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Volpe Center Highlights - January 1999

Safety

Director's Notes | Focus | Safety | Mobility | Human and Natural Environment |
Economic Growth and Trade | National Security | Published and Presented

Promote public health and safety by working toward the elimination of transportation-related deaths, injuries, and property damage.

Volpe Center Participates in TRB Session on High Speed Rail Safety

Dr. Sherry Borener, of the Accident Prevention Division, presented a review of the Volpe developed Corridor Risk Assessment Model at a TRB session entitled, "Advances in High-Speed Rail Safety." The session focused on risk analysis methods and techniques for passenger and freight train operations. The Corridor Risk Assessment Model identifies cost-effective improvements for highway-railroad grade crossings on high-speed rail corridors by determining risk impacts of higher train speeds and the risk reduction benefits of alternative safety improvements at grade crossings. The session also included presentations on the Center’s risk analysis of passenger train crashworthiness.

Volpe Staff Member Assumes Chairmanship of TRB Committee

Dr. Robert Dorer, of the High Speed Ground Transportation Division, assumed the Chairmanship of the TRB Committee on Guided Intercity Passenger Transportation. One of the topics for future work of the committee (in addition to TRB's principal focuses of information sharing and research need planning) will be to highlight the high degree of safety that already exists for this mode and to orient research needs development to rationalizing risk analysis across transportation modes. The Guided Intercity Passenger Transportation Committee is also working on a publication about the direction of the transportation field in the next century, which will be part of a major TRB publication for the new millennium.

Railroad Safety and Performance Research Presented

For over 25 years, the Volpe Center has been working with the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) to improve railroad safety and performance, in part through research to better detect potential defects in rail structures. Rail equipment crashworthiness research conducted by Volpe’s Structures and Dynamics Division has recommended strategies to improve crashworthiness and the application of analytic tools and test techniques to evaluate the effectiveness of those strategies. Messrs. John Choros, Brian Marquis, Andrew Sluz, David Tyrell, Herbert Weinstock, and John Zolock, all of the Structures and Dynamics Division, participated in various TRB sessions and workshops related to railroad safety and performance: Mr. Choros attended the meeting of the Committee on Railway Track Maintenance. Mr. Marquis gave a presentation to the Vehicle-Track Interaction, Part 1 Section entitled, "Modeling and Testing to Evaluate Low Speed Derailment Potential of Equalized Truck Designs" which summarized the simulation studies and measurements that have been made regarding the investigation of Low Speed Derailments in Sharp Turnouts. Mr. Sluz attended the annual meeting of the Committee on Rail Transit Design, of which he is a member. Messrs. Tyrell and Alan Bing of Arthur D. Little, Inc., presented a technical paper entitled, "Risk Assessment and Cost-Benefit Analysis of Rail Passenger Car Crashworthiness Improvements."

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