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Transportation board to hold monthly meeting Aug. 20 in Coeur d’Alene

The Idaho Transportation Board will meet in Coeur d’Alene Aug. 19-20 to discuss performance measures, review speed data and tour area highways, the Idaho Transportation Department announced.

District 1 tour
The board will visit District 1 Aug. 19 and 20.

The tour on Aug. 19 will focus on Shoshone County, including a tour of the Silver Valley Mine. During lunch in Wallace, a representative from Hecla Mining will speak to the board. The board will also travel I-90 to the Montana State Line, through the construction project from Mullan to Lookout Pass.

Returned check report
The business meeting will be held in the District 1 Office Aug. 20.

The board will receive the annual report on returned checks. In state fiscal year 2015, ITD received $40,403,903 in checks. Sixty-two checks were returned due to insufficient funds, totaling $175,428. The percent of returned checks based on all checks received was 0.43 percent. In comparison, out of a total of $38,585,205 in checks received in FY14, 65 checks valued at $101,610 were returned.

Overall, the department receives a minimal amount of returned checks. The collection efforts follow industry standards.

Performance measurement report
Idaho Code requires that all state agencies submit an annual performance measurement report before Sept. 1. The document is to include an overview of the agency, its core functions, the revenues and expenditures, the number of cases managed and key services provided, key performance highlights and awards, and its performance measures and benchmarks. The report will be presented to the board before it is submitted to the Division of Financial Management.

Some of the key services information includes 86 contracts awarded for highway-construction projects in state FY15 at a value of $173.9 million; more than 44,000 vendor payments processed; more than 111,000 phone calls, 2.3 million visits to the web site, and nearly 176,000 smartphone app sessions as part of the 511 statewide traveler assistance system. Some information is collected and reported on a calendar-year cycle versus the fiscal year, so in calendar year 2014, there were 1,673,418 vehicles registered in Idaho and 1,128,497 drivers’ licenses in force.

80 mph speed limit report
In 2014, legislation was approved allowing the department to implement 80 mile per hour (mph) speed limits on the interstate if the increased speed limit was supported by an engineering and traffic study concluding that the increase is in the public interest.

In July 2014, the board approved 80 mph speed zones on various segments of I-15, I-84 and I-86 in southern Idaho. It also requested an annual report on the impacts of the increased speed limit, which staff will present at the August meeting.

The 85th percentile speeds have increased by one to three mph, with observed speeds between 81 and 84 mph. The average speed of motorists also increased between one and three mph, with the average speed now between 72 and 77 mph.

The differential speeds between passenger cars and heavy vehicles have remained relatively constant. The observed differential speeds are 8 to 11 mph on I-15, 11 to 13 mph on I-84, and 9 to 11 mph on I-86.

Crash data is still preliminary and incomplete; however, it appears that the number of total crashes and number of injury and fatal crashes are remaining steady or decreasing.