Glossary

Performance Measures Glossary

Safety and Security

Non-motorized: In Chapter 9 of the KDOT Strategic Highway Safety Plan 2020-2024, a non-motorized user is defined as a combined group of pedestrians and cyclist road users.

Public roads: Any road maintained by a local or state entity.

Rural roads: All other roads not classified as an urban road.

Serious injury: KDOT complies with the national definition for serious injury established in the Model Minimum Uniform Crash Criteria (MMUCC) 4th Edition by the US Department of Transportation as any injury other than fatal that results in one or more of the following:

• Severe laceration resulting in exposure of underlying tissues/muscle/organs or resulting in significant loss of blood
• Broken or distorted extremity (arm or leg)
• Crush injuries
• Suspected skull, chest, or abdominal injury other than bruises or minor lacerations
• Significant burns (second and third degree burns over 10% or more of the body)
• Unconsciousness when taken from the crash scene
• Paralysis

Urban roads: Roads in any city or town with an excess of 5,000 residents.

Transportation System Management

Agency (Percent of counties with transit services available): Transit Provider Agency

Average Speed: Speed is recorded in mph as an integer. The harmonic average speed for all vehicles on the segment.

Pavement in Good condition: “Good” pavement conditions is defined by the FHWA as pavement conditions that meet the following thresholds:

• IRI (inches/mile): <95
• Rutting (inches): <0.20
• Faulting (inches): <0.10
• Cracking (%): <5

Source: FHWA Transportation Performance Management - Pavement Condition Overview

Pavement in Poor condition: “Poor” pavement conditions is defined by the FHWA as pavement conditions that meet the following thresholds:

• IRI (inches/mile): >170
• Rutting (inches): >0.40
• Faulting (inches): >0.15
• Cracking (%):
  • >20 (asphalt)
  • > 15 (jointed concrete pavement)
  • > 10 (continuously reinforced concrete pavement)

Source: FHWA Transportation Performance Management - Pavement Condition Overview

Reference Speed: An approximation of free-flow speed for the segment. This value is calculated by the Center for Advanced Transportation Technology Laboratory (CATT Lab) using the 95th percentile of the speeds between 10 PM and 5 AM. The reference speed is calculated over a 6-month period starting April 1, 2017 – September 30, 2017.

Speed Score: A percentage that is calculated by dividing the average speed by reference speed. Higher speed scores indicate less congestion and lower speed scores indicate higher congestion.

Winter Event: A winter weather event is defined as the following for each data source:

• KDOT Road and Runway Information System (RWIS): consecutive station readings of precipitation where at least one reading occurs at temperatures below 0 Celsius.
• National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Local Climatological Data (NOAA LCD): consecutive station readings of precipitation where at least one reading occurs at temperatures below 32 Fahrenheit.
• National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Storm Events Database (NOAA SED): an event designated as 'Blizzard', 'Frost/Freeze', 'Freezing Fog', 'Heavy Snow', 'Ice Storm', 'Sleet', 'Winter Storm', or 'Winter Weather'.

Winter event end time: A storm’s ending time stamp is defined as the end of precipitation unless:

• Another event occurs within 12 hours or
• Sustained winds exceed 15 mph.

In which cases, a storm ends with the final period of precipitation or once wind speeds have fallen below the 15-mph threshold.

Winter event start time: A storm’s beginning time stamp is defined as the start of qualifying period of precipitation.

Asset Preservation

Bridges in “Good” Condition: “Good” condition is defined by FHWA as: The minimum of the Deck, Superstructure, Substructure, or Culvert ratings is 7 or more. Source: FHWA Bridges & Structures Definitions

Bridges in “Poor” Condition: “Poor” condition is defined by FHWA as: The minimum of the Deck, Superstructure, Substructure, or Culvert ratings is 4 or less. Source: FHWA Bridges & Structures Definitions

Deck: The Deck is commonly associated with the driving surface of the bridge which can be made of concrete, steel, or wood. It can also be the top of the structure that a vehicle would drive on if there was no fill on top of the structure, such as a box culvert or pipes that have soil on top.

Deck Area: The Deck Area is calculated by multiplying the bridge length by bridge width. The length will vary depending on what type of bridge-sized structure is being examined (culvert or span structure). The width will vary depending on the configuration of the culvert or span structure and their interactions with the headwalls or rails. KDOT’s method to determine the deck area is consistent with FHWA’s and the NBI Coding Guide’s definitions of Bridge Deck Length and Bridge Deck Width.

K-TRAN [Kansas Transportation Research and New-Developments Program]: K-TRAN is an ongoing cooperative and comprehensive research program which uses the academic and research resources of all three participating agencies, KDOT, University of Kansas, and Kansas State University. Major benefits of the program are expected to include high quality transportation research targeted to Kansas Transportation needs, financial support to engineering students (in an effort to increase the pool of transportation professionals in Kansas), continuing education opportunities for agency personnel, enhanced quality of faculty, staff, and graduates in the transportation area, and increased ability to attract federal research resources for use in Kansas. Coupled with in-house research efforts, these programs will provide critical information to enable the agency to design, construct, and maintain the Kansas transportation system more efficiently. Source: Kansas Transportation Research and New – Developments Program Summary

Level of Service criteria: A description of the maintenance goal for various rating elements. Each rating element is inspected along randomly chosen road segments to determine whether the desired conditions for the rating element are being met and given an evaluation of “pass”, “fail”, or “not applicable”.

Maintenance Quality Assurance (MQA) Program: A new management tool to assist maintenance managers in prioritizing maintenance projects and resources (personnel, equipment, materials, and funding). The program involves a physical inspection of randomly selected 0.1-mile sample segments using identified Level of Service (LOS) criteria for highway rating elements. Based upon the inspection results, the Level of Service values for the Kansas highway system at various organizational levels (State, District, Area, & Subarea) are then calculated.

Resurfacing: Any project with the intended purpose of rehabbing or resurfacing the upper most layer of pavement but may also include deeper pavement actions.

Stewardship

Economic Development Program: The KDOT Economic Development Program’s objective is to create new jobs and encourage capital investment in Kansas by helping fund transportation improvements that will recruit new businesses and encourage growth of existing businesses. Source: KDOT Economic Development Program Overview

Obligation Limitation: Obligation limitation represents the ability of a State or other entity to enter into a project using Federal funds, with the Federal government making a binding promise to pay or reimburse the State or other entity for the Federal share of the project’s eligible costs. Source: FHWA News Release

Workforce

Minority: Refers to racial minorities, does not include gender.