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Volpe Center Highlights - November/December 2005

Director's Notes

Director's Notes | Focus | Safety | Mobility | Environmental Stewardship
Security | Organizational Excellence | Awards | Published and Presented

35 Years of Creating Innovative Transportation Systems Solutions

This year, the Volpe Center is celebrating its 35th anniversary. In 1970, the Center was established in response to increasing national awareness of the need to improve the nation's transportation system. Effecting these improvements required the application of a wide range of technical disciplines and an understanding of the ramifications of technology deployment in transportation. From the start, the Center has embodied a system-level perspective, with broad-based research one of its primary activities. A crossmodal, multiclient approach has made the Center an important resource for information, concepts, and solutions.

The Center has evolved in response to transportation advances and changing national priorities. Its strength lies in this ability to anticipate change, articulate transportation issues, and focus on the applications—and implications—of new technologies and systems. The past decades have been characterized by wide-ranging accomplishments in support of DOT's modal administrations. This work will continue, and will be strengthened by our position as part of the Research and Innovative Tech-nology Administration (RITA). In its Report to Congress, RITA defines its role as a resource for coordinating and advancing research efforts within DOT.

To further its mission, RITA will implement a number of crosscutting strategies to facilitate solutions to America's transportation challenges. One such strategy is the creation of new crossmodal working groups in areas such as hydrogen technology, remote sensing, and human factors. The Volpe Center is particularly well suited to support a crosscutting approach. For example, the Center has been a key player in DOT's Human Factors Coordinating Committee, one of the first crossmodal working groups. This committee is developing and implementing a national strategic agenda for intermodal human factors research and application, and providing a significant information resource for the transportation community.

This year, we celebrate our people and their accomplishments. Future challenges will involve new modalities, technologies, and energy sources that must be subjected to careful scrutiny to ensure their safety and effectiveness. As part of RITA, the Volpe Center will support the strategic goals of DOT as it faces new and continuing challenges with flexibility and innovation.

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