11th edition of the national MUTCD has been released
By: Tiffany Kautz, Traffic Standards Engineer, MnDOT Office of Traffic Engineering
On December 19, 2023, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) published the 11th edition of the (national) Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD). For me, this is very exciting news! For practitioners working with traffic control devices in Minnesota, nothing much will change right now. Please continue to use the current Minnesota Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MN MUTCD) until a new MN MUTCD is published (in about two years).
The national MUTCD is the backbone of the MN MUTCD. This publication puts us closer to a new MN MUTCD. The MN MUTCD must be in substantial conformance with the national MUTCD. Generally, this means that the MN MUTCD can be more (but not less) strict than the national MUTCD.
Minnesota has 2 years (from the effective date of the national MUTCD) to publish a new MN MUTCD that’s in substantial conformance. We’ve been preparing for this update. The Framework for MN MUTCD Rewrite (PDF) provides a high level overview of the rewrite process and our goals. If you are interested in helping with this rewrite effort, please reach out to me, Tiffany Kautz, at tiffany.kautz@state.mn.us.