Highway Expansion - Creating Tomorrows Transportation Problems Today

OR

Highway Widening Ignores Motorist Safety and Travel Mode Choice in Bad Weather Conditions

Highway Widening Ignores a Travel Choice

for Aging Baby Boomers

Description

Change Management refers to activities that support organizational innovation and reform (in this case the organization can be range from a small, private company to a government agency or even an entire community or jurisdiction). It recognizes that organizations often have inertia that must be overcome to create more efficient, responsive and resilient organizations.

Change Management requires anticipating and addressing potential obstacles to innovation, and building support by showing individuals that new approaches can ultimately make them better off. It requires managing risk, since change involves uncertainty. It requires including stakeholders in decision-making, and responding to their concerns, since change usually affects many people. It requires correcting distortive institutional incentives that encourage individuals to oppose innovation. All of these changes reflect good management, and are particularly important when implementing fundamental change.

Sometimes, when a problem seems particularly difficult it is best to reconsider how the problem is defined, how options are evaluated, and the types of solutions considered. This is called a “paradigm shift,” (Kuhn, 1970). Famous paradigm shifts include Copernicus’s heliocentric model of the universe, Darwin’s theory of evolution, and liberal democracy as a political structure. Common management clichés such as “Work smarter, not harder” and “Think outside the box” are admonitions to consider new approaches to problem solving, i.e., a paradigm shift.

Transportation Demand Management represents a type of paradigm shift. Specifically, TDM requires:

·        Evaluating transportation system performance based on Accessibility and Mobility, not just vehicle travel.

·        Comprehensive Transportation Planning, rather than reductionist decision-making, so the full benefits of TDM can be considered.

·        Least Cost Planning, so strategies that increase system efficiency are given equal consideration as strategies that increase system capacity.

·        Consideration of Transportation Diversity Benefits.

·        Application of Market Reforms to increase overall efficiency and equity.

·        Changing the way transportation activity is Measured and solutions Evaluated.

·        Institutional and Regulatory reforms. 

Although these strategies are often desirable for many reasons, their benefits tend to be dispersed and long-term, and so are often overlooked or undervalued.

TDM implementation often requires a “change agent”, that is, somebody with vision to provide leadership, who is able to articulate the benefits of change and has the resources to overcome the barriers that inevitably develop. This is not for the faint-hearted or easily discouraged: initially such reforms often face exaggerated criticism and fail or are only partially implemented. However, over time, worthwhile reforms take hold and become normal. Once they are well established, people who originally opposed innovations will often claim credit for them! 

Being a Change Agent Mobility management often involves changing current practices, so proponents must be Change Agents, that is, people within an organization who provide leadership for change and anticipate and address objections.   Change Agents must:   ·        Expand the range of solutions that are considered in decision-making.   ·        Question assumptions used for evaluation.   ·        Look at the big picture. Pay attention to context and indirect impacts.   ·        Ask, “Are current trends desirable?” “Will they result in an optimal future?”   ·        Use comprehensive evaluation techniques that consider all benefits and costs.   ·        Make change more attractive than current practices.   ·        Use positive statements. Emphasize the benefits of change.   ·        Focus on appropriate niches. Don’t try to be everything to everybody.   ·        Don’t be afraid to say “no” to bad ideas, but try to offer an alternative which better balances overall objectives.   ·        Listen to and educate stakeholders. Develop communication with stakeholders in order to clearly understand the basis of their concerns and how they can be addressed.   ·        Don’t give up! Most change requires several efforts before success. Be prepared for obstacles and setbacks.   Innovation often faces resistance and criticism from people who fear change.   But if new ideas are fundamentally sound and advocates are persistent, they will often succeed and the same people who previously opposed the change will embrace it and claim it as their own!

People often assume that what is considered normal must be good. For example, efforts to encourage use of alternative transport modes often face resistance from people who are accustomed to automobile travel and so cannot believe that alternatives could be better. “I just want to be able to drive where I want,” they might argue, implying that such behavior is quite reasonable, even if factors such as population growth, land prices and travel demand are increasing the costs of accommodating additional vehicle traffic and making alternatives more cost effective.

Change tends to be difficult because it requires “psychic effort,” that is, it makes people to think about situations that they otherwise can take for granted. For example, a shift from free to Cashed Out parking requires people to think about the value of teach trip and consider use of alternative modes. Similarly, it may seem stressful to try cycling or riding public transit. The first few times people face such a decision it may seem stressful. But over time people become accustomed to new options and conditions, and will often admit that they are better off overall, despite initial opposition.

The psychic effort can be reduced by making changes:

• Convenient
• Desirable
• “Normal”

Consider the first generation of trains, cars and airplanes. To modern eyes they look awkward, and their performance was poor. The first cars were horseless carriages, steered by a tiller rather than a wheel. The first Wright Flyer had various wings, stabilizers, steering panels and reinforcements that seem unnecessarily complex and inefficient; it could only carry one passenger lying on their stomach. But these modest beginnings evolved into modern cars and planes. Similarly, new transportation management programs and policies often seem awkward and inefficient when first introduced, in part because people are unfamiliar with them, and in part because important details may still need to be adjusted to improve performance. Do not let a program be judged too soon, do not be afraid to adjust programs and policies when needed, and continue to maintain a vision of what the program should achieve in the long term.

Organizations often require change management to reform standard practices and resources. For example, a planning agency may need to change its zoning codes, development standards, staff training, funding formulas and decision-making processes to effectively implement TDM.