Development of Hazardous Materials (HM) Shipper Prioritization Program: Technical Brief

Abstract

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) developed the Hazardous Materials Package Inspection Program (HMPIP) to focus on inspecting individual shipments at the roadside or on carriers’ docks. One output of this program is a resulting dataset that can be used to develop a performance-based prioritization of HM shippers for inspection. The Virginia Tech Transportation Institute (VTTI) was tasked to review, document, and recommend improvements to the HM Shipper Prioritization Program. As part of that effort, VTTI developed software titled the HM Shipper Prioritization Application (HMSPA) that was beta tested in a sample of states with existing shipper programs. The purpose of this report is to provide documentation on the development process and the final HMSPA design that was completed by VTTI.