Link to: SMART Infrastructure Goals
Our experience with COVID-19 presents an unprecedented opportunity for the public sector, private sector, and academia to take a step back, work together and plan for a post-COVID transportation system that focuses on providing infrastructure in a manner that supports and enhances healthy outcomes.
At CARTEEH, we have embarked on the “Healthy People through SMART Infrastructure” initiative, which pulls together the strengths of our consortium members and builds on our previous research efforts. We will provide resources for practitioners to enhance the public health benefits of transportation infrastructure, while also meeting the SMART Infrastructure Goals of being Sustainable, Multi-modal, Accessible, Resilient, and Technological (SMART).
Under the SMART initiative, CARTEEH is developing a framework linking transportation infrastructure to health. It will provide stakeholders with a wide range of tools to enhance the public health benefits of transportation infrastructure projects. The framework can be used by practitioners to meet the transportation needs of their constituents, while simultaneously enhancing the public health benefits for society.
The Healthy People through SMART Infrastructure Framework—shown in the figure below—will draw on CARTEEH’s 14 Pathways to Health and the SMART Infrastructure Goals to develop Healthy Transportation Infrastructure Objectives. The Healthy Transportation Infrastructure Objectives will be developed by determining how the desired outcomes of the SMART Infrastructure Goals can be enhanced by incorporating the public health perspectives provided by the 14 Pathways to Health. This process will produce specific objectives that will help guide transportation practitioners in implementing transportation infrastructure that is both SMART and healthy. Each of the Healthy Transportation Infrastructure Objectives will be integrated into a Transportation Health Enhancement Toolkit, consisting of performance measures, methods and models, case studies, and practitioner guidance—all aimed at assisting practitioners in enhancing the health benefits of SMART infrastructure projects.
In addition to the development of the framework and toolkit, CARTEEH consortium members will also be undertaking focused, collaborative projects aimed at advancing measurement and modeling of transportation infrastructure and health. More information on these specific projects are forthcoming. They include assessments of transportation infrastructure facilities such as ports and highway corridors.
For further information on this initiative and how you can be involved, contact Joe Zietsman.
