U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT)

DOT has restructured to strengthen performance measurement, program evaluation, and enterprise risk management functions, which are essential to its Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act mission. This reorganization, aligned with DOT Order 1101.12C, establishes a new Office of Performance, Evaluation, and Enterprise Risk (PEER) within the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Budget and Programs / chief financial officer. A key change is consolidating analysts for these functions into one unit under the director of PEER, who serves as the department’s performance improvement, evaluation, and risk officer, centralizing leadership previously spread across financial and budget roles. This cross-functional oversight ensures that program evidence, including performance measurement, performance analysis, foundational fact-finding, program evaluation, and program project management information, is available to executives when making resource allocation decisions. PEER oversees and coordinates the development of required annual and four-year evidence-building plans and reports on the progress of the implementation of the Evidence Act to the White House Office of Management and Budget and Congress. This includes the DOT’s Learning Agenda, Capacity Assessment, Evaluation Framework and Annual Evaluation Plan.

DOT’s Evaluation Community of Practice and the Research Development & Technology (RD&T) Planning Team further support data and research initiatives. The Evaluation Community, with representatives from across DOT, meets bi-monthly to share insights, while the RD&T Planning Team, led by the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Research and Technology, coordinates research across DOT’s operating administrations enhancing efficiency and preventing duplicate efforts. Together, these efforts underscore DOT’s commitment to improving transportation innovation, optimizing program effectiveness, and delivering cost-effective infrastructure solutions.

DOT has an executive leadership structure that governs data management, collection, sharing and analysis. The chief data officer (CDO), housed within the Office of the Chief Information Officer (OCIO), oversees data governance and compliance, serving as a data strategist and steward to enhance data quality, foster data sharing, and develop new data products. In addition, DOT’s statistical officer, who also directs the Bureau of Transportation Statistics, leads efforts to compile and publish transportation statistics in alignment with the Evidence Act and guided by the Secretary’s strategic objectives.

The OCIO coordinates DOT’s data governance activities, including life cycle data management and applying data and technology to advance safety and infrastructure goals. It leads various working groups, such as the Departmental Data Governance Working Group and a geospatial leaders’ group, which meet monthly to address guidelines, processes, and resource needs to ensure data excellence across DOT. The Bureau of Transportation Statistics also contributes to data governance by fulfilling legislative requirements to provide a comprehensive set of transportation statistics supported by the White House Office of Management and Budget’s Statistical Policy Directives. These structures strengthen DOT’s data governance to support its mission and improve operational effectiveness.

DOT has publicly documented its evaluation framework, which includes a clear definition of evidence. This framework emphasizes the department’s commitment to supporting rigorous, relevant evaluations and to evidence-based strategic and operational decisions that result in continuous improvement. DOT’s evaluation plan and learning agenda establish the department’s vision for the use of data, statistics and evidence to inform decision making. To address emerging issues, the Office of Performance, Evaluation, and Enterprise Risk (PEER) undertook the significant lift to update it two years later, even though DOT wasn’t required. The agency issued an updated and revised learning agenda in November 2024. The Learning Agenda: FY 2024-2026 covers 22 priorities, from distracted driving to supply chain disruption, and reflects input garnered through issuing a formal Request for Information in the Federal Register. In spring 2026, the agency will release another updated and revised learning agenda.

DOT demonstrates its commitment to evaluation, evidence and data use through its publicly available data management policy and strategic data plan, which is part of the agency’s overarching Strategic Plan. This plan, especially under Strategic Goal 4: Equity, uses data to drive improved outcomes and promotes principles of ethics and equity. For the first time, DOT has centered equity as a department-wide strategic goal, marking a significant step toward institutionalizing fairness and addressing disparities across transportation systems. Equity-centered strategic action documents support this focus, such as the DOT Equity Action Plan, the Justice40 Initiative, and the Tribal Consultation Policy, which align data initiatives with broader goals.

DOT developed the Transportation Data + Equity Hub to support this equity-centered approach, offering tools, metrics and data to assess community access to transportation and identify existing challenges. DOT’s Public Access Plan also provides a structured process to make federally funded research and its data publicly accessible, in line with the White House Office of Science & Technology Policy’s guidelines. This framework enhances public access to research data, including datasets prepared for the National Transportation Library, where partners can also request custom datasets vetted for security. These resources reinforce DOT’s commitment to transparency, equity and evidence-based policymaking. DOT’s Secure Data Commons (SDC) is a cloud-based analytics platform that enables traffic engineers, researchers and data scientists to access, analyze and connect transportation-related datasets. DOT created the SDC to provide a secure platform for sharing and collaborating on research, tools, algorithms, and analysis involving moderate sensitivity level datasets using commercially available tools, without needing to install tools or software locally.

DOT provides guidance and resources to support state and local grantees in evaluating programs and building the necessary data systems and capacity. The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (2022), also known as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, provided $1.2 trillion in federal transportation and infrastructure spending to improve public safety and climate resilience, create jobs across the country, and advance more equitable opportunities and outcomes for people in the United States. Understanding the opportunities for data collection, formal evaluation, and evidence use as part of these programs, DOT has doubled down on the importance of these activities. Read more on p. 24 of The Power of Evidence to Drive America’s Progress.

For example, the 2023 Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity (RAISE) NOFO (see p. 68) makes clear that recipients can use grant funds for project evaluation. Likewise, the FY 2023 SMART Stage 1 (see p. 13) enables funds for evaluation. DOT provides technical assistance on a variety of technical areas, including for improving data capacity and integrating data systems to support state and local grantees to evaluate programs and build the necessary data systems and capacity. DOT offers technical assistance to stakeholders through several programs, including the National Highway Institute, the Federal Highway Administration Resource Center, the Local Technical Assistance Program, the Tribal Technical Assistance Program, the Reconnecting Communities Institute, the Transit Cooperative Research Program and through a partnership with the Institute of Transportation Engineers. One example of data-related technical assistance is the Smart Community Resource Center. An example of evaluation-related technical assistance is the Safe Streets and Roads for All Technical Assistance Center which supports more than 1,600 grant recipients by providing resources, including evaluation, and training as they embark on their grant activities.

DOT leverages performance management to enhance decision making, ensure accountability and advance equitable outcomes. The Office of Performance, Evaluation, and Enterprise Risk (PEER) oversees quarterly reviews of each Operating Administration’s progress toward its performance goals, which are summarized annually in the DOT’s Annual Performance Plan and shared with the White House Office of Management and Budget. DOT’s Strategic Plan includes a strategic goal of equity, which involves several objectives and a set of related performance goals. Since 2023, PEER has successfully launched and scaled an online platform that is now routinely used to store and share performance data, improving coordination for DOT’s internal “data calls.”

DOT’s equity goals focus on increasing contract awards to small disadvantaged businesses to support wealth creation for underserved communities. DOT has set an ambitious target to raise these awards from 18.2% in FY 2021 to 21.5% in FY 2025. Additionally, the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) has implemented a goal to direct more outreach activities toward underserved communities, increasing hazardous materials awareness and preparedness. PHMSA’s outreach efforts grew significantly, from none in early FY 2022 to 42% by FY 2023, surpassing its 40% target.

Launched in 2022, DOT’s Thriving Communities Program provides technical assistance and capacity-building support to underserved communities, focusing on place-based projects that advance transformative transportation infrastructure. In 2023, DOT established the Advisory Committee for Transportation Equity (ACTE) to advise the Secretary of Transportation on issues of civil rights and transportation equity across planning, policy and research. ACTE members include transportation equity experts and community leaders and hold public meetings nationwide, addressing specific policy concerns. The Reconnecting Communities Pilot Program was established to help fund community-led projects that mitigate physical barriers to mobility and access, such as train tracks or highways. DOT also partnered with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to expand technical support for community engagement and capacity-building.

DOT emphasizes community engagement in its evaluations, especially for initiatives supporting underserved areas. For example, the Federal Transit Administration will involve local stakeholders in evaluating the Low or No Emissions Grant Program, collaborating to build a logic model, involving regional program experts in documenting program factors that contribute to outcomes, and leveraging inter-office data collection opportunities to answer evaluation questions aligned with program goals. DOT’s outreach for the Equity Action Plan included public dialogues, Requests for Information, and direct engagement with underserved communities. In October 2022, DOT released the guide Promising Practices for Meaningful Public Involvement in Transportation Decision-Making to help recipients strengthen community engagement. DOT’s Annual Evaluation Plan and learning agenda were developed through engaging groups served by the agency, implementation partners and other stakeholders, emphasizing communities experiencing unfavorable outcomes. As one example, for the study of the Federal Aviation Administration’s Weather Camera Program, DOT engaged operators and flight services operating in rural communities that rely on flight service to reach critical services in an emergency, including lifesaving medical treatment.