Transportation System Performance Evaluation - Appendix C

C.1 Cost of traffic injuries and fatalities

Cost of traffic serious injuries and fatalities come from a MnDOT analysis of comprehensive crash costs (Office of Transportation System Management 2022), as part of the state’s Benefit-Cost Analysis for Transportation Projects. The most likely values reflect Minnesota’s recent (three-year) crash history and procedures contained in Federal Highway Administration’s Crash Costs for Highway Safety Analysis (Harmon, Bahar, and Gross 2018) published January 2018, with comprehensive crash cost valuation consisting of both economic/monetary impacts (e.g. medical services, insurance claims processing, legal fees) and estimates of the intangible effects from diminished quality of life following injury crashes. Low/high crash cost dispersion is taken from the range of uncertainty for the value of a statistical life found in U.S. Department of Transportation’s “Departmental Guidance: Treatment of the Value of Preventing Fatalities and Injuries in Preparing Economic Analyses” (USDOT 2021) published March 2021.

Table C.1: Per-crash comprehensive costs.
Severity	Cost per crash
Deaths	$13,600,000
Serious Injuries	$750,000
Minor Injuries	$230,000
Possible Injuries	$120,000
No Injury (Property Damage Only)	$13,000
Source: MnDOT Office of Transportation System Management.

C.2 National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS)

The Clean Air Act, which was last amended in 1990, requires EPA to set National Ambient Air Quality Standards (40 CFR part 50) for six principal pollutants (“criteria” air pollutants) which can be harmful to public health and the environment. The Clean Air Act identifies two types of national ambient air quality standards. Primary standards provide public health protection, including protecting the health of sensitive populations such as people who have asthma, children, and the elderly. Secondary standards provide public welfare protection, including protection against decreased visibility and damage to animals, crops, vegetation, and buildings.

Periodically, the standards are reviewed and sometimes may be revised, establishing new standards. The most recently established standards are listed below. In some areas of the U.S., certain regulatory requirements may also remain for implementation of previously established standards.

Units of measure for the standards are parts per million (ppm) by volume, parts per billion (ppb) by volume, and micrograms per cubic meter of air (µg/m³).

Table C.2 are those used for Figure 14.1.

Table C.2: National Ambient Air Quality Standards
Pollutant	Primary/Secondary	Averaging Time	Level	Form
Carbon Monoxide (CO)	primary	8 hours	9 ppm	Not to be exceeded more than once per year
Carbon Monoxide (CO)	primary	1 hour	35 ppm	Not to be exceeded more than once per year
Lead (Pb)	primary and secondary	Rolling 3 month average	0.15 µg/m³ ¹	Not to be exceeded
Nitrogen Dioxide (NO₂)	primary	1 hour	100 ppb	98th percentile of 1-hour daily maximum concentrations, averaged over 3 years
Nitrogen Dioxide (NO₂)	primary and secondary	1 year	53 ppb ²	Annual Mean
Ozone (O₃)	primary and secondary	8 hours	0.070 ppm ³	Annual fourth-highest daily maximum 8-hour concentration, averaged over 3 years
PM_2.5	primary	1 year	12.0 µg/m³	annual mean, averaged over 3 years
PM_2.5	secondary	1 year	15.0 µg/m³	annual mean, averaged over 3 years
PM_2.5	primary and secondary	24 hours	35 µg/m³	98th percentile, averaged over 3 years
PM₁₀	primary and secondary	24 hours	150 µg/m³	Not to be exceeded more than once per year on average over 3 years
Sulfur Dioxide (SO₂)	primary	1 hour	75 ppb ⁴	99th percentile of 1-hour daily maximum concentrations, averaged over 3 years
Sulfur Dioxide (SO₂)	secondary	3 hours	0.5 ppm	Not to be exceeded more than once per year
¹ In areas designated nonattainment for the Pb standards prior to the promulgation of the current (2008) standards, and for which implementation plans to attain or maintain the current (2008) standards have not been submitted and approved, the previous standards (1.5 µg/m³ as a calendar quarter average) also remain in effect.
² The level of the annual NO₂ standard is 0.053 ppm. It is shown here in terms of ppb for the purposes of clearer comparison to the 1-hour standard level.
³ Final rule signed October 1, 2015, and effective December 28, 2015. The previous (2008) O₃ standards are not revoked and remain in effect for designated areas. Additionally, some areas may have certain continuing implementation obligations under the prior revoked 1-hour (1979) and 8-hour (1997) O₃ standards.
⁴ The previous SO₂ standards (0.14 ppm 24-hour and 0.03 ppm annual) will additionally remain in effect in certain areas: (1) any area for which it is not yet 1 year since the effective date of designation under the current (2010) standards, and (2) any area for which an implementation plan providing for attainment of the current (2010) standard has not been submitted and approved and which is designated nonattainment under the previous SO₂ standards or is not meeting the requirements of a SIP call under the previous SO₂ standards (40 CFR 50.4(3)). A SIP call is an EPA action requiring a state to resubmit all or part of its State Implementation Plan to demonstrate attainment of the required NAAQS.
Source: EPA, 2023-05-30

C.3 Performance Based Planning Targets

Federally required performance measures are tracked and must be reported upon on a regular basis. The Met Council is required to set short-term performance targets for these measures. The results of these measures are primarily concerned with the overall trend and whether this trend is meeting the desired expectations. If a measure is not trending toward achieving the target, federal funds may need to be re-directed to address the problem.

C.3.1 Safety Performance (PM1)

All state departments of transportation and metropolitan planning organizations must adopt a program to measure system performance and set performance targets to monitor progress. Targets for the safety performance measures are required annually. Safety is one of five categories for federally required performance measures. The safety targets serve a dual purpose:

Inform planning and programming to reduce fatal and serious injuries
Track performance of the Highway Safety Improvement Program (HSIP)

Federal requirements specify five safety performance measures for both state DOTs and MPOs that must have annual targets for each measure listed in Table C.3.

The Met Council’s targets are informed by statewide goals set forth in the 2020-2024 Minnesota Strategic Highway Safety Plan. The target setting method reduces targets annually to match the region’s share the state goal for safety performance in 2025. The Met Council annually adopts targets, last updated in March 2023.

Table C.3: Safety Performance Targets, 2023
Target	Target value	Figure
Total Traffic Fatalities	90 deaths	Figure 4.4
Fatality Rate (per 100 million vehicle miles travelled)	0.33	Figure 4.8
Serious injuries	600 injuries	Figure 4.5
Serious Crash Rate (per 100 million vehicle miles travelled)	2.18	Figure 4.7
Non-Motorized Fatalities/Serious Injuries	147 deaths or injuries	Figure 4.9

C.3.2 Pavement/Bridge Performance (PM2)

Table C.4: Pavement and bridge condition standards.
Target	Target value	Figure
Interstate Pavement in Good Condition	70%	Figure 1.8
Interstate Pavement in Poor Condition	2%	Figure 1.6
Non-Interstate Pavement in Good Condition	55%	Figure 1.9
Non-Interstate Pavement in Poor Condition	2%	Figure 1.7
NHS Bridges in Good Condition	30%	Figure 1.1
NHS Bridges in Poor Condition	5%	Figure 1.2

C.3.3 System Performance and Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality (PM3)

Table C.5: System reliability standards.
Target	Target value	Figure
Reliable person-miles travelled on interstate	82%
Reliable person-miles travelled on non-interstate NHS	90%
Truck travel time reliability index	< 1.4

C.3.3.1 Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality (CMAQ)

Table C.6: Congestion mitigation and air quality (CMAQ) standards
Target	Target value	Figure
Peak-hour excessive delay per capita	8.5 hours	Figure A.1
Travel by non-single occupancy vehicle	28%	Figure 6.2
On-road mobile source emissions	0.0 kg/day

C.4 High-frequency transit stops and routes

As used in Section 15.3.

For each year, we sampled a comparable date from TransitFeeds.com and identified stops served by high-frequency routes, as defined by Metro Transit.

stops served by routes that depart every 15 minutes or better,
with at least three stops per hour,
on weekdays from 6:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. and Saturdays from 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.

Once stops were identified, we joined each stop with its 10-minute walkshed. We estimated population by using American Community Survey (ACS) block groups, intersected with the Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) area and walksheds.

Table C.7: High-frequency routes, stops served by those routes by year and sample date.
Year	Date sampled	Number of stops served by high-frequency routes	Number of unique high-frequency routes	High-frequency routes
2013	2013-10-31	1,295	18	Blue Line, 84, 74, 64, 6, 54, 515, 5, 4, 3, 21, 2, 19, 18, 17, 16, 14, 10
2014	2014-10-06	1,392	21	Green Line, Blue Line, 84, 74, 65, 64, 63, 6, 54, 515, 5, 4, 3, 21, 2, 19, 18, 17, 16, 14, 10
2015	2015-10-02	1,451	21	Green Line, Blue Line, 84, 74, 65, 64, 63, 6, 54, 515, 5, 4, 3, 22, 21, 2, 19, 18, 17, 14, 10
2016	2016-09-29	1,594	24	Green Line, Blue Line, A Line, 83, 74, 65, 64, 63, 62, 6, 54, 515, 5, 4, 3, 22, 21, 2, 19, 18, 17, 14, 11, 10
2017	2017-09-29	1,476	21	Green Line, Blue Line, A Line, 74, 64, 63, 62, 6, 54, 515, 5, 4, 3, 22, 21, 2, 19, 18, 14, 11, 10
2018	2018-09-27	1,441	21	Green Line, Blue Line, A Line, 74, 64, 63, 62, 6, 54, 515, 5, 4, 3, 22, 21, 2, 19, 18, 14, 11, 10
2019	2019-09-28	1,334	22	Green Line, C Line, Blue Line, A Line, 74, 64, 63, 62, 6, 54, 515, 5, 4, 3, 22, 21, 2, 18, 14, 121, 11, 10
2020	2020-10-28	1,296	22	Green Line, C Line, Blue Line, A Line, 74, 64, 63, 6, 54, 515, 5, 4, 3, 22, 21, 2, 18, 14, 122, 121, 11, 10
2021	2021-10-02	1,361	21	Green Line, C Line, Blue Line, A Line, 74, 64, 63, 6, 54, 515, 5, 4, 3, 22, 21, 2, 18, 14, 121, 11, 10
2022	2022-10-01	1,101	17	Green Line, C Line, Blue Line, A Line, 64, 63, 6, 54, 5, 4, 3, 21, 2, 18, 121, 11, 10