San Bernardino Transportation Analysis Model

The San Bernardino Transportation Analysis Model Plus (SBTAM+) is a TransCAD-based travel demand model focused on San Bernardino County. As such, it is the primary county-wide tool to forecast future year volumes for planning and engineering applications. It has been developed by SBCTA and is intended to assist SBCTA, Caltrans, and local jurisdictions in a variety of applications. These practical model applications relate to:

Estimating volumes on freeway segments, interchanges, grade separations, and arterial roadways
Supporting circulation elements for general plan updates
Assisting in estimating vehicles miles of travel (VMT) for a variety of projects including climate action plans, air quality/greenhouse gas emissions, energy assessment
Estimating VMT for SB 743 assessment
Estimating needs for AB 1600 compliant nexus studies
Estimation for other efforts that require travel behavior estimation and estimating transportation metrics for specific applications.

SCAG developed a Subregional Model Development Tool (SMDT) to assist local jurisdictions and agencies develop local or subregional models that are consistent with the SCAG Regional Model. SBTAM was developed through application of the SMDT. SBTAM is updated with the latest changes to the SCAG Regional Model making it the best forecasting tool for all multi-modal transportation projects.

For additional information please reference SCAG’s modeling webpage or the SCAG Modeling Task Force.

Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT) Tools

California Senate Bill (SB) 743 fundamentally changed transportation impact analysis as part of California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) compliance. As a result, CEQA guidelines have replaced level of service (LOS) with vehicle miles of travel (VMT) as a basis for determining significant transportation impacts as part of the environmental review process.

In response to the recent implementation of SB 743, SBTAM+ incorporates a web-based VMT Screening Tool and VMT Calculator to facilitate the SB 743 related VMT analysis associated with land use projects. Practical applications include:

Determining whether or not prospective projects are below local thresholds that could qualify projects to be screened from VMT assessment. The Tool relies on SBTAM+ data with a 2019 base year and a 2050 forecast year.
Utilization of the VMT Calculator that can be used in conjunction with the VMT Screening Tool to help evaluate whether a proposed land use would likely result in a transportation impact. This tool has been created to estimate VMT that the model would likely predict for a proposed land use project using trip rates by agency derived from the model and average trip length data from the traffic analysis zone (TAZ) the project is located within. The VMT Calculator should be used for small development projects that:
- Are not expected to change travel patterns in a study area, and
- Have land uses consistent with other land uses in the model area used to estimate project attributes.

Click here to access the VMT Screening Tool and VMT Calculator.

Accessing SBTAM

SBCTA offers access to model volumes and a list of consultants who have access to SBTAM+ for free. For access to the full model, SBCTA charges an initial fee of $5,000 with an annual fee thereafter of $1,000. All three require the submittal of a signed User Agreement attached to an online SBTAM+ Request Form. The fees collected by SBCTA will be utilized to initiate future updates to SBTAM+ and will be utilized to correct any identified SBTAM+ anomalies.

For more information, please visit www.gosbcta.com/sbtam_plus or contact sbtam@gosbcta.com.