Design and oversight of work zone operations

Work zone design is performed by a number of groups including road and bridge designers, traffic and safety personnel in a project or region offices, or consultants or through standardized drawings of typical scenarios. Oversight ranges may involve construction inspectors (MDOT or consultants), permit agents, or statewide work zone administrators. These are the ones that actually review the set up of work zone and determine if it is satisfactory to the road conditions.
For “global” issues MDOT has a Traffic Recommendations Committee (TRC) made up of personnel from Design, Maintenance, Construction, Regions and Traffic and Safety. The TRC makes policy recommendations concerning work zones to upper management. Upper management then decides to agree or disagree with the recommendations. If agreement is reached, policy is made. Each area that works on work zones has its own in-house policies. This includes Construction, Maintenance, Utility/permits, Surveys, etc. As a result, work zones differ depending on the operation being performed.
All work zones recognize and use MUTCD (Michigan version) for set-ups, but they differ greatly. Construction has the longest work zone set-ups, Maintenance tries to use a reduced version of Construction’s set-ups. All the other entities range greatly, where a zone may be minimized to the point an orange cone and flashing beacon on a truck as the only devices marking a work zone.