Benefits and Challenges Associated with the Implementation of Lean in Transportation Agencies

The highway construction industry constantly looks to increase productivity while public transportation agencies face challenges of shrinking budgets and staff numbers, even as the work continues to increase in size and demand. As a paradigm to maximize value and minimize waste with the resources available, Lean offers promise to enhance productivity, quality, and service. This study investigates the implementation of Lean by evaluating Lean conditions, practices, benefits, and challenges as expressed by U.S. and UK public transportation highway agencies as well as comparing the implementation of Lean between these agencies. Using a comprehensive literature review and formal interviews with six state departments of transportation along with Highways England from the UK, the findings show that Lean is intended to make process improvements to boost products and services to consumers. By creating a culture of continuous improvement, transportation agencies can improve their processes and increase their efficiencies and performance. Conversely, transportation agencies struggle to educate their employees and stakeholders in their understanding and practices of Lean, which causes confusion and ineffectiveness. Comparing the U.S. and UK transportation agencies, the approach to Lean implementation differs from a top-down approach for U.S. agencies to a bottom-up approach for Highways England. Furthermore, Highways England has an established tool for measuring Lean while development of quantifiable Lean measures is in its infancy in U.S. agencies. Overall, while the sample is limited, this exploratory study provides information for transportation agencies to use in consideration of implementing Lean.

• Record URL:
  https://doi.org/10.1177/03611981211038483
• Availability:
  • Find a library where document is available. Order URL: http://worldcat.org/issn/03611981
• Supplemental Notes:
  • Data is available on request from the authors. © National Academy of Sciences: Transportation Research Board 2021.
• Authors:
  • Parajuli, Manish
  • 0000-0003-3099-5371
  • Harper, Christofer M
  • 0000-0003-3099-4555
  • Senior, Bolivar
  • 0000-0001-9708-3508
  • Grigg, Neil
  • 0000-0002-3571-288X
• Publication Date: 2022-2

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Web
• Features: References;
• Pagination: pp 186-196
• Serial:
  • Transportation Research Record: Journal of the Transportation Research Board
  • Volume: 2676
  • Issue Number: 2
  • Publisher: Sage Publications, Incorporated
  • ISSN: 0361-1981
  • EISSN: 2169-4052
  • Serial URL: http://journals.sagepub.com/home/trr

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Economic benefits; Implementation; Productivity; Road construction; State departments of transportation
• Identifier Terms: Highways England; Lean (Methodology)
• Geographic Terms: United Kingdom; United States
• Subject Areas: Construction; Economics; Highways;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01782062
• Record Type: Publication
• Files: TRIS, TRB, ATRI
• Created Date: Sep 21 2021 4:00PM