Texas Department of Transportation
A Review of the Right-of-Way Acquisition Process at the Tx. Dept. of Transportation
Report Number 97-069
July 1997
Overall Conclusion
While management controls over the right-of-way acquisition process at the Texas Department of Transportation (Department) provide basic assurance that assets are safeguarded, our review revealed unaddressed weaknesses involving management of the complete process. In addition, we found opportunities to improve the Department's application of the retooling effort to the right-of-way acquisition process and in other areas as well. We commend the Department for recognizing right-of-way control weaknesses and inefficiencies through the Retooling TxDOT Project, which began reviewing the right-of-way acquisition process in 1994. The Department has developed and begun implementing plans to improve management of the right-of-way acquisition process, including a new information system.
Key Facts and Findings
Department management holds the districts accountable for right-of-way management at the end of the acquisition process, rather than using information to monitor the process from beginning to end. There is a risk that overall project schedules will continue to experience unnecessary, costly disruptions.
While Retooling TxDOT has identified and begun implementing improvements to the right-of-way process, opportunities exist for additional improvements. Examples of improvements needed, which could be applied to all retooling efforts, are:
- The use of data to identify change needs improvement. For instance, the baseline data on cycle times used for retooling was developed ad hoc and based upon a single sample project. This approach may not provide a true baseline either for drawing conclusions about the process or measuring improvements.
- Performance measures need to focus less on whether the districts have implemented the changes and more on whether the changes actually result in improvements to outcomes. For example, are more right-of-way projects 100 percent complete by the projected letting date?
- Retooling TxDOT should include district-level processes when it initially frames the process to be retooled. For example, district-level processes for scheduling, monitoring, and managing right-of-way projects were not included in the right-of-way retooling project. These district processes can have a major impact on the timeliness of the overall process.
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