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Examples of Transportation Projects
FXM has developed and applied pioneering economic impact assessment and demographic forecasting techniques in dozens of major highway, transit, port, ferry, rail, and airport development projects throughout the U.S. FXM staff provides population, employment, industry, and land use forecasts for travel demand modeling and assesses the effects of transportation service and investments on business sales, job opportunities, taxes, and financial resources. We regularly engage in all aspects of the public and agency process in developing, screening, and assessing project alternatives. FXM completed the socioeconomic impact components of several major NEPA and state-required environmental documents, and successfully provided expert witness affidavits at U.S. District and Federal Appeals Courts.
Buffalo and Ft. Erie Public Bridge Authority
FXM Associates is assessing the national, regional, and local economic effects associated with an expanded bridge capacity, which now carries approximately $70 billion annually in international trade, more than the value of all US trade with Mexico and one-third of the total trade between the US and Canada. Delays at the bridge are now costing shippers and producers over $100 million annually in lost productivity. FXM is applying a proprietary model (developed over the past six years by FXM and the former Regional Science Institute) to assess, by economic sector and detailed SIC industry, the direct, indirect, and induced effects of travel time savings on business sales, jobs, household income, federal/state/local taxes in the U.S. and Canada. FXM is also assessing neighborhood and community social and economic effects and secondary development potential associated with the location of the bridge on the US and Canadian sides of the Niagara River.
Bourne-Sagamore Rotary Improvements
Massachusetts Highway Department
FXM recently completed an assessment of social and economic effects of proposed replacement of the Route 3 rotary before the Sagamore Bridge to Cape Cod. FXM staff did extensive interviews with local businesses to establish their sales and customer profiles for both resident and passersby markets, interviewed businesses outside the project area that had undergone similar changes in roadway configuration and design, completed a literature search of potentially comparable case studies, then worked with project engineers and property owners to develop effective local access and improved visibility, as well as accommodation of through movements. FXM’s report analyzes and quantifies travel time savings effects on market penetration by local and areawide businesses, as well as regional goods movement, and assesses effects on resident mobility and property values. The full report can be viewed on the Cape Cod Canal Chamber of Commerce web site: capecodcanalchamber.org
Route 18/JFK Highway Access Improvements
City of New Bedford, Massachusetts
FXM Associates has completed work for the City of New Bedford evaluating economic effects of various alternatives for improvements to this highway that runs between New Bedford’s waterfront area and its downtown, making pedestrian and automobile crossing difficult. Using interviews with owners/operators of potentially affected businesses and an evaluation of cost-based analyses of travel time effects of the different alternatives, FXM determined which alternative would be the most suitable for improving both pedestrian and vehicle traffic flow, with minimal economic effects on established business and industry in this area of the city.
Buffalo/Erie County (NY) Southtowns Connector Feasibility Study
New York State Department of Transportation, Western New York Economic Development Council
FXM Associates completed a major study to determine the economic development implications of a proposed $1.5 billion highway with access arterials to waterfront and other prime development parcels between downtown Buffalo and the New York State Thruway and Hamburg, New York. FXM’s work included evaluation of recent and historical trends in the regional economy; extensive interviews with business and industry leaders, community officials, developers, academic and institutional experts; specific examination of potential effects within the region of the U.S./Canada Free Trade Agreement; detailed field investigations of sites for development or reuse throughout the study area; development of household and employment projections within 54 subarea traffic analysis zones under passive, moderate, and aggressive growth scenarios through year 2020; an evaluation of economic and fiscal impacts for four selected alternatives; and an analysis of potential funding options, including local special assessment districts and other innovative mechanisms. The report was submitted to the U.S. Congress (1991 session) as the model study for Economic Development Highways throughout the United States.
Freight Ferry Terminal Market Analysis and Business Plan
Massachusetts Executive Office of Transportation and Construction and
New Bedford Harbor Development Commission
As part of the New Bedford Freight Ferry Terminal project, FXM Associates led the consultant team effort in assessing market demand and operating requirements for a freight ferry and roll on-roll off (ro-ro) cargo facility at the State Pier in New Bedford. The project included a detailed analysis of cargoes transported to Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard, including freight originations, overland shipping times and costs, waterborne shipping times and costs, and terminal operating requirements. In addition, the FXM team assessed non-island destined cargo potential and developed a business plan for marketing, staffing, and terminal operations to capture coastwise and international ro-ro, container, and break bulk freight potential. A second phase of work included market, operating, and economic analyses as part of planning for the development of a new Intermodal Transportation Center in the North Terminal waterfront area, involving coastwise and international waterborne freight, passenger and freight ferry service, cruise ship callings, freight and passenger rail, local and interurban bus service and facilities, a waterfront trolley, and connections to expanded air service.
Chesapeake Bay Ferry Feasibility Study
Northern Neck Regional Planning Commission and Virginia Department of Transportation
For a proposed ferry crossing of Chesapeake Bay between Virginia’s Northern Neck and Eastern Shore communities, FXM interviewed major employers and industries to assess potential demand for freight movements, evaluated vessel types and operating costs, and assessed the likely effects on business sales and employment of increased accessibility for freight, auto, bus, and passenger movements. FXM’s evaluation determined that the primary economic effects would accrue in travel time savings for the movement of goods by major employers, and that the ferry service proposed would likely generate sufficient revenues to cover annual operating costs.
Route 531 Corridor Study, Rochester-Brockport, New York
Genessee Regional Transportation Council, New York State Department of Transportation
FXM Associates examined market and development trends, and current economic conditions along a 10-mile corridor in suburban Rochester to determine the possible influence of proposed transportation improvements, including widening of existing roadways, intersection changes, and new highway alignments. Research included extensive interviews with local brokers, company officials, developers, and local economic development and planning professionals, as well as analyses of secondary source data, to determine industrial, commercial, and residential development potential at major existing nodes, large vacant parcels, and for infill within existing downtowns and adjacent properties. FXM examined distinctive and unique characteristics of existing commercial centers and industrial and distributive companies within the corridor to assess their current and prospective future niche within the broader regional economy. FXM specifically analyzed, using a proprietary economic model the firm has developed, the effects of changes in travel times on the costs of goods movement and job creation potential within local companies. Potential tax revenues and costs of development to each affected community were also estimated.
Route I-295 Interchange and Waterfront Connector Road, Portland, Maine
Maine Department of Transportation, City of Portland
FXM assessed development potential at two major waterfront sites near downtown Portland, with and without completion of proposed transportation projects that would improve access and accessibility to each site. Research included an analysis of regional and local economic and market trends to forecast development in industrial, commercial, residential, and specialty hospitality, institutional, and recreational uses, and a site-specific examination to determine the competitive advantages and disadvantages of the particular major underdeveloped locations. In addition to analyzing all relevant secondary source data, including historical and projected population, employment, and building permit data, FXM conducted numerous interviews with local real estate and development professionals, employers in growth industries regionally, city officials, local community and neighborhood interests, adjacent businesses, and the managers of potentially competitive or complimentary development properties. FXM’s evaluation concluded that, with appropriate investments to improve physical access to the sites and connections to the regional highway system, one site could support a phased development of up to 1 million square feet of mixed office, retail, and residential uses. The other site would be appropriate for a more modest development of light manufacturing and transportation/distributive uses, as well as passive recreational and open space. FXM prepared phasing strategies and preliminary pro forma financial analyses for each development, and assessed the effects of such development on fiscal revenues and costs to the City of Portland.
Hyannis - W. Yarmouth Transportation Plan
Towns of Barnstable and Yarmouth (Massachusetts), Cape Cod Commission
In follow-on work to an earlier study, FXM Associates prepared the financial component of a regional transportation plan and conducted preliminary socioeconomic impact evaluations of major potential transportation investments. Research included a comprehensive review and analysis of all potential sources and mechanisms for funding transportation improvements; contacts with federal, state, and regional planning organizations nationwide to explore funding strategies under ISTEA as well as innovative local initiatives, including public/private partnerships; and development of a financing plan and strategy specifically tailored to local needs, resources, and development opportunities. One of the innovative financing strategies considered for a proposed roadway improvement included a combination of up-front contributions by private property owners, tax increment financing by the Town of Barnstable, a state PWED grant, and developer impact fee banking to meet future requirements of the Cape Cod Commission, and possible demonstration project designation (for innovative financing) by the U.S. Department of Transportation.
Route 146 Widening/Massachusetts Turnpike Interchange EIS, Worcester, MA
Massachusetts Highway Department/Massachusetts Turnpike Authority
Under subcontract to Howard Needles Tammen & Bergendorff, Inc., Consulting Engineers, FXM provided baseline and design years land use, households, income, and retail and non-retail employment forecasts for 88 traffic analysis zones within a large study area under no-build and build alternative assumptions, and completed the land use, socioeconomic, and relocation impacts sections of the EIS. The assignment required extensive field investigations; interviews with community leaders, affected businesses, and industry and trade professionals; daily interaction with engineering and environmental specialists on the project team; and the design of specific mitigation measures to effectively relocate the up to 90 households and 50 businesses that would be displaced under the Preferred Alternative, as well as several dozen businesses that would experience significant loss of through traffic and/or temporary disruption during construction. The FEIS for the proposed $200 million construction project was approved in 1994.
Year 2020 Demographic Forecasts, Greater Buffalo, New York
Niagara Frontier Transportation Committee (NFTC)
In association with Planners Collaborative, Inc., FXM Associates prepared year 2020 forecasts of employment, households, and population for Erie and Niagara Counties in western New York State. Unlike traditional demographic forecasts in transportation planning, which typically extrapolate historical population trends, FXM Associates' methodology employed research on effects of the U.S.-Canada Free Trade Agreement, NAFTA, national industry trends, and other factors particular to the economy of western New York. Population and household forecasts were derived from employment projections based on industry, trade, land, labor, and capital variables unique to the region. County-level forecasts are used by NFTC as control totals in their evaluations of sub-regional, project-specific assessments of traffic and socioeconomic impacts.
