May 2026 Meeting

Bill Hereth · April 3, 2026

Meetings

Date/Time: Thursday May 14, 2026 10:00-11:30am
Location: WFRC - 41 North Rio Grande Street, Suite 103, Salt Lake City, Utah 84101

Virtual option available through the calendar appointment. Email utahMUG@gmail.com to request the calendar appointment.

Agenda

Welcome & Introductions

Discussion Topics

  • Mission Statement
    • Making travel demand models in Utah better through collaboration and shared learning.
    • More details on About Us page
  • Utah-Specific resources:
    • Traffic Volume Map (link)
    • Household/Job Viewer (link)
    • Model one-pagers and documentation (link)
  • Presentation solicitations (link) – due by July 6, 2026
  • Model Updates (link)
  • Others?

Presentations

  • Taking Off Without Four Steps: A New Approach to Airport Forecasting
    Charles Allen, InterVISTAS.
    The Boise Airport is conducting a Master Plan to guide infrastructure growth for the next 20 years. Traffic volume forecasts for the Master Plan do not use the traditional four-step travel demand modeling process. Rather, the Master Plan evaluates economic outlook, air travel market share, socioeconomic data, flight schedules, and other factors to forecast future conditions. This presentation will discuss the uniqueness of traffic patterns at airports and how a variety of data sources are combined to inform the outlook on long-term travel demand.

    • Charles Allen is a Transportation Engineer who found himself working on numerous forms of planning projects. He often gets accused of being a “plan-gineer”. Charles enjoys the challenge of translating the technical analysis outputs into meaning for clients and stakeholders. He treats the MUG Meeting halftime quizzes a little too fiercely.

  • Half Time Break
    Jared Lillywhite, Mountainland Association of Governments

  • Statewide and Wastach Front Commercial Vehicle Model Updates
    Kaveh Shabani, Cambridge Systematics – Bill Hereth, Wasatch Front Regional Council
    This presentation provides an overview of recent updates to the statewide and Wasatch Front commercial vehicle models. It highlights key refinements to model structure, data inputs, and calibration methods aimed at improving the representation of freight and commercial travel patterns. The updates enhance the models’ ability to support planning, policy analysis, and forecasting of goods movement across Utah.

    • Kaveh Shabani is a nationally recognized expert in freight modeling and data, with experience across 27 U.S. states and internationally in Canada and Australia, developing national, statewide, and urban freight forecasting models. He has published books and numerous peer reviewed papers and is an active member of the Transportation Research Board’s Freight Transportation Planning and Modeling committee and the American Society of Civil Engineers Freight and Logistics Committee. He has led major freight modeling efforts for agencies including FHWA, multiple State DOTs such as California, Florida, Michigan, Oregon, and Utah, and regional agencies including SCAG, SANDAG, CMAP, BMC, and SEMCOG. He has pioneered innovative methods in big data processing, vehicle classification, and commodity flow data fusion. He recently led statewide freight model updates for California and Utah.
    • Bill Hereth is a Deputy Director of Analytics at WFRC. The Commercial Vehicle Model update technical development and calibration work was perfomred by Chad Worthen of Insight Analytics.
    • Chad Worthen is a transportation modeler at Insight Analytics with extensive experience in travel demand modeling and regional analysis. He previously worked at the Wasatch Front Regional Council, where he supported the development and application of regional travel models. His work focuses on using data-driven tools to inform transportation planning and policy decisions.

Next meeting

  • Date/Time: Thursday, September 24, 10:00-11:30 am @ MAG.

🍽 lunchiMUG

  • Gather with us at the Gateway between HallPass (many food options) and Costa Vida.

Notes - thanks to Josh Alpers, Horrocks

Model Status Update

  • Utah Statewide Travel Model: Hayden Atchley, UDOT
    • Calibration, 2027 plan updates, currently working on documentation
  • Wasatch Front TDM: Suzie Swim, WFRC
    • Updating to OpenPaths Cube (next summer release), calibrated and updating truck data, 2027 RTP, working to finish the activity based model.
      • Non-motorized trips (greater sensitivity to urban form), commuter rail (station level boardings), UTA microtransit zone travel, commercial vehicle model
      • Trueshape Highway and Transit networks
      • OpenPaths – Migration of all code to OpenPaths (Make sure that you have the right license to use OpenPaths, SHOULD be part of the license)
    • Wasatch Front TDM v11 – ABM Roadmap
      • Year 1 (2027) – Working minimum viable model
      • Year 2 (2028) – WF Estimation and Calibration
      • Year 3 (2029) - Refinement & Training
  • Cache TDM: Isaac Gardner, CMPO
    • SE data has been submitted to Fehr and Peers and UDOT. Going over network files
  • Dixie TDM: Radhika Bhandari, DMPO
    • Final calibrations with WSP, Horrocks for project prioritization, working to fix the trucking portion
  • Summit-Wasatch TDM: Hayden Atchley, UDOT
    • Finished calibration and SE forecasts, comments from local jurisdictions, should be finalized in the next couple of weeks
  • Iron TDM: Hayden Atchley, UDOT
    • Calibrated to Spring-Fall, working on documentation, started updating models to OpenPaths

Taking Off Without Four Steps: A New Approach to Airport Forecasting Charles Allen, InterVISTAS.

  • Study Background
    • Boise Airport Master Plan. Needs for the next 20 years. Includes airfield, terminal, and landside.
    • Previous master plan adopted 2020, guidance from FAA is to update every 10 years.
    • Airports are like landlords that manage tenants
    • Forecast metrics – number of passengers, cargo tonnage, aircraft operations (passenger, general aviation, cargo, and military)
  • Factors
    • Growth, economics, etc
    • Gross Regional product in Idaho is tracking higher than the average US
    • Population growth and employment is above average
    • Personal income is lower
  • Business Factors
    • Aviation system shocks – national and international events, pandemics
    • History of mergers and bankruptcy with certain airlines
    • Jet fuel prices
    • Nonstop destinations available from Boise
    • Market shares from airline companies (Alaska Airlines the top % in Boise)
    • Seat Guage History (seats per aircraft)
    • Load Factor History (how full are the airplanes)
  • The Forecast
    • Base forecast assuming 4.6 million enplanements by 2044. Currently at about 2.5 million enplanements.
  • Connecting to Roadway Operations
    • Select a design period, seasonality, time of day, individual facility variations
    • Busier during the summer months, lighter during winter months
    • Time of day is highly controlled by flight times. Peak arrivals at about noon, peak departures around 1 PM
    • Boise has a high amount of origin traffic, SLC by comparison has a lot of connections that don’t touch the roadway
    • More focus on timeline of events, less on year. When we hit XXX million it’s time to trigger YYY improvements
  • Airport Facility Forecasts
    • Lots of variation in days of the week throughout the day
    • There’s a vast difference between the departures and arrival curb traffic volumes
  • Future Disruptors – Autonomous Vehicles
    • Waymo and Zoox operating at a dozen airports (2025-2030)
    • PAL 1 – Autonomous vehicles begin operations at BOI, initially replacing Uber and Lyft
    • PAL 2 – Increased AV’s, resulting in less public parking/rental car mode split
    • PAL 3 – AV’s increase, even less
    • PAL 4 - AV’s increase, even less

Statewide and Wasatch Front Commercial Vehicle Model Updates Kaveh Shabani, Cambridge Systematics & Bill Hereth, WFRC

  • USTM Freight Model Update
    • Good, Better, Best – trying to make the previous model even better
    • 2012 to 2017 verified data
    • Payload factors added for MD, screenlines added, MD trucks added, subarea extraction for pass-through flows
    • Short vs long-haul trips transitioned to FAF/Non-FAF categorization.
      • FAF = Freight = LH model = Updated Trip Rates
      • Non-FAF = Non-Freight = Expanded SLD – FAF = Updated Trip Rates
    • Data validation and calibration
    • Utah Route update, more in line with observations
    • Energy Extraction Update – represent truck movements associated with crude oil, natural gas, and coal
      • Lots of production in the Uintah Basin
  • WF TDM Freight Model Update
    • Targeted Improvements
      • Trip Patterns – door to door, hub and spoke, local, regional, long haul, etc
      • Currently based on total employment
      • LOTS of updates to what is covered, now includes a lot more for retail and industrial
      • Coming in the v10 model (next spring)