Federal law requires that Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs) situated within a designated Transportation Management Area (TMA) establish a Congestion Management Process (CMP). The Orange County Transportation Council is a part of the Mid-Hudson Valley TMA along with the Dutchess County Transportation Council (DCTC) and the Ulster County Transportation Council (UCTC). The goal of the CMP is to establish a process for defining, identifying, managing, integrating and evaluating congestion throughout the region’s transportation network.  

Congestion Management Process Update

In 2018, staff from DCTC, OCTC, and UCTC formed a sub-committee to update the CMP, and with various agency partners’ input, identified available data and tools, objectives, and corresponding performance measures. 

As part of establishing the Highway Performance Monitoring System, the Federal Highway Administration contracted with two companies to provide real-time travel data to State and MPO organizations. The New York State Department of Transportation (NYSDOT) contracted with SUNY Albany’s AVAIL Labs to create an online tool for MPOs and the State to establish performance measures based on federal requirements.  Working with the NYS Association of MPOs Travel Demand Modeling Working Group, AVAIL Labs expanded the functionality of the tool to develop additional measures for the National Highway System (NHS) at various geographic scales. We are able to use the NPMRDS tools developed by AVAIL Labs to measure and analyze congestion in much greater detail than ever before.

The OCTC adopted the updated Congestion Management Process on June 18, 2019. Please see below for the Congestion Management Process for the Mid-Hudson Valley TMA and the attached OCTC Resolution #2019-08.

Mid-Hudson Valley TMA Congestion Management Process (CMP) (PDF)

As part of the CMP, in early 2020 staff from the three MPOs completed a TMA-Wide Macro-Level Analysis (PDF) —a screening of the Mid-Hudson region to locate congested and unreliable roadway segments—and a Multi-Modal Accessibility Analysis.