2022 Competition: Planning & Projects, Policy and Operations

16th Annual Communicating Concepts with the Public Competition Winners

Why don’t they understand? Transportation professionals often find it challenging to communicate critical transportation topics to a non-technical audience. Since 2007, TRB’s annual competition on “Communicating Concepts with John and Jane Q Public” has focused on a specific communication challenge each year. This year, the competition has a new name, Communicating Concepts with the Public, and instead of a single theme, the competition sought entries in three categories: Planning & Projects, Policy, and Operations.

Four entries were selected for the competition showcase for their exemplary communications efforts, as well as three honorable mentions. The communications tools and techniques they used epitomize the spirit of communicating complex information in an uncomplicated manner. View the handout highlighting all the winners here. You can also view posters highlighting all the winners on our webpage.

Competition Winner: Planning & Projects Category

Storytelling as a Framework for Engagement: MnDOT's 2022 Statewide Multimodal Transportation Plan Update

Storytelling is a powerful way to connect with people. Stories help make the abstract more tangible. This is especially effective for high-level, future-oriented policy conversations, the impacts of which can be profound and hard to understand.

In 2020, MnDOT began the process of updating its Statewide Multimodal Transportation Plan, the state’s highest-level plan for transportation. While previous updates of the SMTP focused on reaching as many Minnesotans as possible, this update focused on having deeper conversations to understand the “why” behind people’s perspectives on transportation. The goal was to provide a variety of inclusive and meaningful ways for people in Minnesota to participate in the plan update process. MnDOT framed its messaging, materials, and input opportunities in way that was understandable and approachable—stories.

The engagement approach was successful. In total, across all tools and phases, MnDOT had more than 3,200 responses/interactions with people in Minnesota.

Competition Runners Up

A Community-Owned Message: Recovering From Oregon’s Historic 2020 Wildfires - Operations Category

Collectively, the 2020 Labor Day wildfires are recorded as the most devastating disaster in Oregon history. The state’s Wildfire Debris Management Task Force – formed by three state agencies: Oregon Office of Emergency Management, Oregon Department of Transportation and Oregon Department of Environmental Quality – worked with federal, state, and local partners to clean up damaged areas throughout the state including removing the ash and debris from destroyed homes and businesses to make way for rebuilding and removing a massive number of burned trees along the state's affected highway system.

Stay home, Colin. - Operations Category

A winter storm in January 2022 made such an impact on the United States, it has its own Wikipedia page. As details of the storm and potential impacts to millions in North Carolina became clearer, North Carolina DOT’s messaging went into action – its prepared as well as its strategically impromptu messaging. NCDOT wanted to speak to every North Carolinian as if it were the fun neighbor who really cared, telling them to stay home.

Naples Airport - Fly Safe Fly Quiet Program - Policy Category

One of the top-10 busiest airports for private jet activity in the country, the Naples Airport is located within minutes of downtown Naples, Florida. Though the City of Naples is a highly noise sensitive community, FAA regulations prohibit the Naples Airport from enacting mandatory restrictions on the type of aircraft, the number of flights, or arrival/departure times. As an engaged, responsive partner to the community, the Naples Airport launched the Fly Safe Fly Quiet Program as a way to tackle the issue of aircraft noise by educating pilots and passengers flying into the airport.