[Federal Register Volume 86, Number 41 (Thursday, March 4, 2021)]
[Notices]
[Pages 12770-12772]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2021-04456]


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DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION

Federal Highway Administration

[Docket No. FHWA-2025-0005]


Agency Information Collection Activities: Notice of Request for 
Approval of a New Information Collection

AGENCY: Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), DOT.

ACTION: Notice of Request for Approval of a New Information Collection.

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SUMMARY: The FHWA has forwarded the information collection request 
described in this notice to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) 
for approval of a new (periodic) information collection. We published a 
Federal Register Notice with a 60-day public comment period on this 
information collection on November 18, 2019. We are required to publish 
this notice in the Federal Register by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 
1995.

DATES: Please submit comments by April 5, 2021.

ADDRESSES: You may submit comments identified by DOT Docket ID Number 
(FHWA-2125-0005) by any of the following methods:
    Website: For access to the docket to read background documents or 
comments received, go to the Federal eRulemaking Portal: http://www.regulations.gov. Follow the online instructions for submitting 
comments.
    Fax: 1-202-493-2251
    Mail: Docket Management Facility; U.S. Department of 
Transportation, West Building Ground Floor, Room W12-140, 1200 New 
Jersey Avenue SE, Washington, DC 20590.
    Hand Delivery or Courier: U.S. Department of Transportation, West 
Building Ground Floor, Room W12-140, 1200 New Jersey Avenue SE, 
Washington, DC 20590, between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. ET, Monday through 
Friday, except Federal holidays.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Daniel Jenkins, 202-366-1067, 
[email protected], National Travel Behavior Data Program Manager, 
Federal Highway Administration, Office of Policy, 1200 New Jersey 
Avenue SE, Room E83-414, Washington, DC 20590, Monday through Friday, 
except Federal holidays.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
    Title: Next Generation National Household Travel Survey (Next Gen 
NHTS)
    Type of Request: New request for periodic information collection 
requirement
    Background: Title 23, United States Code, Section 502 authorizes 
the USDOT to carry out advanced research and transportation research to 
measure the performance of the surface transportation systems in the 
US, including the efficiency, energy use, air quality, congestion, and 
safety of the highway and intermodal transportation systems. The USDOT 
is charged with the overall responsibility to obtain current 
information on national patterns of travel, which establishes a data 
base to better understand travel behavior, evaluate the use of 
transportation facilities, and gauge the impact of the USDOT's policies 
and programs.
    The NHTS is the USDOT's authoritative nationally representative 
data source for daily passenger travel. This inventory of travel 
behavior reflects travel mode (e.g., private vehicles, public 
transportation, walk and bike) and trip purpose (e.g., travel to work, 
school, recreation, personal/family trips) by U.S. household residents. 
Survey results are used by federal and state agencies to monitor the 
performance and adequacy of current facilities and infrastructure, and 
to plan for future needs.
    The collection and analysis of national transportation data has 
been of critical importance for half a century. Previous surveys were 
conducted in 1969, 1977, 1983, 1990, 1995, 2001, 2009, and 2017. The 
current survey will be the ninth in this series, and allow researchers, 
planners, and officials at the state and federal levels to monitor 
travel trends.
    Data from the NHTS are widely used to support research needs within 
the USDOT, and State and local agencies, in addition to responding to 
queries from Congress, the research community and the media on 
important issues. Current and recent topics of interest include:
     Travel to work patterns by transportation mode for 
infrastructure improvements and congestion reduction,

[[Page 12771]]

     Access to public transit, paratransit, and rail services 
by various demographic groups,
     Measures of travel by mode to establish exposure rates for 
risk analyses,
     Support for Federal, State, and local planning activities 
and policy evaluation,
     Active transportation by walk and bike to establish the 
relationship to public health issues,
     Vehicle usage for energy consumption analysis,
     Traffic behavior of specific demographic groups such as 
Millennials and the aging population.
    Within the USDOT, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) holds 
responsibility for technical and funding coordination. The National 
Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), Federal Transit 
Administration (FTA), and the Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) 
are also primary data users and have historically participated in 
project planning and financial support.

Proposed Data Acquisition Methodology

    NHTS data are collected from a probability-based sample comprised 
of a representative mixture of households with respect to various 
geodemographic characteristics. For this purpose, FHWA will field two 
independent survey designs using two independent samples: (a) An 
address-based sample (ABS) of 7,500 households and (b) a panel frame 
sample (PFS) of 7,500 households drawn from a previously recruited 
national probability-based online panel. The ABS sample will deliver a 
set of national data that will be used for official purposes and will 
be available for public use. The PFS sample will offer FHWA an 
opportunity to conduct an independent assessment of the viability of an 
alternative data collection methodology for future NHTS data collection 
efforts.
    Randomly sampled ABS households will be surveyed using a combined 
mail/online survey mode in that they will receive a mailing that 
directs them to an online survey system to capture household 
information and core travel data. Non-internet ABS households will be 
offered paper versions of the questionnaire and trip diary. For the PFS 
sample, an online panel survey approach will be used, where email 
invitations will be sent to selected panel members inviting them to 
participate in the survey. Follow-ups with nonresponding households 
from the ABS and PFS samples will utilize mail, telephone, and email 
communications where contact information is available, and the contact 
method is appropriate.
    Monetary incentives will be provided for all ABS households that 
complete the survey. As the burden is higher for those in households 
with more people, larger households will receive a larger incentive 
amount. Households will receive $5 per household member when all 
household members complete the travel survey.
    Both the ABS and PFS survey modes will collect data during an 
entire 12-month period so that all 365 days of the year, including 
weekends and holidays, are accounted for. To maximize the accuracy of 
the recall information and to provide coverage for every day of the 
year, all surveys will collect information about the travel during the 
previous 24 hours. A total of 7,500 completed households will comprise 
the ABS sample and 7,500 completed households will comprise the PFS 
probability-based panel sample.
    Issues Related to Sampling. The sampling design reflects the U.S. 
household trends of decreasing landline telephone ownership and 
increasing access to the internet. Both the ABS and PFS samples will 
originate from the USPS Delivery Sequence File (DSF), which includes 
all points of delivery in the US. The requisite address samples are 
obtained from a third party vendor that enhances the residential 
address by appending various auxiliary variables to the DSF prior to 
sample selection including block-, block group-, and tract-level 
characteristics from the Decennial Census, the American Community 
Survey (ACS), and commercial databases.
    Sample Size. In total, completed surveys will be secured for a 
nationally representative sample of 7,500 households using the ABS 
sample and an additional 7,500 households will be completed from the 
PFS sample.
    Stratification. The sample for this survey will be designed to 
produce the most efficient estimates at the national level, as well as 
those needed for urban and rural areas. While different sample 
allocation options for the national sample are being considered in 
order to arrive at a final allocation for the NHTS sample, the 7,500 
households will be selected from each sampling frame in a manner that 
ensures estimates can be generated for urban, rural, and national 
geographic levels.
    It should be noted that assignments for recording travel data by 
households in each sample (ABS and PFS) will be equally distributed 
across all days to ensure an approximately balanced day of week 
distribution. To this end, the sample will be released periodically 
through a process that will control the balance of travel days by 
month.

Data Collection Methods

    The questionnaire for this survey will be designed to be relevant, 
aesthetically pleasing, and elicit participation by including topics of 
importance to the respondents.

Information Proposed for Collection

    For the ABS sample, households will receive an invitation to 
complete the survey through the US mail. The online panel survey 
households will receive an emailed invitation. In both survey modes, 
the primary household respondent will complete a short roster to 
collect key household information (e.g., enumeration of household 
members and household vehicles). Then, all travel information about a 
specific day from every household member 5 years of age and older will 
be collected using the online travel diary or equivalent paper form.
    For households choosing to complete the survey online, the primary 
respondent will complete the household roster, then complete his or her 
diary as well as serve as a proxy responder for all children 5-15 years 
old in the household. Household members 16 and older will be invited to 
complete their own online diaries. If they fail to do so in a 
reasonable amount of time after multiple reminders, the primary 
household member may be asked to serve as a proxy for non-responding 
teens and adults in the household. Households electing to complete the 
survey by mail will be provided equivalent paper forms, with similar 
proxy-reporting instructions.
    The online household travel diary program will allow for 
sophisticated branching and skip patterns to enhance data retrieval by 
asking only those questions that are necessary and appropriate for the 
individual participant. Look-up tables will be included to assist with 
information such as vehicle makes and models. A Google Maps API will be 
used to assist in identifying specific place names and locations. The 
location data for the participant's home, workplace, or school will be 
stored and automatically inserted in the dataset for trips after the 
first report. Household rostering will include a list of all persons in 
the household and trips reported from one household member can be 
referenced for ease in reporting that trip by other household members 
who travelled together. This automatic insert of information reduces 
the burden of the subsequent respondents to be queried

[[Page 12772]]

about a trip already reported by the initial respondent.
    Data range, consistency and edit checks will be automatically 
programmed to reduce reporting error, survey length, and maintain the 
flow of information processing. Data cross checks also help reduce the 
burden by ensuring that the reporting is consistent within each trip. 
Surveys completed by mail will be entered into the same online survey 
program to ensure consistency in quality control efforts.

Estimated Burden Hours for Information Collection

    Frequency: This collection will be conducted every 2-4 years in the 
future.
    Respondents. As mentioned earlier, two nationally representative 
random samples of 7,500 households from the ABS and PFS samples 
representing the 50 states and the District of Columbia will be 
surveyed. Given that each household will include an average of 2.5 
members 5-years of age or older, travel data for a total of 18,750 
individual respondents will be collected for the ABS survey and an 
additional 18,750 individual respondents will complete the PFS survey.
    Estimated Average Burden per Response. It will take approximately 5 
minutes to complete the roster data form, and 15 minutes to complete 
the travel diary. This results in a total of 20 minutes for the first 
household member and 15 minutes per additional household member (these 
estimates are the same for both ABS and PFS respondents).
    Estimated Total Annual Burden Hours. It is estimated that a total 
of 18,750 persons will be included in the survey from each sampling 
frame (ABS and PFS). This would result in approximately 10,625 hours of 
support for this data collection effort, assuming an average of 17 
minutes per person across the roster data form and retrieval survey.

Post-Collection Independent Analysis

    The two proposed survey approaches will provide FHWA the 
opportunity to assess validity and reliability of the panel frame 
sample approach for use in future NHTS data collection cycles. At the 
conclusion of this data collection effort, FHWA will conduct an 
independent assessment of the results from both survey designs, with a 
focus on identifying similarities and differences with respect to 
survey administration metrics, including response rates, unit and item 
non-response, etc. In addition, the differences in travel patterns will 
also be assessed. This includes assessing the differences in trip 
rates, miles traveled, distance traveled, trip purpose, travel mode, 
and time of day of trip-making by specific demographic and geographic 
subpopulation groupings. The results from both survey modes will also 
be vetted against external data sources such as the Census, the 
American Community Survey, the National Transit Database, and FHWA data 
on vehicle miles traveled.

Public Comments Invited

    You are asked to comment on any aspect of this information 
collection, including: (1) Whether the proposed collection of 
information is necessary for the USDOT's performance, including whether 
the information will have practical utility; (2) the data acquisition 
methods; (3) the accuracy of the USDOT's estimate of the burden of the 
proposed information collection; (4) the types of data being acquired; 
(5) ways to enhance the quality, usefulness, and clarity of the 
collected information; and (6) ways that the burden could be minimized 
without reducing the quality of the collected information. The agency 
will summarize and/or include your comments in the request for OMB's 
clearance of this information collection.

    Authority: The Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995; 44 U.S.C. 
Chapter 35, as amended; and 49 CFR 1.48.

    Issued on: March 1, 2021.
Michael Howell,
Information Collection Officer, Federal Highway Administration.
[FR Doc. 2021-04456 Filed 3-3-21; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4910-22-P