Efficient and safe transportation movement is a regional issue, and may require sustained cooperation of many jurisdictions, including States, MPOs and other transportation and trade facilitation entities. Coalitions have formed in recent years on an ad hoc basis, using pooled funding approaches or Congressional earmarks to support their activities. These coalitions study transportation, economic development and other issues and aid in implementing solutions that involve more than one governmental entity, and sometimes private partners. This forum examined issues and options to enable the creation and operation of multi-state formal and informal coalitions and multi-state/jurisdictional transportation coordinating mechanisms. The proliferation of high priority corridors, the national border crossing initiatives and new economic alliances suggest that more new multi-jurisdictional coalitions will be formed. Forum participants examined past accomplishments in coalition-buildings and future prospects for such coalitions. Topics addressed include enabling authority, funding, membership, scope and scale and implementation strategies. Forum sponsors were the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), the I-95 Corridor Coalition, the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials and two committees of the Transportation Research Board -- the Committee on Statewide Multimodal Transportation Planning and the Committee on Transportation Programming, Planning & Systems Evaluation. The forum is part of a comprehensive FHWA outreach program. |