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Volpe Center Highlights - Fall 2005

Published and Presented

Director's Notes | Focus | Safety | Mobility | Organizational Excellence | Awards
Published and Presented | Volpe Journal

• National Environmental Policy Act. Two Volpe Center staff members wrote papers that were published in the proceedings of the National Association of Environmental Professionals 30th Annual Conference held in Alexandria, Virginia, April 16-19, 2005. The papers highlight different aspects of the role of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).

  • Ms. Jennifer Papazian "The Role of NEPA in National Transportation Projects: The National Parks Service Air Tour Management Plan Program as a Case Study."

  • Dr. Amishi Joshi wrote "The Role of NEPA in Agency Decision-Making: The U.S. Maglev Deployment Program as a Case Study."

• Technologies for Homeland Security. The Volpe Center co-sponsored and participated in the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Conference on Technologies for Homeland Security held in Boston, Massachusetts, April 26, 2005. The conference theme was "Advanced Sensors for Personnel, Baggage, and Cargo Security." Volpe Center presenters included the following.

  • Dr. Aviva Brecher of the Office of Environmental Preservation and Systems Modernization and Mr. Michael Rossetti of the Surveillance and Assessment Division presented "Defining Transportation Security Data Needs and Standards for Networked Sensors."

  • Mr. Robert Hoaglund, CPP, of the Infrastructure Protection and Operations Division presented "The Challenges of Technical Security Screening at Seaport Terminals."

• Acoustical Analysis of Wake Vortices. Volpe Center staff from the Surveillance and Assessment Division presented papers discussing a wake acoustics test designed and carried out jointly by the Volpe Center and NASA in 2003 at Denver International Airport to study the feasibility of using passive acoustic sensors as a means to detect and track wake vortices. It resulted in one of the richest data sets ever collected on the sound generated by wake vortices.

  • Mr. Hadi Wassaf presented "Acoustical Spectral Analysis of a Wake Vortex Cross-Section Using Microphone-Arrays" at the 149th meeting of the Acoustical Society of America held in Vancouver, Canada, May 15-20, 2005. Mr. Wassaf co-authored the paper with colleagues from the University of Massachusetts Lowell, OptiNav Inc., and the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

  • Dr. Frank Y. Wang, Mr. Hadi Wassaf, and Mr. Andrew Gulsrud presented "Acoustic Imaging of Aircraft Wake Vortex Dynamics" at the 23rd American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Applied Aerodynamics Conference held in Toronto, Canada, June 6-9, 2005. Colleagues from North West Research Associates and Aviation Turbulence Research co-authored the paper. (AIAA 2005-4849).

• Transit Planning and ITS. Dr. Scott Smith of the Service and Operations Assessment Division presented "Transit Planning and Intelligent Transportation Systems" at the Transportation Research Board's 10th Transportation Planning Applications Conference held in Portland, Oregon, April 24-28, 2005. The paper introduced a handbook that the Volpe Center developed to outline opportunities for incorporating the impacts of transit Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) improvements into current planning models and techniques. The project is sponsored by the Federal Transit Administration's Office of Planning with support from the ITS Joint Program Office.

• Electronic Flight Bag Industry Review. In April 2005, the Volpe Center published Electronic Flight Bag (EFB): 2005 Industry Review (DOT-VNTSC-FAA-05-06). The report, a review of the EFB industry, provides information about EFB systems, software/content, and hardware that are currently on the market or in active development. It was prepared by Dr. Michelle Yeh and Dr. Divya Chandra of the Operator Performance and Safety Analysis Division. This work is part of the Division's ongoing human factors support to the Federal Aviation Administration. The report is available at www.volpe.dot.gov/library/pp05.html.

• Vehicle Collision Avoidance Technologies. On May 4, 2005, Dr. David Yang of the Advanced Safety Technology Division presented "Lessons Learned from Vehicle Crash Statistics and their Implications to U.S. DOT's Research Activities" at the Intelligent Transportation Society of America's annual meeting held in Phoenix, Arizona. In his presentation, Dr. Yang showed various bus and passenger vehicle crash statistics generated from the Federal Transit Administration's National Transit Database and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's General Estimates System. He also discussed five current U.S. DOT projects that are studying and developing vehicle collision avoidance technologies. Work related to this presentation is part of Volpe Center's ongoing support to the U.S. DOT's Intelligent Transportation System Program.

• Decision Sciences Institute. Dr. Seamus McGovern of the Airport Surface Division presented "Stochastic and Deterministic Combinational Optimization Solutions for an Electronic Product Disassembly Flow Shop" at the 2005 Northeast Decision Sciences Institute Conference held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, March 30 to April 1, 2005.

• Alternative Transportation Evaluation. Ms. Frances Switkes of the Service and Operations Assessment Division and Dr. Jeffrey Bryan of the Planning and Policy Analysis Division co-authored Minute Man National Historical Park Alternative Transportation Evaluation Final Report, for the National Park Service, April 2005 (DOT-VNTSC-NPS-05-06). The report is available at www.volpe.dot.gov/nps/docs/minuteman-2.pdf.

• Motor Carrier Safety. Ms. Sarah Dammen of the Economic and Industry Analysis Division published "The Effects of Safety Practices, Technology Adoption, and Firm Characteristics on Motor Carrier Safety" in Journal of the Transportation Research Forum, v. 44, n. 1, Spring 2005, pp. 103-120.

• Highway-Railroad Grade Crossings. Dr. Monica Gil of the Operator Performance and Safety Analysis Division presented "Driver Compliance and Noncompliance at Actively Protected Highway-Railroad Grade Crossings" at the Western Regional Grade-Crossing Safety Training Conference held in Costa Mesa, California, May 17-20, 2005.

• Transit Security Design. Mr. Matthew Rabkin of the Planning and Policy Analysis Division presented an overview of the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) Security Design Considerations at the American Public Transportation Association 2005 Rail Conference held June 6-8, 2005 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Mr. Rabkin also presented the overview at the FTA's Annual Engineers Meeting in Pittsburgh.

• Deicing Decision Support Tool. Dr. Jonathan Lee presented "Detroit Deicing Decision Support Tool" at the 5th Integrated Communications Navigation and Surveillance Conference & Workshop held in Fairfax, Virginia, May 2-5, 2005. A Volpe Center team developed the Deicing Decision Support Tool, which will enable airport and Northwest Airlines personnel to more efficiently manage aircraft moving through the deicing stations.

• Automotive Collision Avoidance System. Dr. Wassim Najm of the Advanced Safety Technology Division presented "Overview and Evaluation of the Automotive Collision Avoidance System Field Operational Test (ACAS FOT)," at the SAE 2005 Government/ Industry Meeting held in Washington, D.C., May 10, 2005.

The Vessel Identification and Positioning System uses differential GPS-based transponders and shore-side base stations to help ensure port security. (View larger image.)

• Communication, Navigation, and Surveillance. Several Volpe Center staff members participated in the 61st Annual Meeting of the Institute of Navigation held in Cambridge, Massachusetts, June 27-29, 2005.

  • Mr. William Baron of the Infrastructure Protection and Operations Division presented "Development of the Guardian Vehicle Tracking and Emergency Communications System."

  • Dr. James Carroll of the Surveillance and Assessment Division was a co-chair of a Communication, Navigation, and Surveillance (CNS) session titled "CNS Applications Enabled by Radionavigation," and presented a paper in that session on field test results on performance of a GPS/Loran-C/Dead Reckoning tracking system developed by the Volpe Center.

  • Mr. David Phinney of the Technology Applications and Deploy-ment Division presented "Data Presentation Considerations for Land and Water Surveillance and Navigation Systems."

  • Mr. Henry Wychorski of the Technology Applications and Deployment Division presented "The Vessel Identification and Positioning System--Key Element to Harbor Security."

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