Partners in response

When disaster strikes, transportation is key to any response and recovery effort. In order for transportation to work effectively, there must be collaboration with other responder agencies, including the police and firefighters and emergency medical and management, hazardous materials, military and public health personnel. Effective coordination requires an understanding of all the elements of disaster, the function of transportation agencies and expectations following a disaster.

What’s your plan?

State and local transportation agencies have responded to highway incidents for decades. In some areas, they are active, founding members of statewide, regional or metropolitan traffic incident management coalitions. Although much of the same principles and forms of cooperation still apply, the possible scale of certain disasters that could now require an emergency response surpasses what transportation agencies have experienced over the years. Today, transportation agencies must look to new partners to ensure an effective response to major disasters.

Planning is an essential element of any effective response. There are two aspects of planning that require attention. The first is that every region’s emergency management plan should effectively describe the role of transportation agencies and how they accomplish their functions. Transportation agencies should find these plans feasible and be included in the process of developing them.

Second, transportation emergency operation plans should be consistent with overall regional emergency management plans. If the plans are consistent, then other responders have an accurate understanding of what can be expected from transportation officials. Based on an analysis of sample emergency operations plans, FHWA identified several goals for these plans:

• The transportation agency has a plan and follows it;
• It addresses both response and recovery;
• It is current and complete;
• It includes the current types of threats;
• It reflects the available resources and includes where to find these resources (i.e., personnel, assets, protective equipment and supplies);
• It includes preparatory actions at every level of the Homeland Security Advisory System (HSAS); and
• It includes planned alternative routes around all major assets and choke points.

A final note on planning is that, as with all plans, if they simply gather dust on a shelf, they are of no value. Transportation agency personnel should be familiar with the plan contents. Equally important is that transportation agencies participate in multiagency exercises, building both familiarity with the incident response process and relationships with partner responders.

Information management

Although much of the focus is on response to an incident and recovery after it occurs, information sharing with law enforcement, homeland security and intelligence agencies that focus on what happens before an incident also are important. Although the network of transportation agencies is building and improving on how it shares intelligence internally, typically the earliest intelligence will come from traditional intelligence and law enforcement agencies. For this reason, it is important that transportation agencies become familiar with their state Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) and that they know their state department of homeland security.

Effective relationships with local law enforcement are often equally important routes for sharing intelligence. Relationships built in jointly occupied transportation management centers (TMCs) can establish the levels of trust and routes of communication that enable appropriate sharing of information about threats and allow transportation agencies to take appropriate action. An increasing number of TMCs have substantial law enforcement presence, including all eight urban TMCs in California and others in Texas and Maryland where satellite centers are actually at state police barracks.

It’s important to realize that transportation agencies themselves can be significant sources of information that help to protect the transportation infrastructure. Thousands of transportation construction, inspection, operations and maintenance personnel work on and around critical transportation infrastructure across the country as part of their daily duties. They are constantly observing the transportation infrastructure, and being familiar with appropriate observation and response procedures makes them highly valuable sources of information. The public transit community has developed training for its personnel on appropriate procedures and on what to observe. These same procedures are in place for agency personnel working around possibly hazardous conditions such as wiring, piping and stressed structural members. They are trained to identify problems and to protect.

The communication scene

An effective transportation system is critical to dealing with an incident as is a reliable communications network to allow responding agencies to share information. Voice communication interoperability—the ability for responder agencies to communicate at an incident scene regardless of different types of radios being used—is an issue that extends far beyond the transportation community and has a direct impact on transportation’s ability to do its job at the incident scene.

Fortunately, both transportation and other responders have been working diligently to understand the extent of the problem and identify possible solutions. Projects such as the Capital area Wireless Network (CAPWIN) and the Integrated Incident Management System (IIMS) are demonstrating how transportation can share information, including data and video, with other agencies.

Two demonstrations of the integration of traffic management and public safety computer-aided dispatch system are under way in Washington State and Utah. Work through the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) on standard 1512 to facilitate the integration of transportation, public safety and emergency management systems has made significant strides toward improved interoperability.

On the institutional side, transportation agencies need to understand how the incident will be managed. This process is referred to as the Incident Command System (ICS). It originated with wildfires and has evolved and been refined. ICS describes responsibilities and coordination at the incident scene. A larger version, Unified Command, describes how multijurisdictional incidents are managed. This can be especially important when there are multiple incidents, perhaps due to multiple tornados spawned by a single storm front.

Tech support

Managing the transportation impacts of a major incident can be a complex and resource-intensive process. When the incident spans multiple jurisdictions, or there are multiple interacting incidents, the complexity also increases. Technology can be a powerful tool in supporting the incident management process and can assist greatly in preventing additional incidents by identifying hazardous conditions and informing the public of hazards and alternative safe routes. FHWA’s recommendations regarding use of technology to support response and recovery are:

• Agencies should have intelligent transportation systems (ITS) well integrated into their response and recovery plans;
• Agencies should have measures in place to protect their intelligent infrastructure;
• Partner agencies should understand transportation’s ITS capabilities;
• ITS information should be shared with emergency management partner agencies;
• Agency ITS should be effectively integrated with other emergency management systems, such as plume and dispersal models;
• Agencies should have decision support tools to assist them in conducting evacuations and other response activities in real time, such as flow modeling and redistribution; and
• These tools should be effectively integrated with the agency’s traffic management systems and information.

Federal assistance

FHWA has focused a major portion of its surface transportation operations security program on creating relationships and improving plans at the state and local level.

FHWA has developed an operations security plan with five elements: planning for response and recovery, applying technology, using the Homeland Security Advisory System, facilitating defense mobilization, and outreach. The elements in each of these are described on FHWA’s operations security website at www.ops.fhwa.dot.gov/opssecurity. The website describes the projects included in each program area in detail and offers access to some of the products already generated by the operations security program.

FHWA has been active in the operations aspects of security and in activities that reinforce the security of transportation infrastructure. One example is a pooled-funds project led by FHWA to study what is available in state-of-the-art surveillance systems for bridges and tunnels. The website includes basic briefing materials on several key security topics, such as the Homeland Security Advisory System. The website also provides links to sources for other security information, such as AASHTO projects under the National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP).

FHWA continues to be active in researching highway security topics and sharing information with its state and local partners. It works extensively with other federal agencies and coordinates closely with the Transportation Security Administration and other agencies within the Department of Homeland Security. TME