Freight movement has a major impact on the mobility and economy of the State of Florida. The state's seaports, airports, and railroads have long been major cornerstones of economic prosperity. Freight shipments through these facilities continue to increase at a rapid pace. Florida is poised to become a major player in the international shipping arena because of its unique geographic location.
The continued success of freight transportation facilities depends on the interconnectivity of all modes of transportation throughout the state to effectively meet state, regional, and world market needs.
The state's roadway system, along with airports, seaports, and railroads, provides the foundation of freight movement into, around and out of Florida. While air and intermodal rail become increasingly important, trucking still dominates the freight movement industry. Virtually every business and household in the state is dependent to some extent on the movement of trucks for shipping and receiving goods.
The Florida Intrastate Highway System (FIHS), designated in 1990 by the Florida Legislature, is composed of interconnected limited- and controlled- access roadways including Interstate highways, Florida's Turnpike, expressways, and selected arterial highways. As a statewide transportation network designed for the efficient movement of high-speed and high-volume traffic within the state, the FIHS carries a large share of Florida's long-distance freight/truck travel. Deficiencies occur primarily on the shorter distance facilities such as immediate connections to the seaports and airports, the congested urban streets over which truckers must move cargo, and even the major arterials leading to somewhat distant industrial parks, warehouses, freight yards, and rail yards. This observation is in accord with the Strategic Investment Plan to implement the Intermodal Access Needs of Florida's Seaports (Landside Access Study).
Federal Perspective
Congressional passage of the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act (ISTEA) in 1991 underscored the need to address the specific challenges for efficient freight movement in urbanized areas throughout the country. ISTEA requires planning studies to address issues concerning the efficient movement of freight. ISTEA also requires providing for adequate and efficient intermodal connections between roadway systems, seaports, airports, railroads and other freight handling facilities.
The Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act (ISTEA) requires all states to develop, establish, and implement an Intermodal Management System (IMS) for coordinating access to intermodal transportation facilities. In metropolitan areas, state and local governments must develop and implement these systems in cooperation with the Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs) responsible for carrying out the transportation planning process.
The Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act also mandated that freight mobility be addressed as part of the transportation planning process. It requires that the Long-Range Transportation Plans must identify port access routes, airport access routes, major freight terminal access routes, intermodal facilities and other similar projects.
State of Florida Initiatives
With the passage of the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act (ISTEA) many of Florida's MPOs are including the movement of freight in their decision-making process. Many are inviting shippers and trucking associations to become members of their Technical Advisory Committees, while others are establishing Freight Advisory Committees that report directly to the Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO). MPOs throughout the country are increasingly undertaking goods-movement studies.
Florida's standard model, FSUTMS, helps to forecast passenger and truck trips for Florida's urbanized areas. In recent years, model developers have incorporated more sophisticated approaches to model truck movements into several of Florida's regional travel forecasting models, employing economic development-related variables such as dwelling units and employment by sector.
This trend of modeling and planning for the efficient movement of freight and goods is growing at both the national and state level. Nationwide, 75% of the Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs) have either created Freight Advisory Committees or added members from the freight community to existing committees. In Florida, 19 of the 25 MPOs are currently addressing freight and goods movement planning through either the long-range planning process or have developed specialized modeling procedures to help plan for the needs of the shipping community.
Freight planners have conducted a number of studies around the state to identify the needs of the shipping community. Most of these have been at the local or regional level. These studies have considered issues ranging from how best to collect and classify industry data to collecting and forecasting facility-specific freight movements.
For further information on this topic contact:
Vidya Mysore
Systems Planning Office, Mail Station 19
Florida Department of Transportation
605 Suwannee Street
Tallahassee, Florida 32399-0450
Telephone: (850) 414-4924
Fax: (850) 414-4876
