As discussed at the 2017 TRB Annual Meeting

Model vs Model

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What goals/specific outcomes should this initiative have?

Goals:

  • Help regions identify the models and tools that best serve their needs
  • Save regions the trouble of producing the same thing over and over [ particularly if it isn’t useful ]

There is likely value in evaluating Sketch planning tools vs complex models Mixed thoughts on whether to include land use models.

What steps are involved in moving this initiative forward

Identify Test Beds

Thoughts:

  • should there be multiple test beds with different features/sizes?
  • it is a real challenge to find a singular “representative” location
  • Suggested comparisons of 2010 and 2020

Potential criteria for determining where test bed should be:

  • what ‘evaluatable’ changes happened over the 10 year period vs what sensitivities do we want to test?
  • willingness and motivation to participate
  • political resilience

Define Performance Evaluation Process**

Discussed requirements for doing a comparison:

  • calibrated to same data
  • should achieve similar validation

Definition of a “better” model system depends on the questions being asked and will likely be very different for small cities compared to complex regions.

Metric types include:

  • screenlines
  • VMT
  • other regional performance measures
  • project-level

What budget/funding would be needed?

What priority/urgency should model vs model have compared to others for Zephyr?

There were a diversity of opinions, but in general the group thought this was a mid-level priority. There are other topics that would need to feed into this one.