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Volpe Center Highlights - November/December 2006
Published & Presented
Letter from the Director | Tribute | Focus | Safety | Published & Presented
- The Safety of Push-Pull and Multiple-Unit Locomotive Passenger Rail Operations. This June 2006 report, written with support from the Volpe Center, was delivered by
the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) to the House and Senate
Appropriations Committees. The report was prepared in response to a request from
Congressman Adam Schiff (D-California) who had voiced safety concerns arising
from a train collision on January 26, 2005, in Glendale, California, in which 11
people were killed. The report has received numerous mentions in the California
and national media. Contributors included Ms. Karina Jacobsen, Mr. David Tyrell,
Mr. Brian Marquis, Mr. Eloy Martinez, and Mr. Dan Parent of the Structures and
Dynamics Division; Ms. Anya A. Carroll and Mr. Paul Bousquet of the Rail and
Transit Systems Division; and Mr. Bob Dorer, Deputy Director of the Office of
Surface Transportation Programs. The report can be downloaded at
http://www.fra.dot.gov/downloads/safety/
062606FRAPushPullLetterandReport.pdf.
- Security Implications of Changing Trends in Containerization. At the 81st Annual
Conference of the Western Economic Association International held in San Diego,
California, June 29-July 3, 2006, Dr. Bahar Barami of the Economic and Industry
Analysis Division presented "The Changing Economics of Containerization:
Implications for Homeland Security" to a panel on Economic Impacts from
Terrorism and Improved Security Measures,
organized by the U.S. Coast Guard. The paper
focused on how the economics of U.S. freight
transportation in the last two decades have
been shaped by three trends: an escalation in
global trade demands for containerized
goods, post-deregulation shifts in logistics
costs, and growing security concerns at the
nation's container gateways.
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Tire/Pavement Noise Studies. Dr. Judith
Rochat of the Environmental Measurement
and Modeling Division participated in the
Transportation Research Board's Summer
Meeting held in Williamsburg, Virginia,
July 9-12, 2006. As chair of the Highway Noise
Subcommittee, Committee on Transportation-
Related Noise and Vibration, Dr. Rochat presented
a paper, "Volpe Center Update on
Tire/Pavement Noise Studies." The Volpe
Center supports the Federal Aviation
Administration (FAA), the Federal Highway
Administration (FHWA), and other federal,
state, and local agencies in developing
measurement and modeling techniques
pertaining to the mitigation of transportationrelated
noise and exhaust emissions.
- Motor Carrier Data Quality Improvements.The Volpe Center supports the Federal Motor
Carrier Safety Administration's (FMCSA) Data
Quality Improvement Program, which uses a multifaceted approach to improve the
quality of data reported by states. Volpe team members delivered presentations
about various aspects of the program at the 32nd International Forum on Traffic
Records, held in Palm Desert, California, July 30-August 3, 2006.
- "State Data Quality Review Program." Ms. Beth Deysher of the Motor Carrier
Safety Division described the on-site state review and how it can be used to
identify areas to improve the quality of state-reported data.
- "FMCSA State Safety Data Quality: Enhancing the Evaluation." Ms. Courtney
Stevenson of the Motor Carrier Safety Division discussed proposed enhancements
to existing methodology currently used to evaluate the completeness,
timeliness, accuracy, and consistency of state-reported crash and roadsideinspection
data.
- "FMCSA Tools To Improve State Data Quality." Mr. Walter Zak of CASE LLC, a
Volpe Center on-site contractor, demonstrated online reports and tools available
to states to assist them in managing and improving data reported to FMCSA.
- Roadway Departure Crash Warning Study. At the Transportation Research Board's
Strategic Highway Research Program II Safety Research symposium in Washington,
D.C., August 16, 2006, Mr. Jonathan Koopmann of the Advanced Safety Technology
Division presented analytic techniques for assessing safety benefits and overall
lessons learned from the recently completed roadway departure crash warning
independent evaluation.
-
Railroad Bridge Security: Video image of a
trespasser on a railroad bridge.
Final Report on Railroad Bridge Security. For the FRA, Mr. Marco DaSilva of the
Advanced Safety Technology Division, Ms. Anya Carroll of the Rail and Transit
Systems Division, and Mr. William Baron of the Infrastructure Protection and
Operations Division contributed to a three-year demonstration of an automated
prototype security system on a railroad bridge. The main objective was to
demonstrate a stand-alone video-based trespass monitoring and deterrent system
for railroad infrastructure applications using Commercial-off-the-Shelf (COTS)
technology. The report, "Railroad Infrastructure Trespassing Detection Systems
Research in Pittsford, New York" (Report No. DOT/FRA/ORD-06/03; Washington,
D.C.: FRA, August 2006), can be downloaded at http://www.fra.dot.gov/downloads/Research/ord0603.pdf.
- Next Generation Air Transportation System. Dr. Thomas B. Sheridan and Dr. Judith
Bürki-Cohen of the Human Factors Division and Dr. Kevin Corker of the National
Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) coauthored "Human Transient intothe-
Loop Simulation for NGATS," which was published in the proceedings of the
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Modeling and Simulation
Conference held in Keystone, Colorado, August 21-24, 2006. (AIAA-2006-6114)
The paper was prepared as part of the "Human Automation Interaction in NGATS"
project, sponsored by the NASA Airspace Systems Program.
- Integrated Crash Warning System. Dr. Wassim Najm of the Advanced Safety
Technology Division coauthored a paper presented at the Performance Metrics for
Intelligent Systems (PerMIS) workshop held at the National Institute of Standards
and Technology (NIST) in Gaithersburg, Maryland, August 21-23, 2006.
"Performance Evaluation of Integrated Vehicle-Based Safety Systems" was
coauthored by Mr. Jack Ference of the National Highway Traffic Safety
Administration (NHTSA) and Mr. Sandor Szabo of NIST. The paper, presented by
Mr. Ference, describes a program to develop and test an integrated crash warning
system that addresses rear-end, lane-change, and roadway-departure collisions for
passenger cars and heavy commercial trucks. The paper can be downloaded from
http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/departments/nrd-12/ pubs_rev.html.
- Air Quality Monitoring Tool. Mr. Gregg Fleming of the Environmental
Measurement and Modeling Division presented a paper, "Using the Federal
Aviation Administration's SAGE Model to Conduct Global Inventories and to Access
Route-Specific Variability in Aviation Fuel Burn, Emissions, and Costs," at the 25th
Congress of the International Council of the Aeronautical Sciences, held in
Hamburg, Germany, September 2-9, 2006. The Volpe Center supports the FAA
Office of Environment and Energy by improving, enhancing, and validating
evaluation and modeling tools. The FAA seeks international acceptance of these
tools for determining potential impacts of policy, technology, and operations on
global aviation-related noise, emissions, and fuel burn.
- Travel Model Improvement System. At the Transportation Research Board's "Tools
of the Trade 10th National Conference on Transportation Planning for Small and
Medium-Sized Communities" held in Nashville, Tennessee, September 13-15, 2006,
Ms. Ann Steffes of the Planning and Policy Analysis Division presented "Issues and
Lessons Learned from the TMIP Peer Review Program." The paper covers methodological
lessons extracted from 13 peer reviews of regional travel-demand models.
The peer reviews are sponsored by FHWA's Travel Model Improvement Program
(TMIP). The Volpe Center supports the program by working with host agencies
(metropolitan planning organizations and state departments of transportation) to
plan the events and write a report summarizing the proceedings.
- Track Safety Standards. Mr. Brian Marquis of the Structures and Dynamics Division
presented a paper, "Recent Studies in Support of the Federal Railroad
Administration's (FRA) Track Safety Standards," at the track safety symposium
"Improving the Track Safety Rules— A Roadmap for Improvements," held in
Louisville, Kentucky, September 20-21, 2006.
- Human-Computer Interaction in Aeronautics. At the International Conference on
Human-Computer Interaction in Aeronautics, held in Seattle, Washington,
September 20-22, 2006, Dr. Michelle Yeh and Dr. Divya Chandra, both of the
Human Factors Division, presented two papers, "Pilot Stereotypes for Navigation
Symbols on Electronic Displays" and "Evaluating Electronic Flight Bags in the
Real World."
- Final Report on Red Light Violations. For NHTSA, Dr. Wassim Najm of the
Advanced Safety Technology Division and Dr. David Yang, formerly of the Division,
produced a final report, "Analysis of Red Light Violation Data Collected from
Intersections Equipped with Red Light Photo Enforcement Cameras," to support
the development of effective crash countermeasures. The goal of this analysis was to
understand the correlation between red light violations and various driver, intersection,
and environmental factors. The report can be downloaded at http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/departments/nrd-12/
IntelligentTransportationSystems.html.
- Disassembly Expert Contributes to Scholarly and Management Studies. Product
disassembly takes place prior to remanufacturing, recycling, or disposal. An
efficient disassembly line requires a mathematical approach to the disassembly linebalancing
problem. Dr. Seamus McGovern of the Terminal and Surface Systems
Division recently coauthored:
- "Deterministic Hybrid and Stochastic Combinatorial Optimization Treatments of
an Electronic Product Disassembly Line," a chapter in a peer-reviewed book,
Applications of Management Science, Volume 12, published by Elsevier Science-North
Holland, Amsterdam, 2006.
- "Ant Colony Optimization for Disassembly Sequencing with Multiple
Objectives," a peer-reviewed research paper published in the September 2006
issue of The International Journal of Advanced Manufacturing Technology.
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