This report provides a guide for achieving a basic service model for traffic signal management and operations. The basic service model is based on simply stated and defensible operational objectives that consider the staffing level, expertise and priorities of the responsible agency. The report includes a Literature Review, which provides a review of the National Traffic Signal Report Card and Self- Assessment, case studies based on agency archetypes that provide an understanding of how agencies deliver traffic signal management services based on their resources and interviews with acknowledged leaders providing support for the basic service concept. A discussion of signal timing versatility in support of the role it plays in providing good basic service is included in the Appendix.

This report provides guidance to practitioners on effective strategies to mitigate the effects of congestion at signalized intersections. The scope is limited to single intersections and does not address network-level strategies. The strategies are defined in terms of their underlying objective. Under congested conditions, traditional objectives and performance measures shift from progression and minimizing delay to maximizing throughput and managing queues. Experts were interviewed to identify the strategies and tactics they used to address congested intersections, a discussion of their methods is presented. Selected strategies were studied further, particularly the belief that longer cycles are more efficient, and the effects of buses on signal timing in grid networks.