Case studies of the economic impacts of highway bypasses on individual towns are needed since the effects of bypasses may vary a great deal from place to place. The objectives of this report were for a sample of small Kansas towns that have highway bypasses, (1) assess the impact of the bypass on the towns' total employment, (2) measure the impact on retail sales of the towns' travel-related businesses, (3) measure the impact on employment of the towns' travel-related businesses, (4) measure the impact on labor cost per employee of the towns' travel-related businesses, and for the Kansas counties that contain the sample of small Kansas towns that have bypasses, (5) assess the incremental impact on the county's road maintenance expenditures of assuming maintenance responsibility for the previous road alignment.

This synthesis report will be of interest to DOT administrators, supervisors, and staff, as well as to the consultants working with them in assessing the economic development impacts of existing or proposed transportation investments. Metropolitan Planning Organization regional and local staffs might also find it informative. It is intended to help practicing planners become aware of the range of methods and analysis techniques available, organized by the different categories of agency needs, to address different types of planning, policy, and research needs. This synthesis summarizes the current state of the practice by means of a survey of transportation planning agencies in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. This report provides reviews of the analysis methods used in recent project and program evaluation reports of these agencies, in addition to a bibliography of economic literature and guides.

Ex-post evaluation is important to improving the delivery of transport policy objectives. It can be used for multiple purposes at the core of which is the improvement of ex-ante assessment. A small number of jurisdictions employ ex-post evaluation systematically and leading experience is ...

Wamego, Lawrence, Beloit, and Abilene.

This report provides literature reviews, empirical findings and policy analysis related to some of the effects of building a highway bypass around a small town in Kansas. The report describes three types of models: an origin-destination model showing the number of trips between each town and city in Kansas; a model to estimate the value of the time-saving generated for through traffic by bypasses in Kansas; and a variety of economic impact regression models.

The analysis did show that, even though the population of a community may be stable for several years and per capita income is increasing, sales leakage still occurs. The literature, site visits, and data make it apparent that a bypass can positively affect a community. Some conditions that would need to exist in order to maximize a positive impact include the installation of signage along the bypass directing travelers to businesses and services in the community, community or regional plans that include the bypass in future land development scenarios, and businesses adjusting their business plans to attract bypass users. In addition, how proactive a community is in adapting to the bypass will determine the kinds of effects felt in the community.