Volpe Technical Experts
Anya A. Carroll,
Ms. Anya A. Carroll, a civil engineer and research scientist at the Center for more than two decades, is a Domain Expert in Surface Transportation Operations. She is recognized as an international authority on safety issues related to highway and rail operations. For 19 years, Ms. Carroll has led the Center's efforts to support the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) and other modal agencies such as the Intelligent Transportation Systems’ Joint Program Office in finding ways to reduce the number of collisions between trains and road vehicles and the resulting fatalities and injuries.
Ms. Carroll has guided the Center in support of numerous legislative efforts by the FRA including active signal systems inspection, maintenance and testing, locomotive and freight car conspicuity, and railroad horn systems. Evaluations of innovative technologies such as the recently completed, Volpe developed, Railroad Infrastructure Automated Trespass Detection System mitigating the US DOT’s highest rail incident fatality rate was completed in 2007. Other significant research to include the highway-rail grade crossing consolidation evaluations, methodologies and guidelines are underway. The use of Intelligent Transportation Systems at highway-rail intersections as well as recent state-of-the-art obstacle and intrusion detection technologies for railroad infrastructure safety and security are just a few examples.
Ms. Carroll has played a significant role in national and international symposia, workshops and seminars that have brought together academia, railroad industry experts, and stakeholders from different modalities and nationalities in the area of rail safety research. Ms. Carroll is the author of numerous papers and reports in the area of rail safety and presides over the National Academy of Sciences Transportation Research Board's Committee on Highway Rail Grade Crossings, AHB60. She also mentors and provides technical leadership to various multidisciplinary teams at Volpe to include the Rail and Transit Systems Division team conducting analytic and experimental research as the sole expertise in support of the US DOT Federal Railroad Administration.
