at a crossroads and must
abandon its outdated, business-as-usual approach to meet the challenges of the
Internet Age. To meet them, TxDOT will need exceptional vision, new skills, and
the ability to react quickly to the changing needs of the emerging economy. In
the 21st century, planners, engineers, systems analysts, and business
managers—among others—will play just as important a role in
transportation as construction crews.
TxDOT must learn to adapt to an economy powered by services and high
technology and changing patterns of business and personal transportation. It can
do so by adopting innovative management techniques that can provide
higher-quality results for the agency’s ultimate customers, the businesses
and citizens of Texas.
Use Innovative Financing Techniques
One of the most pressing issues raised by Texans in e-Texas
hearings is the need for increased funding to ease traffic congestion. TxDOT has
estimated that its current funding streams will meet only 36 percent of
Texas’ needs for road construction projects over the coming decade.
TxDOT’s analysis attributed its declining ability to meet Texas’
needs to two major factors—inflation and traffic increases.
Texas can better meet its critical transportation needs by making the best
use of all opportunities to maximize the impact of its revenues. These
opportunities include new funding mechanisms such as GARVEE bonds and federal
credit assistance available through the federal Transportation Infrastructure
Finance and Innovation Act (TIFIA). Both programs are designed to maximize the
ability of states to use federal funding to further their highway projects and
complete them more quickly than would be possible under traditional
approaches.
In addition, TxDOT could use Texas’ State Infrastructure Bank (SIB)
Program to increase its funding by issuing revenue bonds for state and local
construction projects.
Use Innovative Contracting Options to Speed Road Construction
“Time has a way of killing projects,” Jerry Hiebert, executive
director of the North Texas Tollway Authority (NTTA), told us at
e-Texas’ Arlington hearing. “The more time we spend on
planning, permitting and funding, the less likely the project will be
implemented.”
TxDOT needs to focus more on delivering projects quickly and less on
time-consuming processes. Two ways to do this are to increase the use of A+B
bidding and to authorize design-build contracting to complete highway projects
faster. While these innovative methods will not necessarily replace traditional
contracting methods, they should be used in circumstances where it will provide
benefits to the taxpayer, such as increased completion speed on complex
projects.
Another way to accelerate project delivery and obtain greater funding for
infrastructure projects is to make better use of the Texas Turnpike Authority
(TTA). The Authority’s considerably greater flexibility and responsiveness
in project development allow it to deliver projects more quickly than TxDOT and
use innovative practices such as exclusive development agreements.
Register Vehicles Online
Each year, TxDOT sends out millions of vehicle registration notices that must
be returned with the appropriate fees to the county assessor-collector, in
person or by mail. TxDOT recently began a pilot project allowing for vehicle
registration through the Internet. This project should be enhanced to reduce the
workload on county assessor-collectors and increase the process’s
convenience for Texans.
Create County “One-stop Shops” for Vehicle Titling and
Registration
Texans can title and register their vehicles either with their home counties
or through TxDOT’s headquarters and regional offices. Some transactions,
however, require visits to both county and state offices. To make the process
more customer-friendly, county assessor-collector offices should be authorized
to act as “one-stop shops” for vehicle titling and registration.
Streamline TxDOT Internal Business Practices
TxDOT should strive to streamline and improve its business practices so that
it can devote as much of its funding as possible toward meeting Texas’
transportation needs. Reengineering through advanced technology or better
personnel allocations could improve the agency’s business processes and
maximize its positive impact on Texas’ transportation needs.
Recommendations for doing this include using private-sector practices to
reduce costs and flattening management layers and reallocating staffing to
increase efficiency. In addition, applying just-in-time practices throughout
TxDOT should significantly reduce the amount of warehouse space the agency
needs, as well as the resources required to receive, store, inventory, and
distribute materials and supplies.
Achieve Greater Cost-Efficiency by Consolidating Project Contracts
Currently, TxDOT has a tendency to spread projects among numerous small
contracts, meaning the agency must devote a considerable amount of effort and
resources to mobilizing, inspecting, and managing each of many contracts. TxDOT
should look for opportunities to aggregate its projects.
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