Disaggregating Freight Analysis Framework Version 2 Data for Florida

Abstract

Economic expansion and global trade over the past several decades have driven growth in demand for freight transportation in the United States. However, freight transportation capacity is expanding too slowly to keep up with demand, and freight productivity improvements gained through investment in the Interstate highway system and economic deregulation of the freight transportation industry in the 1980s are showing diminishing returns. In Florida, this problem is especially acute, because the population and employment in the state between 2001 and 2030 are expected to grow dramatically. For Florida to maintain its competitiveness in the face of this growth, a good understanding of freight and its impacts on the transportation network is needed. The Freight Analysis Framework Version 2.2 (FAF2) provides a wealth of information to understand and evaluate the impact of freight on the transportation network. To make FAF2 more applicable to state departments of transportation and metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs), it is necessary to disaggregate the FAF2 regional origin–destination (O-D) database to smaller geographies. Two potential audiences will find a disaggregated FAF2 O-D database useful. The first audience consists of MPO and state department of transportation modelers who want equations for inclusion in travel demand models that would estimate freight, and ultimately truck shipments, on the basis of population and employment. The second audience consists of planners who want the FAF2 tonnage information by detailed commodities at the county level of geography. The existence of the two groups suggests different methods. A methodology that satisfies both audiences was developed.