The American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) Standing Committee on the Environment (SCOE) is called on periodically to provide information to establish policies and positions of the state transportation departments on environmental issues associated with the nation's transportation system. The committee needs information, on a prompt schedule, about new environmental analyses, streamlining, environmental stewardship, and planning methods and procedures. This information supports member departments efforts to effectively respond to program delivery and project development challenges, opportunities, and issues. Among other applications, SCOE needs to be responsive to the AASHTO Board of Directors and others involved in legislative matters. When new or revised federal transportation environmental and planning regulations are proposed or finalized, research is often required to develop new methods, processes, and procedures to ensure their effective and timely implementation by the states and metropolitan planning organizations. NCHRP Project 25-25 was created to respond to these needs. NCHRP Project 25-25A is a request for qualifications to select at least two task-order contractors to carry out the quick-response environmental research activities described above. Proposers should realize that research assistance and contracts may be secured, albeit infrequently, through various other mechanisms such as sole source contracts to obtain specialized project support or through standard requests for proposals for larger, more complex projects. For studies selected by NCHRP Project Panel 25-25 and approved by the AASHTO SCOE, the selected task-order contractors will be asked to prepare a short proposal with a research plan and budget. NCHRP Project Panel 25-25 will use the proposals to award individual task orders. Some tasks may require organizing, conducting, and facilitating workshops or interviews with practitioners to develop state-of-the-practice syntheses, guidebooks, compendiums, and communication tools.
KW - Environment
KW - Environmental impacts
KW - Environmental policy
KW - Policy
KW - Policy, legislation and regulation
KW - State departments of transportation
UR - http://www.trb.org/TRBNet/ProjectDisplay.asp?ProjectID=2429
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1232751
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01111949
AU - Rephlo, Jennifer A
AU - Haas, Robert
AU - Feast, L
AU - Newton, D
AU - Science Applications International Corporation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
AU - Research and Innovative Technology Administration
AU - Federal Transit Administration
TI - Evaluation of Transit Applications of Advanced Parking Management Systems - Final Evaluation Report
PY - 2008/05/09/Final Evaluation Report
SP - 82p
AB - Throughout the United States, transportation agencies have begun implementing advanced parking information systems to increase customer satisfaction and to improve traffic operations. Through the use of variable message signs, these systems provide motorists with real-time information about parking availability at appropriate decision points on their route so that they can make an informed decision about where to park. These systems are being deployed in a variety of environments including central business districts, airports, and transit park-and-ride lots. The goals in deploying such a system can vary depending on the operating environment. When deployed in a transit environment, goals can include improved user satisfaction, increased parking utilization at a lot that is currently under-utilized, and increased transit ridership. This report presents the results of an independent national evaluation of two transit applications of parking management systems: one that was deployed in conjunction with two Metra Stations in suburbs southwest of Chicago, Illinois and the other which was deployed in conjunction with two Metro Stations in Montgomery County, Maryland. The study documents quantified system impacts in terms of parking utilization, transit ridership and mode choice, traffic circulation within and between transit park and ride lots, and customer satisfaction. It also includes an institutional issues review that includes organizational and institutional challenges encountered by the project stakeholders throughout the course of deployment and operation of these systems. The evaluation involved conducting passenger intercept surveys of transit riders, gathering data on transit ridership, gathering archived system data that documents in and out counts at the lots, as well as conducting a series of interviews with the staff. The results of the study indicate that it is unclear whether the parking management systems increased parking utilization or transit ridership, or whether they reduced circulation within and between park-and-ride lots. The results do indicate that commuters are in general satisfied with the sign locations and accuracy (and that they would like to see similar signs at other locations). In terms of mode share, although not many, a few respondents did indicate that the signs have affected how often they take transit and that the parking availability information has caused them to take transit rather than driving. Finally, the results show that, depending on the circumstances, parking management systems can increase driver awareness of parking alternatives or reduce circulation within and between lots.
KW - Advanced parking information systems
KW - Advanced parking management systems
KW - Case studies
KW - Chicago (Illinois)
KW - Customer satisfaction
KW - Institutional issues
KW - Montgomery County (Maryland)
KW - Park and ride
KW - Parking availability
KW - Parking management
KW - Public transit
KW - Real time information
KW - Ridership
KW - Variable message signs
UR - http://www.fta.dot.gov/documents/ParkingManagementEvaluationReport.pdf
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/30000/30500/30588/14432.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/871511
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01100770
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Pavement Management Systems Peer Exchange Program Report (Sharing the Experiences of the California, Minnesota, New York, and Utah Departments of Transportation)
PY - 2008/05/08
SP - 42p
AB - In 2008, the Federal Highway Administration’s (FHWA’s) Office of Asset Management initiated a Peer Exchange Program to promote the effective use of Pavement Management Systems (PMS) in general and more informed decision making in particular. The first two Peer Exchange meetings allowed representatives from the New York State Department of Transportation (NYSDOT) and the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) to meet with pavement management practitioners in Minnesota and Utah to learn more about the use of their pavement management program to support investment decisions and to influence project and treatment selection. Through the Peer Exchange meetings, which were held early in February, representatives from the Minnesota Department of Transportation (Mn/DOT) and Utah Department of Transportation (UDOT) presented information explaining how pavement management tools are being used to: provide the information used for long-term planning to address future pavement needs; establish strategic performance targets based on realistic estimates of future funding levels; set investment levels for pavement preservation programs that extend the life of pavements in relatively good condition before more costly rehabilitation is needed; support the project and treatment decision process in the Districts and Regions by providing them with useful information that can substantially influence their work program; and conduct engineering and economic analyses that evaluate the cost-effectiveness of treatment options in support of the agency’s asset management practices. This report summarizes the use of pavement management tools to support agency decisions in UDOT and Mn/DOT, provides tips for procuring new pavement management software, and identifies institutional issues that must be addressed to make the most of a pavement management program. It closes with a summary of the key factors influencing the successful 2 pavement management practices in UDOT and Mn/DOT, which include the following considerations: Consistency in the pavement management personnel operating the system; The use of quality data so the pavement management program provides reliable recommendations; A strong relationship with the software providers so any issues that arise can be addressed immediately; A commitment to pavement management concepts throughout the organization; The involvement of pavement management stakeholders in decisions regarding changes to the analysis models; The use of software tools that are flexible enough to adapt to the changing environment in which they must operate. The strong pavement management programs in each of the host agencies have resulted in improvements in the quality of information used to make investment decisions. Both Mn/DOT and UDOT have been able to use their pavement management information to effectively revise investment priorities during periods in which competition for available funding has increased. As a result, both agencies have established strategic plans that increase the emphasis on system preservation and align their project and treatment selection process in accordance with those plans. As the Peer Exchange meetings demonstrated, strong pavement management programs can benefit transportation agencies tremendously. The information provided during the meetings, which is documented in this report, provides valuable insight into the practices of the participating transportation agencies and the factors that have contributed most to their success. The information is provided so that other agencies can benefit from the experience and develop strategies that enhance their own pavement management practices.
KW - Asset management
KW - California Department of Transportation
KW - Cost effectiveness
KW - Data quality
KW - Decision making
KW - Institutional issues
KW - Investments
KW - Long range planning
KW - Minnesota Department of Transportation
KW - New York State Department of Transportation
KW - Pavement management systems
KW - Pavement preservation
KW - Peer exchange
KW - Software
KW - Strategic planning
KW - Utah Department of Transportation
UR - http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/asset/pmspeer/pmspeer.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/860543
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01103418
AU - Wang, Kelvin C P
AU - Gong, Weiguo
AU - Hou, Zhiqiong
AU - Mack-Blackwell Transportation Center
AU - Research and Special Programs Administration
TI - Networked Sensor System for Automated Data Collection and Analysis
PY - 2008/05/07/Technical Report
SP - 20p
AB - This research describes the development of a real-time multi-functional system for roadway data acquisition and analysis with multiple sensors. This system, Digital Highway Data Vehicle (DHDV), combined the technologies of laser illumination based digital imaging, inertial profiling and GPS mapping into an integrated system to accomplish the multiple tasks of survey and management for roadway data. It can capture the pavement surface images, the right-of-way (ROW) color images, the roughness and rutting data at a driving speed over 100km/h (60 mph). The resolution of the pavement images is 1-mm in both longitudinal and transverse directions with the use of high resolution gray-scale line cameras. The image covers 4-meter full lane width. ROW color images are acquired with multiple high resolution color frame cameras. The pavement distress analysis and road sign inventory can be conducted in real time. The system provides a comprehensive database engine which streams various imaging and location data into the on-board computer system as the data sets become available. This research presents the designs of this comprehensive data acquisition and analysis platform with respect to multi-function, integration and automation. The reliability and efficiency of DHDV have been demonstrated in different agencies with thousands of running miles.
KW - Automatic data collection systems
KW - Condition surveys
KW - Digital Highway Data Vehicle
KW - Pavement conditions
KW - Pavement performance
KW - Real time information
KW - Sensors
UR - http://www.uark.edu/rd_engr/MBTC/Final_Report_MBTC_2077_Networked_Sensor_System_for_Automated_Data_Collection_and_Analysis.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/863020
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01103378
AU - Wang, Kelvin C P
AU - Gong, Weiguo
AU - Hou, Zhiqiong
AU - Mack-Blackwell Transportation Center
AU - Research and Special Programs Administration
TI - Automated Inventory and Analysis of Highway Assets, Phase-II
PY - 2008/05/07/Technical Report
SP - 21p
AB - Road signs play an important role in highway system management by providing drivers and road users guidance, warning and other driving related information. Proper sign maintenance and inventory is therefore necessary. Sign inventory system is an essential tool for infrastructure management and maintenance. Currently, sign inventory is mostly conducted by human observation of the digital images of roadway scenes. Automated system would substantially improve the processing speed and accuracy of two key processing tasks, sign detection and sign classification, since the human observation of the large amount of images is tedious, error-prone and time-consuming. The research in this final report emphasizes on the study of the classification. Classification is to categorize signs into proper classes, which is important and also more difficult for automation in the automated sign inventory system. The most frequently used technique in previous research for classification is neural network. However, neural network has the local minimum problem. In addition, neural network lacks explainable inner theoretical rule which brings difficulty to fine tune the performance of the model. This research presents a method for sign classification which combines feature extraction, Support Vector Machine (SVM), and multi-class classification. SVM is a statistical learning method based on Vapnik-Chervonenkis (VC) dimension and structural minimum principle. It is supposed to overcome the aforementioned two drawbacks of neural network method. The feature extraction is accomplished by Principal Component Analysis (PCA) which reduces the dimension of the image as well as keeping the most important features. Preliminary experimental result presented in the report demonstrates that the SVM method has potential to solve the road sign classification problem.
KW - Asset management
KW - Classification
KW - Feature extraction
KW - Highways
KW - Inventory
KW - Maintenance
KW - Statistical analysis
KW - Traffic signs
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/27000/27000/27002/MBTC_202097_20Final_20Report.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/863022
ER -
TY - ABST
AN - 01462031
TI - Technical Support for Two-Lift Paving Construction in Kansas
AB - This research project is intended to demonstrate the effective use of a lower quality of aggregate in the lower layer of the 2-lift paving and the effect of using higher quality material and texturing techniques in the upper layer. The cost effectiveness of using a variety of aggregates on the project will be documented.
KW - Kansas
KW - Pavement layers
KW - Paving
KW - Paving materials
KW - Research projects
KW - Road construction
KW - Technical support
KW - Texture
UR - http://www.intrans.iastate.edu/research/detail.cfm?projectID=-696405275
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1230251
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01115361
AU - Hughes, Ronald G
AU - Scott, Jeremy
AU - Ferrara, Greg
AU - North Carolina State University, Raleigh
AU - North Carolina Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Estimating the Off-Network Presence of STAA Dimensioned Vehicles on North Carolina Roadways Using CMV Crash Data, 2001-2005
PY - 2008/05/06/Final Report
SP - 94p
AB - The present study used commercial motor vehicle crash data from North Carolina Department of Transportation's (NCDOT’s) Traffic Engineering Accident Analysis System (TEAAS) to infer the presence and relative extent of Surface Transportation Assistance Act (STAA) dimensioned vehicles operating beyond the three-mile buffer of the present STAA Truck Network in North Carolina. STAA dimensioned vehicles include trailers 53 feet or greater in length and double trailers. STAA routes in North Carolina constitute only about eight percent of all state-maintained roadway miles. The data showed that approximately 87 percent of all large truck crashes took place on STAA network roads during the period 2001-2005. While only 13 percent of large truck involved crashes took place on roads ‘off’ the network, the likelihood of any given off-network crash involving a fatality was twice that of a crash taking place on the network. Off network crashes involving large trucks are problematic for reasons other than safety, especially in metropolitan areas where operations, irrespective of crash involvement, are associated with traffic delays (due to the maneuvering/turning requirements of larger vehicles) and infrastructure damage. The report provides GIS ‘maps’ of each of the eight North Carolina State Highway Patrol (NCSHP) troop areas, the network and its three-mile buffer and the location and severity of all large truck-involved crashes reported as taking place ‘off’ the network. The report also provides a detailed description of the attributes of off-network crashes for 2001-2005 for each NCSHP troop. Several criteria were explored as a means for ranking troop areas in terms of need for STAA improvements. The report also identifies specific off-network routes at the county and troop levels having the highest numbers of crashes per mile. Recommendations are provided for ‘next steps’ as well as a plan for technology transfer and implementation.
KW - Commercial vehicles
KW - Crash severity
KW - Crashes
KW - Networks
KW - North Carolina Department of Transportation
KW - Size
KW - Surface Transportation Assistance Act
KW - Trucks
UR - http://itre.ncsu.edu/VAMS/CVS/documents/STAA-Final-Report.pdf
UR - http://www.ncdot.org/doh/preconstruct/tpb/research/download/2007-14BFinalReport.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/873896
ER -
TY - ABST
AN - 01464555
TI - Research for the AASHTO Standing Committee on the Environment. Task 45. Transportation Program Responses to Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Reduction Initiatives and Energy Reduction Programs
AB - The prospect of global warming caused by an increase in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions is a major policy issue. According to the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT), the transportation sector is currently responsible for approximately one-quarter of GHG emissions in the United States and a majority of fuel consumption. Within the Federal-aid highway program states and metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs) have the major decision-making authority for highway construction projects and system operations. Research is needed to understand the relative GHG reduction and energy efficiency capability of transportation related strategies that States and MPOs can deliver. Research is also needed to develop a critical path for state transportation departments and MPOs to follow when participating in state or regional efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and energy efficiency improvements.
KW - Air quality management
KW - Energy conservation
KW - Energy consumption
KW - Environmental impacts
KW - Greenhouse gases
KW - Metropolitan planning organizations
KW - Pollutants
KW - Research projects
KW - Strategic planning
UR - http://www.trb.org/TRBNet/ProjectDisplay.asp?ProjectID=1663
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1232786
ER -
TY - ABST
AN - 01459761
TI - Corrosion Evaluation of Post-Tensioned Tendons Embedded in Concrete Bridges
AB - The Coatings and Corrosion Laboratory at Turner-Fairbank Highway Research Center of Federal Highway Administration launched an in-house corrosion study addressing a very critical durability issue related to post-tensioned concrete bridges. Currently, there are no effective non-destructive corrosion detection techniques to diagnose corrosion activities hidden inside post-tensioned tendons despite growing number of this type of bridge structures. Accelerated corrosion testing is being conducted with five 4-in. diameter and 7-10 ft. long field tendons and two mock-up laboratory specimens. Condition of the deteriorated tendon specimens will be assessed, in terms of section loss and extent of corrosion, by several experimental techniques such as Magnetic Flux Leakage (MFL) and other non destructive evaluation (NDE) methods. Reliable NDE technique(s) with accuracy and reproducibility will be identified in the end of the study.
KW - Concrete bridges
KW - Corrosion
KW - Corrosion rate
KW - Durability
KW - Posttensioning
KW - Research projects
KW - Tendons
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1227976
ER -
TY - ABST
AN - 01464581
TI - Development of Fatigue Loading and Design Methodology for High-Mast Lighting Poles
AB - Recent failures of high-mast lighting poles in several states have raised questions as to the robustness and safety of the existing inventory of these structures. Fatigue failures have occurred at the base plate-to-column weld, handhole detail, and anchor rods. Several of the failed poles had been in service for less than 5 years. Based on field observations and forensic analysis of high-mast lighting poles, it is believed that wind-induced vibrations have a significant influence on the fatigue life. Neither the magnitude of the loads or the frequency of the application is understood. The current American Association of State Highway & Transportation Officials (AASHTO) specification does not adequately address these topics. Research is needed to define the fatigue loading for the safe design of high-mast lighting poles. A design methodology and specification with the associated commentary also is needed. The objectives of this research are to develop (1) loading and analysis criteria for use in the fatigue design of high-mast lighting poles and (2) a design method and specifications for high-mast lighting poles.
KW - Columns
KW - High mast lighting
KW - Lighting columns
KW - Specifications
KW - Traffic safety
KW - Wind
UR - http://www.trb.org/TRBNet/ProjectDisplay.asp?ProjectID=1626
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1232812
ER -
TY - ABST
AN - 01464622
TI - Guide for Pavement-Type Selection
AB - The
Mechanistic Empirical Pavement Design Guide, recently developed under NCHRP Project 1-37A (http://www.trb.org/mepdg/guide.htm), presents the broad issues involved in pavement type and strategy selection.
These issues include engineering considerations (e.g., roadway/lane geometrics, roadway foundation, and roadway peripheral features); traffic considerations; environmental considerations; construction considerations (e.g., availability of local materials or contractor capabilities, recycling, and conservation of materials and energy); other considerations (e.g., performance of similar pavements in the area, adjacent existing pavements, traffic safety, incorporation of experimental features, stimulation of competition, and recognition of local industry and local government preferences); and economic considerations (e.g., life-cycle cost). However, this Guide does not identify specific procedures for comparing alternatives and making selections.
Also, recent developments in construction practices, contracting approaches, material utilization, and other factors are expected to influence the selection process and should be considered. The pavement-type selection process traditionally uses life-cycle cost analysis (LCCA) concepts to model the cost of pavement alternatives during a performance period.
However, some state departments of transportation (DOTs) have begun developing processes that provide for selection of pavement type or other highway materials through the bid process.
The selection process is then accomplished through the alternate design/alternate bidding (ADAB) procedure that allows the bidding contractors to select the pavement type that will be constructed.
There are several forms of pavement selection processes but they have not been well documented.
Also, c
oncerns have arisen in recent years regarding the effectiveness and equity of pavement-type selection processes. Research is needed to identify current practices, review relevant information, and develop rational processes that consider all relevant factors and thus provide a realistic means for pavement-type selection. Also, there is a need to prepare a Guide for Pavement-Type Selection to facilitate use of these processes. Such a Guide will help highway engineers and administrators with the task of pavement-type selection. The objective of this research is to develop a Guide for Pavement-Type Selection. The Guide shall include processes for consideration in making decisions regarding pavement-type selection as well as agency-based (decision is internal to the highway agency) and contractor-based (selection is made by the contractor using criteria stipulated by the agency) processes.
KW - Design bid build
KW - Life cycle analysis
KW - Pavement design
KW - Pavement maintenance
KW - Pavement performance
KW - State departments of transportation
KW - Traffic safety
UR - http://www.trb.org/TRBNet/ProjectDisplay.asp?ProjectID=1627
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1232854
ER -
TY - ABST
AN - 01462741
TI - Synthesis of Information Related to Airport Problems. Topic S04-03. Identification of the Requirements and Training to Obtain Driving Privileges on Airfields
AB - During the last fifteen years the Federal Aviation Administration in conjunction with the aviation industry has placed a major emphasis on the reduction of the risk of runway incursions.
Vehicle/pedestrian deviations (VPDs) account for approximately 15 to 20 percent of the annual number of incursions.
Airport operators have the overall responsibility for determining who receives driving privileges on the airport operational areas (AOA), i.e., inside the fence, and therefore are directly connected to efforts to reduce VPDs.
The requirements that must be met to obtain driving privileges vary widely from one airport to the next. At some airports, it may be a simple statement from the person's employer, e.g., an airline or FBO, that the person needs driving privileges. At other airports, the person studies the airport's driving manual and then takes a written test (this is similar to the approach that many DMV's use.) Other airports require the person to attend a classroom training session or take a computer tutorial followed by a test. Still others may require a hands-on driving test or probationary period with an authorized driver before the employee is authorized to operate a vehicle on the AOA. Sometimes training may be conducted using a driving simulator. Airports sometime create a tier system, i.e., drivers in the top tier are allowed to drive anywhere while drivers in lower tiers are restricted to certain areas. There are many variations to these scenarios. This synthesis would identify the airfield driving privilege requirements across a broad spectrum of airports and obtain information on who administers the training, the training curriculum, length of training, and the cost associated with such training for both initial and recurrent training. Background information such as number of authorized drivers on the airfield, availability of perimeter roads etc. would also be collected. The audience for this synthesis would include airport managers and those responsible for airfield safety and preventing VPDs.
KW - Airport operations
KW - Airports
KW - Driving
KW - Driving simulators
KW - Lane deviation
KW - Research projects
KW - Risk assessment
KW - Runway incursions
KW - Training
UR - http://www.trb.org/TRBNet/ProjectDisplay.asp?ProjectID=2415
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1230963
ER -
TY - ABST
AN - 01459980
TI - Dependence of HAP Emissions from Idling Aircraft on Ambient Conditions
AB -
Frequently, commercial airport operators are asked to estimate the magnitude of toxic emissions from airport-related sources. These requests may come from government officials, courts or concerned community groups. One of the key categories of potentially toxic emissions is Hazardous Air Pollutant (HAP) emissions and the most important source of airport related HAPs compounds at most commercial airports is idling jet engines. This is because the HAPs emissions of modern jet engines are very small at power settings greater than idle. It is therefore critical to understand the rate of HAPs emissions at low power settings. These emissions will vary as a function of thrust setting, environmental variables (especially temperature) and engine type. In order to properly estimate airport HAP emissions it is necessary to better understand the aircraft engine emission factors as a function of these variables.
KW - Air pollution
KW - Air pollution sources
KW - Air quality management
KW - Aircraft
KW - Aircraft exhaust gases
KW - Aircraft operations
KW - Airport facilities
KW - Airport operations
KW - Airport runways
KW - Research projects
UR - http://www.trb.org/TRBNet/ProjectDisplay.asp?ProjectID=2424
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1228195
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01152609
AU - Jeon, JongKoo
AU - Rahman, M S
AU - North Carolina State University, Raleigh
AU - North Carolina Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Fuzzy Neural Network Models for Geotechnical Problems
PY - 2008/05/01/Final Report
SP - 411p
AB - Uncertainty, imprecision, complexity, and non-linearity are inherently associated with many problems in geotechnical engineering. The conventional modeling of the underlying systems, tend to become quite intractable and predictions from them are very difficult and unreliable. The general nature of geotechnical problems makes them ideally amenable to modeling through emerging methods of fuzzy and neural network modeling. Piles have been used as a foundation for both inland and offshore structures. The evaluation of the load carrying capacity of a pile, setup, and its drivability are important problems of pile design. In this study, Back Propagation Neural Network (BPNN) models and Adaptive Neuro Fuzzy Inference System (ANFIS) models are developed for: i) Ultimate pile capacity, ii) Pile setup, and iii) Pile drivability. A database for ultimate pile capacity and pile setup has been developed from a comprehensive literature review. Predictions for the above are made using BPNNs as well as commonly used empirical methods, and they are also compared with actual measurements. For the pile drivability analysis, a database of a number (3,283) of HP piles is developed from the data on HP piles from 57 projects in North Carolina (with both GRLWEAP data and soil profile information and without PDA and CAPWAP analyses). All of the programs are developed within MATLAB (and its toolboxes) with its Graphical User Interface (GUI). It is found that ANFIS and BPNN models for the analyses of pile response characteristics provide similar predictions, and that both are better than those from empirical methods, and can serve as a reliable and simple tool for the prediction of ultimate pile capacity and pile setup. Also, the BPNN model developed for pile drivability analysis provides good predictions. BPNN may be considered to be more efficient than ANFIS, as the BPNN model trains much faster, while both provide equally good predictions. However ANFIS models with some additional work will be more desirable for those cases in which one or more input variables may be available only in ‘fuzzy’ terms, and when the model is developed with a limited data range, because in ANFIS extrapolation beyond the data range is made through the membership functions.
KW - Bearing capacity
KW - Fuzzy logic
KW - Geotechnical engineering
KW - Neural networks
KW - Pile driving
KW - Pile foundations
KW - Piles (Supports)
UR - http://www.ncdot.org/doh/preconstruct/tpb/research/download/2005-17FinalReport.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/913556
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01565451
AU - Cyrus, Holly M
AU - Nadel, Jess
AU - Hi-Tec Systems, Incorporated
AU - Federal Aviation Administration
AU - Federal Aviation Administration
TI - Light Emitting Diode Taxiway Lighting Effects on Constant Current Regulator Stability
PY - 2008/05//Technical Note
SP - 20p
AB - This study was conducted to determine how light emitting diode (LED) taxiway edge lights affect the operation of Constant Current Regulators (CCR). Some CCRs turn off due to overvoltage or overcurrent because of LED taxiway edge lights. A test bed was developed to measure and record the voltage and current supplied to an LED taxiway edge fixture as power was applied. The test bed setup consisted of an LED taxiway edge fixture, circuit current control subsystem for constant current to the taxiway edge fixture, and a data acquisition subsystem, which collected the data for analysis. Five types of LED taxiway edge fixtures were used for the testing. The baseline incandescent taxiway edge fixture had a smooth power curve. Two of the five LED taxiway edge light fixtures showed significant peak power volt ampere (VA) loading after power-up compared to the loading during normal operation. The highest peak power VA was 163% of the nominal VA required. Based on the results of this study, the following are recommendations for future operation of LED taxiway edge lighting fixtures. (1) The peak power VA required by an LED taxiway edge lighting fixture should not exceed the nominal operating power VA by more than 10% for the fixture. When the peak load is limited to 10%, the CCR will have enough reserve capacity to support the load and should easily adjust so that it will not trip off due to an overvoltage condition. (2) The LED taxiway edge light fixture should not drop the power VA required at a given step by more than 10%. When the power VA load suddenly drops, the CCR can trip off due to overcurrent. By limiting the power VA drop to 10%, the overcurrent protection function of the CCR should easily adjust so that it will not trip off due to an overcurrent condition.
KW - Airport runways
KW - Light emitting diodes
KW - Lighting
KW - Recommendations
KW - Taxiways
KW - Voltage
KW - Voltage regulators
UR - http://www.airporttech.tc.faa.gov/DesktopModules/FlexNews/DownloadHandler.ashx?id=1aed3846-2fbb-4cab-a1dd-2933abd05587&f=TN08-29.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1355035
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01565450
AU - Cyrus, Holly
AU - Previti, Anthony J
AU - Hi-Tec Systems, Incorporated
AU - Federal Aviation Administration
AU - Federal Aviation Administration
TI - Evaluation of Thermoplastic Marking Materials
PY - 2008/05//Technical Note
SP - 91p
AB - Due to the harsh conditions of airport environments, frequent repainting of existing waterborne pavement markings is required. This painting is expensive and affects life-cycle costs. A thermoplastic marking material has been identified as an alternative to the existing waterborne material. The purpose of this research effort was to determine if this thermoplastic marking material is as effective as the current waterborne material in terms of its retro-reflectivity, chromaticity, friction properties, and its adherence to the airport pavement surface. Two types of thermoplastic materials were applied on asphalt and concrete surfaces at the Federal Aviation Administration William J. Hughes Technical Center and were evaluated for 1 year starting in June 2006. These materials were also applied on concrete pavement surfaces at the Newark Liberty International Airport and evaluated for 1 year starting in August 2006. One thermoplastic material was 60-mil thick with Type I and III beads and was applied on a heated surface; the other material was 90-mil thick with Type I and IV beads and was applied on cold surface. Retro-reflectivity was measured using a retroreflectometer; a spectrophotometer was used to measure chromaticity, a Dyna-Meter Pull-Off tester was used to measure adherence strength, and a Saab Surface Friction Tester was used to measure friction properties. Most measurements were taken on a monthly basis. The results showed that the retro-reflectivity characteristics of thermoplastic marking materials were acceptable. The chromaticity of the thermoplastic was within tolerance for white, red, yellow, and black. The average friction readings recorded on thermoplastic were significantly lower than those taken on bare pavement and about 50% less than waterborne paint. The adherence showed that preparation is necessary for a good bond. The tensile strength of the bond between the thermoplastic marking material and hot-mix asphalt was acceptable. The tensile strength of the bond between the thermoplastic marking material and Portland cement concrete was acceptable when an additional adhesive was applied. Based on the result of this evaluation, thermoplastic marking material is recommended for taxiways.
KW - Adhesion
KW - Airport runways
KW - Evaluation
KW - Friction
KW - Newark Liberty International Airport
KW - Retroreflectivity
KW - Road markings
KW - Taxiways
KW - Tensile strength
KW - Thermoplastic materials
UR - http://www.airporttech.tc.faa.gov/DesktopModules/FlexNews/DownloadHandler.ashx?id=b6f7c429-ef03-44f8-b0fb-6d951c12919a&f=TN08-22.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1354998
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01523707
AU - Koros, Anton
AU - McAnulty, D M
AU - Beck, Bryan
AU - Federal Aviation Administration
AU - Federal Aviation Administration
TI - Recommended Layouts for the En-Route Area Supervisor Work Space
PY - 2008/05//Technical Note
SP - 66p
AB - Over the past decade, the Supervisor Work Space (SWS) at Air Route Traffic Control Centers (ARTCCs) has evolved to include as many as eight computer-based systems and other legacy equipment, paper reference materials, and supplies. Researchers from the Federal Aviation Administration Human Factors (HF) Team surveyed supervisors regarding equipment usage, location, and placement issues. Supervisors from 20 ARTCCs responded. The supervisors reported using computer systems approximately 50% of the time during a typical shift. They noted that their work spaces were cluttered, that placement of some systems made it difficult to see monitors or to access input devices, and that it was difficult to maintain the equipment. The HF researchers identified two common SWS layouts: (a) one layout in which the supervisor was seated in the main aisle looking into the operations area and (b) an alternate layout in which the supervisor was seated inside the operations area. The researchers developed baseline virtual reality models of the SWS based on HF guidelines and satisfactory aspects of existing work spaces. A working group of operational supervisors reviewed the baseline models and developed recommended layouts for the exterior, interior, and centralized command models of the en route area SWS.
KW - Air route traffic control centers
KW - Air traffic control
KW - Air traffic controllers
KW - Human factors
KW - Recommendations
KW - Supervisors
KW - Surveys
KW - Workplace layout
UR - http://hf.tc.faa.gov/publications/2008-recommended-layouts/full_text.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1307211
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01483307
AU - Nebraska Department of Roads
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - 2007 Continuous Traffic Count Data and Traffic Characteristics on Nebraska Streets and Highways
PY - 2008/05
SP - 294p
AB - The Nebraska Department of Roads, in cooperation with the Federal Highway Administration, collected and analyzed data at 61 continuous traffic count locations in 2007. Of these 61 locations, 38 are on rural state and federal highways, 8 on low volume rural roads, 2 on city streets in Grand Island, 3 on city streets in Lincoln, 7 on city streets in Omaha, 1 on the Interstate in South Sioux City, 1 on a city street in Scottsbluff, and 1 on a city street in Holdrege. Most of the machines have been converted to collect data on vehicle type, not just volume. As a result, continuous classification data is available at the majority of the stations. Short-term manual vehicle classification data was collected during 2007 at many of the remaining permanent continuous traffic counters. A traffic counter detects each passing vehicle and records hourly totals electronically. This information is retrieved periodically over the telephone lines by the Planning and Project Development Division of the Nebraska Department of Roads. Here the information is processed into Average Daily Traffic (ADT) figures. Some of the uses of these ADT values are determination of design standards, classification of highways, development of improvement programs and safety programs. Another important use of the information provided by these permanent traffic counters is to adjust many statewide 24- and 48-hour machine counts and 8-hour manual counts to annual average daily traffic volumes.
KW - Average daily traffic
KW - Nebraska
KW - Traffic counts
KW - Traffic data
KW - Traffic volume
KW - Vehicle classification
UR - http://nlc1.nlc.state.ne.us/epubs/R6000/S009-2007.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1251973
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01457041
AU - Phares, Brent M
AU - Ceylan, Halil
AU - Souleyrette, Reginald
AU - Smadi, Omar
AU - Gopalakrishnan, Kasthurirangan
AU - Iowa State University, Ames
AU - Federal Highway Administration
AU - Iowa Department of Transportation
TI - Development of a High Speed Rigid Pavement Analyzer – Phase I Feasibility and Need Study
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 58p
AB - The long-term goal of this effort is to develop a device that will measure, at highway speeds, pavement structural condition which is known to impact the performance of portland cement concrete (PCC) and composite pavements. Such a system needs to be able to process the collected measurements into an immediately usable form in near real-time. It is believed that the recent improvements in computers, laser measuring devices, and similar technologies will make the development of such a system possible. The goal of the work specifically described herein is to, in fact, determine if the required technologies exist and to what extent a market exists for such a device. The proposed research project will investigate the feasibility and practicality of developing a device for measuring the structural condition of PCC and composite pavements.
KW - Composite pavements
KW - Condition surveys
KW - Measuring instruments
KW - Portland cement concrete
KW - Rigid pavements
KW - Technological innovations
UR - http://www.pooledfund.org/Document/Download/1338
UR - http://www.pooledfund.org/Document/Download/3854
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1224272
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01454503
AU - Tarko, Andrew P
AU - Kwasniak, Andrew
AU - Ramos, Jorge
AU - Purdue University
AU - Indiana Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Knowledge-Based System to Support Site Investigation for Safety Improvement
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 306p
AB - Specialists in transportation and other areas of engineering are trying to improve road safety. The most difficult part is determining the road features, driver behaviors, and vehicular failures that unduly increase the risk of crash. To help INDOT safety investigation teams, a previous research project developed a prototype Road Safety Investigation Tool (RSIT) for two-way stop-controlled intersections. The research summarized here has evaluated the prototype RSIT and has developed a new version RSIT2 that has incorporated the findings of the evaluation. The evaluation of the RSIT prototype confirmed usefulness of the proposed methodology. The tool has been applied to two two-way stop-controlled intersections by a team of non-experts. The two sites have been previously investigated by experts using the standard approach. The safety investigation outcomes obtained by both the teams indicate strong similarities. The proposed RSIT method helped non-experts identify additional road hazards confirmed later by the experts’ team. RSIT has been found decreasing the required investigation team size and time as well as being useful as a training tool. RSIT presents the logical connections between driver behaviors, road elements and environment conditions. RSIT2 is the next version of the RSIT method. The knowledge base developed for RSIT 2 includes all the major types of roads in Indiana: a) all-way stop-controlled intersection, b) road segment, c) railroad crossing, and d) signalized intersection, and e) improved two-way stop-controlled intersections. The RSIT 2 method uses the rule-based structure converted to a dynamic checklist that adjusts in real-time to the investigation progress. A friendly graphic-user interface has been developed together with a knowledge base editor to allow updating the knowledge base by the user. Finally, a novel technique of ranking safety countermeasures was developed and applied.
KW - Crash causes
KW - Crash risk forecasting
KW - Expert systems
KW - High risk locations
KW - Highway safety
KW - Intersections
KW - Prototypes
KW - Safety audits
KW - Safety engineering
UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.5703/1288284314304
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1218775
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01343655
AU - Parker, Robert
AU - Johnson, Bethany
AU - University of Oregon, Eugene
AU - Oregon Transportation Research and Education Consortium
AU - Research and Innovative Technology Administration
TI - Linking Experiential Education to Community Transportation Planning
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 21p
AB - This Oregon Transportation Research and Education Consortium (OTREC) education project links experiential education with local transportation planning through a collaborative partnership between the University of Oregon and the City of Eugene. The Community Planning Workshop (CPW) is an experiential/service learning program affiliated with the Department of Planning, Public Policy and Management at the University of Oregon. Through this service learning program, graduate students learn professional planning skills while assisting communities in actual planning and policy projects. The project results include: (1) a completed City of Eugene Bicycle and Pedestrian Strategic Plan; (2) the development of a rich, cross-disciplinary, experiential learning opportunity that could be replicated in other universities; and (3) a case study describing the methods used to integrate experiential learning into transportation planning processes as well as lessons learned. Recognizing the need to create a vehicle to share the results of this project, CPW created a website targeted to communities and universities. Community members, city staff, and/or university faculty can go to this site and download the strategic plan to use as an example for their own community, or download CPW’s service learning curriculum and/or a case study about lessons learned from this project. This website will host all deliverables from University of Oregon OTREC projects related to service learning.
KW - Bicycle travel
KW - Case studies
KW - City planning
KW - Education
KW - Eugene (Oregon)
KW - Lessons learned
KW - Partnerships
KW - Pedestrians
KW - Strategic planning
KW - Transportation planning
KW - University of Oregon
KW - Websites (Information retrieval)
UR - http://otrec.us/project/51
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1106025
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01334240
AU - Wang, Yinhai
AU - Cheevarunothai, Patikhom
AU - Hallenbeck, Mark
AU - University of Washington, Seattle
AU - Washington State Transportation Center
AU - Washington State Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
AU - Research and Innovative Technology Administration
TI - Quantifying Incident-Induced Travel Delays on Freeways Using Traffic Sensor Data
PY - 2008/05//Final Research Report
SP - 76p
AB - Traffic congestion is a major operational problem for freeways in Washington State. Recent studies have estimated that more than 50 percent of freeway congestion is caused by traffic incidents. To help the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) identify effective countermeasures against such congestion-inducing incidents, a thorough understanding of travel delays caused by incidents is essential. By using traffic data extracted from archived loop detector measurements and incident log data recorded by the WSDOT Incident Response (IR) team, this research project developed a new algorithm for quantifying travel delays produced by different incident categories. The algorithm applies a modified deterministic queuing theory to estimate incident-induced delay by using 1-minute aggregated loop detector data. Incident-induced delay refers to the difference between the total delay and the recurrent travel delay at the time and location influenced by the incident. The uniqueness of the delay calculation in this study is the use of a dynamic traffic-volume-based background profile, which is considered a more accurate representation of prevailing traffic conditions. According to the test results, the proposed algorithm can provide good estimates for incident-induced delay and capture the evolution of freeway traffic flow during incident duration. Because actual traffic data measured by loop detectors were used in this study to compute vehicle arrival and departure rates for delay calculations, the estimated incident-induced delay should be very close to the reality. Additionally, the proposed algorithm was implemented in the Advanced Roadway Incident Analyzer (ARIA) system. ARIA is a database-driven computer system that automates all the computational processes. More accurate incident delay information will help WSDOT improve its understanding of congestion-inducing incidents and select more effective countermeasures against incident-related traffic congestion on freeways.
KW - Advanced Roadway Incident Analyzer
KW - Algorithms
KW - Freeways
KW - Loop detectors
KW - Queuing theory
KW - Traffic congestion
KW - Traffic data
KW - Traffic delays
KW - Traffic flow
KW - Traffic incidents
KW - Washington (State)
UR - http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/research/reports/fullreports/700.1.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1097561
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01160030
AU - Gucunski, Nenad
AU - Rascoe, Carl D
AU - Maher, Ali
AU - Center for Advanced Infrastructure and Transportation
AU - New Jersey Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
AU - Research and Innovative Technology Administration
TI - Rutgers/NJDOT Pavement Resource Program (NJDOT Statewide GPR Project Network GPR Data Collection and Analysis Update of HPMA GPR Database)
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 28p
AB - The Center for Advanced Transportation Infrastructure (CAIT) of Rutgers University is mandated to conduct Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) surveys to update the New Jersey Department of Transportation's (NJDOT’s) pavement management system (PMS) with GPR measured pavement layer thicknesses. Based on the reviewof the GPR data currently in the pavement management system, it has been identified that 2328 miles of pavement have “No GPR Data” and 1550 miles of pavement have data with“Gaps”. Gaps generally refer to missing portions of data of about 50 to 100 ft in length. The number and distribution of Gaps vary. In some cases, the sections with Gaps contain adequate GPR information to interpolate thicknesses between the Gaps. For the purpose of this work plan, the section with “No GPR Data” are considered to be of the highest priority. As a part of the PMS project, GPR surveys were conducted at locations throughout New Jersey. Interpretations of the survey information were conducted for network-level pavement management purposes. The objective of the work was to provide NJDOT with information obtained by the GPR survey regarding pavement structure and layer properties (thickness, dielectric, etc.) to aid at decision-making, improvement of falling weight deflectometer (FWD) backcalculation or characterization of pavement thickness variability over potential project sections.
KW - Data gaps
KW - Ground penetrating radar
KW - Missing data
KW - New Jersey
KW - Nondestructive tests
KW - Pavement layers
KW - Pavement management systems
KW - Pavements
KW - Thickness
UR - http://cait.rutgers.edu/files/166-RU9309_0.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/920571
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01159703
AU - Letchford, Christopher J
AU - Cruzado, Hector
AU - Texas Tech University, Lubbock
AU - Texas Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Full-Scale Controlled Tests of Wind Loads on Traffic Signal Structures
PY - 2008/05//Technical Report
SP - 56p
AB - The wind-induced vibrations of the mast arm of cantilever traffic signal structures can lead to the fatigue failure of these structures. For this project, both full-scale and wind tunnel tests were conducted to study the behavior of the structures. Results of these experiments indicated that when the signals have backplates, vortex shedding can cause large-amplitude vibrations that may lead to fatigue failure. These results contradict what has been generally accepted by other researchers: that galloping is the main cause for the fatigue inducing vibrations and that vortex shedding is of no relevance in this type of structure. As a result of this research, a methodology to estimate the fatigue life of these structures was developed. Using the climatology of the region, the methodology was applied as a risk assessment model to traffic signal structures of the city of Lubbock. Guidance is given on how life-cycle cost analysis can be applied to the structures.
KW - Backplates (Traffic signals)
KW - Cantilevers
KW - Failure
KW - Fatigue (Mechanics)
KW - Fatigue life
KW - Life cycle costing
KW - Lubbock (Texas)
KW - Mast arms (Traffic signals)
KW - Risk assessment
KW - Structural supports
KW - Traffic signal supports
KW - Traffic signals
KW - Vibration
KW - Vortex shedding
KW - Wind
UR - http://www.depts.ttu.edu/techmrtweb/reports/complete_reports/0-4586-3_final.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/920234
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01158177
AU - Federal Aviation Administration
AU - New Hampshire Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Instrument Landing System (ILS) at the Mount Washington Regional Airport - Whitefield, NH
PY - 2008/05//Feasibility Study Report
SP - 45p
AB - The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) entered into a Reimbursable Agreement with the New Hampshire Department of Transportation, Division of Aeronautics to investigate the feasibility of establishing a full Instrument Landing System (ILS) on Runway 10 at the Mount Washington Regional Airport in Whitefield, New Hampshire. The purpose of the study was to evaluate whether a full ILS system could be successfully sited at the Airport given the terrain and airfield layout limitations, and to provide a cost estimate for the project. The FAA determined that an End Fire Glide Slope (EFGS) can be properly sited and would provide the best results for a precision approach when combined with new Localizer and DME antenna systems. The FAA recommends proceeding to field test and flight check the full EFGS antenna system to verify the math modeling engineering analysis. Cost estimates are provided in section 9 of this report.
KW - Antennas
KW - Cost estimating
KW - End fire glide slope
KW - Instrument landing systems
KW - Layout
KW - Mount Washington Regional Airport
KW - Terrain
KW - Whitefield (New Hampshire)
UR - http://www.nh.gov/dot/org/projectdevelopment/materials/research/projects/14282p.htm
UR - http://www.nh.gov/dot/org/projectdevelopment/materials/research/projects/documents/FHWA-NH-RD-14282P.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/918741
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01150497
AU - Federal Aviation Administration
TI - Air Traffic Organization: Safety Management System Manual
PY - 2008/05
SP - 173p
AB - In support of the effort to provide a safer National Airspace System (NAS) using the Safety Management System (SMS), this manual describes the Air Traffic Safety Oversight Service (AOV) safety requirements and responds to International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) safety process requirements for the Air Traffic Organization (ATO). The manual also provides guidance, processes, and tools to ATO personnel for managing the safety of the NAS, building on existing ATO safety management capabilities. This manual was created to provide specific operational process information to support the daily activities of ATO employees. It describes the functions, components, and principles of the SMS and provides the guidance to apply them effectively. ATO Order JO 1000.37, Air Traffic Organization Safety Management System, requires the use of the current version of the ATO SMS Manual and the safety standards defined in it.
KW - Air traffic
KW - Air traffic control
KW - Air Traffic Organization
KW - Air transportation
KW - Aviation safety
KW - National Airspace System
KW - Policy
KW - Quality assurance
KW - Risk assessment
UR - http://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/publications/media/ATOSMSManualVersion2-1_05-27-08_Final.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/912579
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01144478
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Swiss Heavy Goods Vehicle Control Sites Peer Exchange Meeting
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 17p
AB - On February 19, 2008, a peer exchange meeting was held in Glendale, Arizona with the intent of exchanging information on technology-based approaches supporting commercial motor vehicle enforcement. Meeting attendees included transportation and law enforcement officials from Switzerland and U.S. counterparts in the states of Arizona and Washington and at the federal level. During the meeting, U.S. representatives described vehicle size and weight management procedures and practices at the federal and state levels. Similarly, Swiss representatives provided an overview of vehicle size and weight management policies and procedures in Switzerland, concluding with a description of their Heavy Goods Vehicle (HGV) Control Sites. Dr. Jodi Carson, Texas Transportation Institute, presented the results of the 2006 European Commercial Motor Vehicle Size and Weight Enforcement Scan Tour, providing a comparative perspective between U.S. and Swiss (and broader European) vehicle size and weight management policies and procedures. This document summarizes the information that was presented and exchanged among meeting attendees.
KW - Arizona
KW - Commercial vehicles
KW - Freight transportation
KW - Peer exchange
KW - Size and weight regulations
KW - Switzerland
KW - Trucks
KW - Vehicle size
KW - Vehicle weight
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/30000/30800/30825/swisspeerexchgmtg.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/904398
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01135396
AU - Maritime Administration
TI - U.S. Water Transportation Statistical Snapshot
PY - 2008/05
SP - 32p
AB - It is the mission of the Maritime Administration to strengthen the U.S. water transportation system, including infrastructure, industry, and labor, to meet the economic and security needs of the Nation. The U.S. water transportation industry serves the needs of both foreign and domestic commerce. It comprises companies that carry freight or passengers on the open seas or inland waterways, offer towing services, charter vessels, and operate canals and terminals. The U.S. water transportation industry is in a period of renewal and expansion with major changes in trades, fleets, gross output and employment. The following snapshot highlights the major changes that have occurred over the last five years.
KW - Data collection
KW - Economic indicators
KW - Employment
KW - Infrastructure
KW - Inland water transportation
KW - International trade
KW - Liquefied natural gas
KW - Maritime industry
KW - Ships
KW - Statistical analysis
KW - Trade
KW - Water transportation
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/892111
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01135311
AU - Research and Innovative Technology Administration
TI - Key Transportation Indicators, May 2008
PY - 2008/05
SP - 21p
AB - This report is intended to provide timely, easily accessible information for the transportation community. It was developed by the Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) of the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT), and is updated each quarter on the BTS website. The indicators fall under two broad categories: those that provide context about the economy and society in which transportation functions, and those that convey information about an aspect of transportation. To the extent possible, these latter indicators are transportation-wide in scope; however, some apply to only part of the transportation system. Reference tables at the beginning of the document provide key statistics about U.S. social and
KW - Air travel
KW - Amtrak
KW - Canada
KW - Economic indicators
KW - Fatalities
KW - Fuel prices
KW - Indicators (Instruments)
KW - Mexico
KW - On time performance
KW - Public transit
KW - Railroad travel
KW - Ridership
KW - Safety
KW - Transportation
UR - http://www.bts.gov/publications/key_transportation_indicators/may_2008/index.html
UR - http://www.bts.gov/publications/key_transportation_indicators/may_2008/pdf/entire.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/894270
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01135289
AU - Zinke, Scott
AU - Mahoney, J
AU - Schaffer, G
AU - University of Connecticut, Storrs
AU - Connecticut Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Use of a Notched Wedge Joint in Connecticut Pilot Projects, Phase 1 Interim Report, Summary 2006
PY - 2008/05
SP - 36p
AB - Performance of Hot Mix Asphalt (HMA) longitudinal joints have been an item of increasing scrutiny in Connecticut. The traditional butt joint has typically been the method used in Connecticut. These joints have been reportedly opening up creating a longitudinal crack at the joint thus contributing significantly to the premature failure of the wearing surface. It has been widely speculated that alternative longitudinal joint construction methods could be employed to reduce the rate at which joints fail. Here, the Notched Wedge Joint is investigated. Two resurfacing projects were constructed in Connecticut during the 2006 paving season that utilized the notched wedge joint construction method. These projects were investigated as to their nuclear density and volumetric density from cut cores along the longitudinal joints.
KW - Connecticut
KW - Cores (Specimens)
KW - Hot mix asphalt
KW - Longitudinal joints
KW - Notched wedge joints
KW - Nuclear density gages
KW - Pavement design
KW - Pavement performance
KW - Resurfacing
UR - http://www.ct.gov/dot/LIB/dot/documents/dresearch/CT-2249-1-07-3.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/894316
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01135264
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Monthly Motor Fuel Report by States, December 2007
PY - 2008/05
SP - 17P
AB - Based on reports of 40 Entities, gasoline consumption for January - December 2007 changed by 0.2 percent compared to the same period in 2006. The gasoline volume shown in this report is a cumulative tabulation of gross volume reported by wholesale distributors to State motor fuel tax agencies. It includes highway use, nonhighway use and losses. There is a lag of up to 6 weeks between the wholesale transactions reported and retail sales to consumers. Travel trends are reported monthly in Traffic Volume Trends based on actual traffic counts at permanent traffic recorders operated by the State highway agencies and reflect highway use of fuel. The vehicle-miles reported include all vehicles, regardless of fuel type. While data in both reports reflect changes in trends, large monthly changes can be caused by exceptional weather conditions, variations in timing of holidays, or processing delays.
KW - Energy conservation
KW - Energy consumption
KW - Fuel taxes
KW - Gasoline
KW - Motor fuels
KW - Traffic delays
KW - Traffic distribution
KW - Traffic volume
KW - Weather conditions
KW - Wholesale trade
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/894303
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01135235
AU - Feuerberg, Gary
AU - Research and Innovative Technology Administration
TI - Uncovering Trends in Seasonal Transportation Data: New Tool Analyzes Airline Revenue Passenger-Mile Trend Data
PY - 2008/05
SP - 6p
AB - Transportation activity often varies appreciably from month to month and season to season, making it difficult to discern from the data whether the overall trend for the activity is increasing, unchanging, or decreasing. Traditionally, analysts adjust data to compensate for these fluctuations; however, conventional methods of controlling seasonal factors can be limiting particularly when viewing trends over many years or months. But by eliminating the seasonal influence, rather than simply controlling for it, decades of data can be grasped at a glance. In October 2004, the Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) began to remove the seasonal fluctuation in the data used in its monthly Transportation Services Index (TSI). And, although the approach for removing seasonal factors from airline revenue passenger-miles (RPMs) is examined here, this same approach can be used for most data series that show strong seasonal variation.
KW - Air transportation
KW - Fluctuations
KW - Passenger transportation
KW - Revenue miles
KW - Revenues
KW - Seasonal activity patterns
KW - Seasonal variations
KW - Seasons
KW - Statistical analysis
UR - http://www.bts.gov/publications/bts_technical_report/2008_003/html/entire.html
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/35000/35400/35445/Trends.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/892112
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01131612
AU - University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute
AU - National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
TI - Integrated Vehicle-Based Safety Systems (IVBSS) Phase I Interim Report
PY - 2008/05//Progress Report
SP - 126p
AB - The Integrated Vehicle-Based Safety Systems (IVBSS) program is a four-year, two-phase cooperative research program being conducted by an industry team led by the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute. The goal of the IVBSS program is to assess the safety benefits and driver acceptance associated with a prototype integrated crash warning system designed to address rear-end, road departure, and lane change/merge crashes on light vehicles and heavy commercial trucks. This report describes accomplishments and progress made during Phase I of the program (November 2005 to April 2008). Activities during Phase I focused on system specification, and design, development, and construction of prototype vehicles.
KW - Commercial vehicles
KW - Crash avoidance systems
KW - Integrated Vehicle Based Safety Systems (Initiative)
KW - Lane changing
KW - Light vehicles
KW - Merging traffic
KW - Prototypes
KW - Ran off road crashes
KW - Rear end crashes
KW - Specifications
KW - Vehicle safety
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/30000/30800/30868/14434.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/891784
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01128960
AU - Nassif, Hani
AU - Aktas, Kagan
AU - Najm, Husam
AU - Suksawang, Nakin
AU - El-Khoury, Raymond
AU - Rutgers University, Piscataway
AU - New Jersey Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Self Consolidating Concrete (Phase I & II)
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 60p
AB - This report summarizes the two-phase research on Self-Consolidating Concrete (SCC) in New Jersey. Phase I involves collecting actual field SCC mixes that were used for casting non-structural concrete components such as tee walls and noise walls. In addition, laboratory mixes were also made to evaluate the mechanical properties and the durability of SCC with various pozzolanic materials. In Phase II, the feasibility of using SCC in drilled shaft construction was evaluated on the new viaduct construction at the intersection of the GSP/I280 near Newark, NJ. SCC was used in the drilled shaft foundations of this project as part of the NJDOT’s SCC implementation plan with support from the Innovative Bridge Research and Construction Federal program. Fresh mix tests as well as visual inspection were performed; and specimens were collected to perform laboratory tests. All three shafts were instrumented with temperature sensors and cross-hole sonic logging (CSL) along the shaft length. Results from Phase I and II showed that SCC can be successfully made using viscosity modified admixture (VMA) or solely using superplasticizer (namely the polycarboxilate type) by properly adjusting the paste volume and coarse to fine aggregate ratios. SCC can also be made to equivalently match the mechanical properties and durability of high-performance concrete (HPC) by substituting portland cement with pozzolans and other cementitious materials. Furthermore, based on the observations of the field mixes, more fundamental knowledge on SCC needs to be disseminated to the contractor. It is recommended that the spread test be used in the field for classifying the fresh concrete properties of SCC as a screening test. For more quantitative results, it is recommended that the spread test be used in conjunction with other segregation tests, such as the J-ring test in order to determine the consistency of the mix.
KW - Admixtures
KW - Drilled shafts
KW - Durability
KW - Laboratory tests
KW - Mechanical properties
KW - Pozzolan
KW - Self compacting concrete
KW - Superplasticizers
UR - http://www.state.nj.us/transportation/refdata/research/reports/FHWA-NJ-2007-021.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/889131
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01128371
AU - Hamilton, David
AU - University of Kentucky, Lexington
AU - Kentucky Transportation Cabinet
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Traffic Forecasting Report - 2007
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 64p
AB - This is the sixth edition of the Traffic Forecasting Report (TFR). This edition of the TFR contains the latest (predominantly 2007) forecasting/modeling data as follows: Functional class average traffic volume growth rates and trends; Vehicle miles traveled statewide total by functional class; Automatic Traffic Recorder (ATR) locations, K-factors, and ADTs; Functional class average K-factors and D-factors; Functional class average truck volumes, truck percentages, ESAL calculation factors, and vehicle types; Kentucky Statewide Model Summary; List of MPO (urbanized) and county-level models; Socioeconomic data sources for models and summary of MUG (model users group) meetings; ADT and DHV count factors; Hourly volume percentage by functional class; Kentucky population projections by county; and Traffic volume growth rates by county and functional class.
KW - Automatic traffic recorders
KW - Average daily traffic
KW - Design hourly volume
KW - Equivalent single axle loads
KW - Kentucky
KW - Population forecasting
KW - Traffic data
KW - Traffic forecasting
KW - Traffic volume
KW - Trend (Statistics)
KW - Truck traffic
KW - Vehicle miles of travel
UR - http://www.ktc.uky.edu/files/2012/06/KTC_08_06_PL_14_07_1F.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/888871
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01127117
AU - Raeburn, Christopher L
AU - Monkul, M Murat
AU - Pyles, Marvin R
AU - Oregon State University, Corvallis
AU - Oregon Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Evaluation of Corrosion of Metallic Reinforcements and Connections in MSE Retaining Walls
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 41p
AB - Mechanically Stabilized Earth (MSE) retaining walls have become the dominant retaining wall system on Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT) projects. The permanent MSE walls constructed on ODOT projects, in recent years, use metallic reinforcements and facing connections buried directly in the backfill soil. Accelerated deterioration of these structural elements would have serious financial and safety impacts for the Department. Classical MSE wall design incorporates an estimate of deterioration of reinforcement by corrosion. Monitoring of actual corrosion performance, however, is an important element of managing the current inventory of MSE walls. Monitoring could answer key questions that can provide for the best management of the existing walls, and provide feedback to the design process for future installations. This report details a literature review of methods for estimating and measuring deterioration of structural reinforcing elements in both concrete and MSE walls. It also presents a selected history of metallic reinforcement design specification and utilization. A listing of the MSE walls that can be identified in the ODOT Bridge Data System is included.
KW - Corrosion
KW - Design
KW - Deterioration
KW - Literature reviews
KW - Mechanically stabilized earth
KW - Monitoring
KW - Reinforcement (Engineering)
KW - Retaining walls
KW - Specifications
KW - Structural connection
UR - http://www.oregon.gov/ODOT/TD/TP_RES/ResearchReports/MSE_Retaining_Walls.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/887769
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01123429
AU - Huijser, Marcel P
AU - Kociolek, Angela V
AU - Oechsli, Lauren
AU - Galarus, Doug E
AU - Western Transportation Institute
AU - Board of Blaine County Commissioners
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Wildlife Data Collection and Potential Highway Mitigation Along State Highway 75, Blaine County, Idaho
PY - 2008/05//Research Report
SP - 141p
AB - This report investigates historic and recent road mortality data (mostly for mule deer and elk) along a 26 mi. long road section of S.H. 75 in Blaine County, Idaho (between Timmerman Jct (Jct with Hwy 20) and the Trail Creek Bridge in Ketchum, Idaho). The project aimed to review potential mitigation measures (presented in a separate report), and to collect and analyze historic and current wildlife-vehicle collision (WVC) data and provide advice on potential mitigation measures, including animal detection systems (this report). Road mortality data were collected by the Idaho Department of Transportation (carcass data), the Idaho Highway Patrol (wildlife accident data), the Western Transportation Institute and the public. The public was asked to enter road mortality data as well as live animals observed in a web based database. The minimum number of road killed deer and elk along the 26 mi. long road section was estimated at 134 in 2007, a sharp increase over previous years (25-40), most likely because of increased search and reporting effort. The road mortality data were used to identify road sections that had the highest number of road-killed mule deer and elk: between mile post 118.4 and 119.1, just north of Hailey. This section was reviewed with regard to the suitability for the installation of an animal detection system. Based on the projected costs and benefits of animal detection systems, the benefits of an animal detection system at the location described above may be much greater than the costs for such a system. Furthermore, different systems and their characteristics are discussed with regard to their potential implementation at the road section identified above. Finally, six options are presented with regard to the implementation of mitigation measures for the road section concerned. These include, but are not limited to, animal detection systems.
KW - Animal detection systems
KW - Animal vehicle collisions
KW - Benefit cost analysis
KW - Countermeasures
KW - Crash data
KW - Data collection
KW - Deer
KW - Detection and identification systems
KW - Elk
KW - Fatalities
KW - Habitat (Ecology)
KW - Highway safety
KW - Idaho
KW - Road kill
KW - Traffic crashes
KW - Wildlife
KW - Wildlife crossings
UR - http://www.wti.montana.edu/ForceDownloadHandler.ashx?name=4W1403_Final_Mitigation_Report.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/884620
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01122968
AU - Tao, Mingjiang
AU - Abu-Farsakh, Murad Yusuf
AU - Louisiana Transportation Research Center
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Effect of Drainage in Unbound Aggregate Bases on Flexible Pavement Performance
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 65p
AB - It has been well demonstrated that a positive subsurface drainage is beneficial in enhancing pavement performance and thus extending pavement service life. Typical permeable base materials include asphalt/cement-treated, open-graded aggregates and unbound aggregates. Although asphalt/cement-treated, open-graded permeable bases perform well based on the past engineering practice, they are expensive solutions and less desirable for some roadways when compared to unbound aggregates, especially for low- to medium-volume roadways. In these situations, it is possible to use a properly graded unbound aggregate that is adequately drainable and structurally stable during the construction and service lifetime after the roadway is open to traffic. This study is to determine a proper/optimum gradation by conducting laboratory testing for unbound aggregates of Mexican limestone that are commonly used in Louisiana highways. However, there is trade-off between structural stability and permeability of unbound aggregates. The increase of permeability is often at the cost of structural stability or vice verse. Therefore, the criteria for selecting an optimum gradation are: (1) an adequate permeability to drain the infiltrated-water from the pavement as quickly as possible; and (2) a sufficient structural stability to support the traffic loading. The permeability of unbound aggregate is quantified by its saturated hydraulic conductivity while its structural stability is characterized by various laboratory tests on the strength, stiffness, and permanent deformation of the material. A series of laboratory tests, including constant-head permeability, California Bearing Ratio (CBR), Dynamic Cone Penetrometer (DCP), tube suction (TS), monotonic load traiaxial tests, and repeated load triaxial (RLT) tests, were conducted on Mexican limestone with different gradations. The gradations under investigation include coarse and fine branches of Louisiana class II gradation, New Jersey gradation medium, and an optimum gradation (fine and coarse branches). The optimum gradation is the result of a series of laboratory trial-error tests. The results from laboratory tests indicate that: (1) the coarse branch of Louisiana class II gradation outperform the fine counterpart in terms of permanent deformation and hydraulic conductivity; (2) CBR and DCP values may not be good properties to differentiate performance of unbound aggregate with different gradations; and (3) an optimum gradation is identified, which outperforms current Louisiana class II base gradation in terms of both structural stability and permeability.
KW - Aggregate gradation
KW - Base course (Pavements)
KW - California bearing ratio
KW - Cone penetrometers
KW - Drainage
KW - Flexible pavements
KW - Laboratory tests
KW - Limestone aggregates
KW - Open graded aggregates
KW - Permeability
KW - Permeability coefficient
KW - Stability (Mechanics)
KW - Structural stability
KW - Unbound aggregate base courses
KW - Unbound aggregates
UR - http://www.ltrc.lsu.edu/pdf/2009/fr_429.pdf
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/55000/55900/55975/LA-FR_429.PDF
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/884596
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01122966
AU - Rasmussen, Ben
AU - Boston Metropolitan Planning Organization, CTPS
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Carbon Dioxide, Climate Change, and the Boston Region MPO: A Discussion Paper
PY - 2008/05
SP - v.p.
AB - Climate change will likely have significant impacts on the Boston region. If climate trends continue as projected, the climate and weather patterns in Boston at the end of this century will look more like those now found in Richmond, Virginia, or Atlanta, Georgia. More severe weather events, a rise in sea level coupled with storm-induced flooding, and warmer temperatures would impact the region's infrastructure, economy, human health, and natural resources. Greenhouse gases (GHG) contribute to climate change, and 84% of the United States' GHG emissions are composed of carbon dioxide (CO2), a common emission from motor vehicles and the burning of fossil fuels. In Massachusetts, transportation sources emit more CO2 than any other sources. Transportation planning policies and decision-making can affect a reduction in the transportation sector's CO2 emissions. To have a significant effect, however, some important considerations and trade-offs must be faced. Improving mobility for alternative mode users, particularly transit, may result in reduced mobility for motorists. For example, shifts in investments to increase transit mode split may reduce funding for highway projects. The purpose of this document is threefold. Part I provides the Boston Region Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) with an overview of climate change and its local impacts. Part II provides a summary of the MPO's plans and programs that are already resulting in the reduction of GHG emissions. Part III provides specific potential "next step" actions to deliberately continue existing programs or start additional GHG-reducing initiatives.
KW - Boston (Massachusetts)
KW - Boston Region Metropolitan Planning Organization
KW - Carbon dioxide
KW - Climate change
KW - Decision making
KW - Greenhouse gases
KW - Transportation planning
KW - Transportation policy
UR - http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/planning/metro/bostmpo.htm
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/884570
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01120273
AU - Research and Innovative Technology Administration
TI - White House Economic Statistics Briefing Room Transportation, May 2008
PY - 2008/05
SP - 21p
AB - This report presents information on more than 20 trends. Compiled monthly from multiple sources, the indicators fall under two broad categories, those that provide context about the economy and society in which transportation functions, and those that convey information about an aspect of transportation. To the extent possible, these latter indicators are transportation-wide in scope; however, some apply to only part of the transportation system. Reference tables at the beginning of the document provide key statistics about U.S. social and economic characteristics, and about the extent of the transportation system.
KW - Domestic transportation
KW - Economic and social factors
KW - Economic indicators
KW - Finance
KW - Financial analysis
KW - Information systems
KW - Information technology
KW - Statistical analysis
KW - Transportation
KW - Transportation planning
KW - Vehicle miles of travel
UR - http://www.bts.gov/publications/white_house_economic_statistics_briefing_room/may_2008/pdf/entire.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/880405
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01118731
AU - Cooley, L Allen
AU - James, Robert S
AU - Burns Cooley Dennis, Incorporated
AU - Mississippi Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Hot Mix Asphalt Mix Selection Guide for Mississippi
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 56p
AB - Mississippi’s roadway system is vital to the state’s economy. As time passes, new and/or improved roadways will be needed in order to attract and hold industry. Hot mix asphalt constitutes the material used to construct and maintain the vast majority of roadways in Mississippi. However, not all hot mix asphalt mixtures perform the same. The objective of this project was to develop guidance for hot mix asphalt mix selection in Mississippi. Three primary mix types were considered and included: dense-graded hot mix asphalt, stone matrix asphalt and open graded friction courses. Recommended guidance was developed and presented for when certain mix types should be used on Mississippi roadways. Recommendations were provided based upon the pavement layer and traffic category being considered.
KW - Hot mix asphalt
KW - Mississippi
KW - Mix design
KW - Open graded aggregates
KW - Pavement design
KW - Pavement layers
KW - Stone matrix asphalt
KW - Thickness
UR - http://mdot.ms.gov/documents/research/Reports/Interim%20and%20Final%20Reports/State%20Study%20204%20-%20Hot%20Mix%20Asphalt%20Mix%20Selection%20Guide%20for%20Mississippi.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/878512
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01118457
AU - Fowler, David W
AU - Zollinger, Dan G
AU - Whitney, David P
AU - University of Texas, Austin
AU - Texas Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Implementing Best Concrete Pavement Spall Repairs
PY - 2008/05//Technical Report
SP - 83p
AB - The implementation project, 5-5110, Implementation of Best Spall Repair Practices for Concrete Pavement, was initiated to assist the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) in using more durable repair practices and materials for concrete spalls, especially in continuously reinforced concrete pavement (CRCP). In the related previous research project 0-5110, Best Practices for Concrete Pavement Spall Repairs, researchers discovered that TxDOT already had several technical tools in place to make it easier for district personnel to find and specify the most promising materials for their concrete spall repair projects.
KW - Best practices
KW - Concrete pavements
KW - Continuously reinforced concrete pavements
KW - Implementation
KW - Pavement maintenance
KW - Repairing
KW - Spalls (Pavements)
UR - http://www.utexas.edu/research/ctr/pdf_reports/5_5110_01_1.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/878475
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01115444
AU - Crum, Nicole
AU - Fitch, Jennifer
AU - Vermont Agency of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - PavePrep Crack Reduction Interlayer, Lowell, Highgate, and Hartford, Vermont
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 19p
AB - The appearance of cracking in pavement roadways leads to increased maintenance needs and a shorter pavement life. As a result, many products have been developed to help prevent distresses in new asphalt pavement overlays by minimizing the appearance of cracking, in particular reflective cracking. One way to combat the appearance of reflective cracking is through the use of geotextiles that are designed to reinforce the pavement overlay and distribute the stresses in the underlying layers. These geotextile materials are placed on the underlying pavement layer prior to placement of the overlay and help to prevent or delay cracks from propagating through into the new asphalt overlay. In the summer of 1994, the Vermont Agency of Transportation (VTrans) engaged in an assessment of a type of geotextile designed to prevent reflective cracking, known as the PavePrep Crack Reduction Interlayer. The installation was relatively simple, with few problems. The projects were evaluated annually to observe the location and type of cracking and when it began in both the experimental test sites and adjacent areas. The success of the material varied between test sites. Overall, the PavePrep appeared to work best in areas with lower traffic levels. In high traffic areas reflective cracking appeared after 2-3 years while in low traffic areas cracking didn’t occur until over 8 years after installation. In general, the reflective cracking that occurred in the PavePrep test sections was observed to be less severe than other adjacent cracks.
KW - Asphalt pavements
KW - Geotextiles
KW - Overlays (Pavements)
KW - Pavement cracking
KW - Pavement performance
KW - Reflection cracking
KW - Reinforcement (Engineering)
KW - Vermont
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/875161
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01115408
AU - Tremblay, Jason
AU - Fitch, Jennifer
AU - Vermont Agency of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Terminal Blend Asphalt Rubber Hot Mix Lowell-Westfield, VT Route 100
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 62p
AB - This report summarizes the implementation and evaluation of a terminal blend asphalt rubber hot mix (ARHM) overlay which was constructed on VT Route 100 in the towns of Lowell and Westfield. The investigation compares the performance of this material to that of a standard overlay in terms of thermal, fatigue, and reflective cracking, as well as rutting, and the international roughness index (IRI). All sites were examined and measured for these factors and ride roughness prior to the commencement of construction and on a yearly basis. Throughout the duration of the study the two overlay types performed as near equals, with the ARHM doing slightly better in some respects. Of particular note is the fact that the ARHM was comprised of only around 10% crumb rubber by weight rather than the normally required 15%. It may be logical to assume that if the ARHM had the correct amount of crumb rubber it would have performed somewhat better, especially with regards to elastic properties.
KW - Asphalt rubber
KW - Bituminous overlays
KW - Blends
KW - Crumb rubber
KW - Hot mix asphalt
KW - Pavement performance
KW - Vermont
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/875164
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01113234
AU - House, Barry
AU - University of Kentucky, Lexington
AU - Kentucky Transportation Cabinet
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Access Management Implementation in Kentucky: Technical Support Document and Status Report
PY - 2008/05//Research Report
SP - 108p
AB - This report describes the efforts of the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet's Access Management Implementation Task Force. The task force was established in May 2004 and was charged with the responsibility of reviewing and refining the recommendations in the "Access Management for Kentucky" research study for the purpose of implementing a comprehensive access management program for the state of Kentucky. The Kentucky Transportation Center provided technical and administrative support to the task force. This report provides documentation of the information considered by the task force, the deliberations over that information, and the decisions and recommendations made by the task force. Although a decision was made to suspend task force initiatives prior to full-scale implementation of a formal program, the information contained in this report should prove to be a valuable resource for a resumption of implementation efforts when conditions are deemed to be appropriate.
KW - Access control (Transportation)
KW - Decision making
KW - Implementation
KW - Kentucky
KW - Recommendations
KW - Task forces
UR - http://www.ktc.uky.edu/files/2012/06/KTC_08_05_SPR_290_05_2F.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/872729
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01113192
AU - Peck, Steven M
AU - Carroll, Anya A
AU - Kloeppel, Miriam
AU - Research and Innovative Technology Administration
AU - Volpe National Transportation Systems Center
AU - Federal Railroad Administration
AU - Federal Railroad Administration
TI - Private Highway-Rail Grade Crossing Safety Research and Inquiry
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 122p
AB - This report provides a summary of the private highway-rail grade crossing safety inquiry conducted by the United States Department of Transportation Federal Railroad Administration and the Volpe Center. The safety inquiry consisted of a series of public meetings to solicit oral commentary on the safety of the nation’s private highway-rail grade crossings, a docket for electronic comment submission, a panel discussion at the Transportation Research Board’s annual meeting, and other activities as described in the table of contents.
KW - Highway safety
KW - Private enterprise
KW - Railroad grade crossings
KW - Railroad safety
UR - http://www.fra.dot.gov/eLib/Details/L01317
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/871542
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01112782
AU - Witczak, Matthew
AU - Arizona State University, Tempe
AU - Arizona Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Development of Performance Related Specifications for Asphalt Pavements in the State of Arizona
PY - 2008/05//Final Report - Executive Summary
SP - 74p
AB - This report presents an Executive Summary of a comprehensive study conducted by Arizona State University regarding a series of 11 separate projects relating to the implementation of the Mechanistic-Empirical Pavement Design Guide (MEPDG) for the state of Arizona. The individual study project reports deal with the characterization of a variety of AC binder types used by the Arizona Department of Transportation (ADOT) (Project 2); characterization results of E* Master Curve results for typical AC mixtures used in Arizona (Project 3); the characterization of these typical AC mixtures for Thermal Fracture (Project 4), Permanent Deformation (Project 5), and Load associated Fatigue (Project 6). In addition, recommendations are made in Project 7 regarding the implementation of the Simple Performance Test for AC Mixtures. Projects 8 and 9 focus on unbound bases/subbases and subgrades. Project 8 describes the results of nonlinear modulus of resilience response for a variety of typical unbound bases and subgrades. Project 9 deals with the development of an unbound material permanent deformation database and development of a more universal permanent strain model. In the Project 10 study report, the state of Arizona has been subdivided on the basis of relatively unique climatic regions based upon regional geomorphology. Finally, Project 11 is a very comprehensive report study of the existing ADOT traffic files for eventual inclusion with the MEPDG. A computerized (spreadsheet) traffic database of the entire ADOT highway network was conducted. This database incorporates every mile of the Arizona highway network (6 Interstates, 13 U.S. Highways and 86 state highways). Four significant traffic factors are included in the database: Average Annual Daily Traffic (AADT), Annual Growth Rate, Percent Trucks, and Vehicle Classification Percentage (VCP). Relatively homogeneous traffic units were selected based on existing ADOT HPMS and VCP stations.
KW - Annual average daily traffic
KW - Arizona
KW - Asphalt concrete
KW - Asphalt pavements
KW - Base course (Pavements)
KW - Binders
KW - Climatic regions
KW - Dynamic modulus of elasticity
KW - Fatigue (Mechanics)
KW - Fracture mechanics
KW - Geomorphology
KW - Mechanistic-Empirical Pavement Design Guide
KW - Modulus of resilience
KW - Pavement design
KW - Performance based specifications
KW - Research projects
KW - Rutting
KW - Subbase (Pavements)
KW - Subgrade (Pavements)
KW - Traffic data
KW - Traffic growth rates
KW - Vehicle classification
KW - Vehicle mix
UR - http://apps.azdot.gov/ADOTLibrary/publications/project_reports/PDF/AZ402(2).pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/872730
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01112571
AU - Cole, David
AU - Furst, Tony
AU - Daboin, Sharon
AU - Hoemann, Warren
AU - Meyer, Michael D
AU - Nordahl, Richard
AU - Parker, Marygrace
AU - Penne, Leo
AU - Stoner, Norman
AU - Tang, Tianjia
AU - American Trade Initiatives
AU - Federal Highway Administration
AU - American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO)
AU - National Cooperative Highway Research Program
TI - Freight Mobility and Intermodal Connectivity in China
PY - 2008/05
SP - 64p
AB - Trade growth between the United States and China has increased U.S. interest in how the Chinese transportation system handles exports. The Federal Highway Administration, American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, and National Cooperative Highway Research Program sponsored a scanning study to identify how China provides intermodal access to its ports and uses investment strategies to foster freight mobility and intermodal connectivity. The scan team learned that China’s national, provincial, and metropolitan transportation policy is closely coordinated with the country’s economic policy and social harmony goals. The transportation system is expanding rapidly to meet global intermodal freight demands and promote expansion into underdeveloped regions of the country. Team recommendations for U.S. implementation include reviving a national transportation infrastructure focus to maintain U.S. competitiveness in the global market, conducting a study on how China uses performance measures to manage transportation policy, and synthesizing the results of this and earlier scans on intermodal freight and connectivity around the world.
KW - China
KW - Connectivity
KW - Exports
KW - Freight mobility
KW - Freight transportation
KW - Global markets
KW - Highways
KW - Intermodal terminals
KW - International competition
KW - International trade
KW - Investments
KW - Ports
KW - Railroads
KW - Strategic planning
KW - Study tours
KW - Transportation infrastructure
KW - Transportation policy
KW - Trucking
UR - http://international.fhwa.dot.gov/pubs/pl08020/pl08020.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/872323
ER -
TY - SER
AN - 01111555
JO - PATH Research Report
PB - University of California, Berkeley
AU - Li, Yue
AU - Koonce, Peter
AU - Li, Meng
AU - Zhou, Kun
AU - Li, Yuwei
AU - Beaird, Scott
AU - Zhang, Wei-Bin
AU - Hegen, Larry
AU - Hu, Kang
AU - Skabardonis, Alex
AU - Sun, Z Sonja
AU - California Department of Transportation
AU - University of California, Berkeley
AU - Kittelson and Associates, Incorporated
AU - Department of Transportation
TI - Transit Signal Priority Research Tools
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 178p
AB - This report presents the results of a research project that addresses Transit Signal Priority (TSP) deployment issues. The report reviews National Transportation Communications for ITS Protocol (NTCIP) 1211 Signal Control and Prioritization (SCP) standards, defines five SCP scenarios, and describes how the SCP scenarios can be applied differently based on TSP priority and operating policies. The report provides an overview of a number of TSP systems, including centralized TSP, two discrete TSP systems based on loop detection and Global Positioning System (GPS) technologies, and an Adaptive Transit Signal Priority (ATSP) system. A comparison of the different TSP deployments, and guidance on the necessary infrastructure required to implement these TSP systems, are provided. The report also discusses TSP evaluation methodologies, including recommended measures of effectiveness (MOE’s) and data required for performing a quantitative assessment. Evaluations of a number of TSP deployment sites are documented to demonstrate
KW - Adaptive control
KW - Bus priority
KW - Global Positioning System
KW - Highway operations
KW - Loop detectors
KW - Measures of effectiveness
KW - Research
KW - Simulation
KW - Traffic signal preemption
UR - http://www.dot.ca.gov/newtech/researchreports/reports/2008/tsp_research_tools_final_report.pdf
UR - https://merritt.cdlib.org/d/ark%3A%2F13030%2Fm59025g8/2/producer%2FPRR-2008-04.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/870669
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01111373
AU - Jarossi, Linda
AU - Matteson, Anne
AU - Woodrooffe, John
AU - University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute
AU - Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration
TI - Buses Involved in Fatal Accidents Factbook 2005
PY - 2008/05//Special Report
SP - 71p
AB - This document presents aggregate statistics on buses involved in traffic accidents in 2005. The statistics are derived from the Buses Involved in Fatal Accidents (BIFA) file, compiled by the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute. The BIFA database is a census of all buses involved in a fatal accident in the United States, and provides coverage of buses recorded in the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) file. BIFA combines vehicle, accident, and occupant records from FARS with information about the physical configuration and operating authority of the bus from the BIFA survey.
KW - Bus crashes
KW - Buses
KW - Buses Involved in Fatal Accidents
KW - Crash data
KW - Fatalities
KW - Fatality Analysis Reporting System
KW - Statistics
KW - Traffic crashes
KW - Transportation safety
UR - http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/58710/1/96746%20A07.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/871085
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01110882
AU - Cai, Steve C S
AU - Avent, R Richard
AU - Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge
AU - Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Assessing the Needs for Intermediate Diaphragms in Prestressed Concrete Bridges
PY - 2008/05
SP - 40p
AB - Reinforced concrete Intermediate Diaphragms (IDs) are currently being used in prestressed concrete (PC) girder bridges in Louisiana. Some of the advantages of providing IDs are disputed in the bridge community because the use of IDs increases the cost and time of construction. There is no consistency in the practice of providing IDs among various states and codes of practice, and the overall effectiveness of IDs, as well as the need for them in prestressed concrete bridges, is unclear. The objectives of this research were (1) to assess the need of reinforced concrete (RC) IDs in PC girder bridges and to determine their effectiveness, and (2) to search for a possible alternative steel diaphragm configuration that could replace concrete diaphragms if necessary. The research team has examined and reviewed state-of-the-art technology and current practices from many sources of information on IDs. Through a survey questionnaire and review of the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development (LADOTD) Bridge Design Manual, the research team obtained relevant information regarding the ID practices in Louisiana. Through the LADOTD data base for all state bridges, and from direct interaction with district engineers, several of the bridges that are of interest for this study were selected for field inspection. From these field trips to various bridge locations, much information has been acquired from the bridges themselves, as well as from the district engineers. Systematic parametric studies for various bridge configurations, which are representative of an entire range of bridge geometries with different parameters, were analyzed through simplified and solid finite element models. This study was performed on right and skewed bridges, which are simply supported and continuous. A reduction factor that could be multiplied by the AASHTO load distribution factor to account for the influence of the diaphragm in load distribution was developed. A finite element analysis was carried out using 3-D solid models to assess the effectiveness of various diaphragms in protecting the girders against the lateral impact and to determine the design forces in the steel bracing members during construction of deck. The results from the parametric studies indicated that several parameters such as skew, span length, spacing, stiffness of diaphragm and girder have different levels of influence on the effectiveness of diaphragms in live load distribution for bridges. Correction factors that could quantify the ID influence on load distribution were developed. Results from various studies indicated that a steel diaphragm section can possibly replace the RC diaphragms. A prestressed concrete bridge was tested in the field. This bridge was selected by an inspection team comprised of personnel from FHWA, LADOTD, and the LSU research team and is located over Cypress Bayou on LA 408 East, in District 61. A comprehensive instrumentation and loading scheme is presented and illustrated in this report. The instrumentation consists of LVDTs – Linear Variable Differential Transformers (to measure the midspan deflection of each girder), accelerometers, strain gauges, and acoustic emission sensors. The measured results are presented, and comparisons are made between the finite element model and the field tests.
KW - Acoustic emission
KW - Concrete bridges
KW - Diaphragms (Engineering)
KW - Finite element method
KW - Girders
KW - Instrumentation
KW - Load transfer
KW - Prestressed concrete bridges
UR - http://www.ltrc.lsu.edu/pdf/2008/FR_420.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/870690
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01110667
AU - Harris, J Patrick
AU - Texas Transportation Institute
AU - Texas Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Evaluation of Stabilization of Sulfate Soils in Texas
PY - 2008/05//Technical Report
SP - 60p
AB - This implementation project was developed to provide technical support to the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) in developing subgrade soil mixture designs in high sulfate soils and to monitor the performance of projects constructed following the guidelines established in Project 4240. Secondly, the researchers were to assess equipment needs of the TxDOT districts, train laboratory personnel in mix design procedures in high sulfate soils, and provide educational materials for TxDOT to train additional personnel. Mix designs of high sulfate soils for two projects, in the Austin and Laredo Districts, are reported as technical support to districts. The construction and subsequent reevaluation of the project in Eagle Pass is reported to give TxDOT a record of the construction process used in the high sulfate soil on the Second Street project and shows how the project has performed since construction. Evaluation of the 3-D swell procedure shows the test to be repeatable if the density and water source are tightly controlled. A review of the equipment needed for adequate testing of the high sulfate subgrade soils showed that all required equipment can be obtained at minimal cost to TxDOT.
KW - Austin (Texas)
KW - Calcium oxide
KW - Granulated slag
KW - Laredo (Texas)
KW - Mix design
KW - Soil stabilization
KW - Subgrade (Pavements)
KW - Sulfates
KW - Swelling soils
UR - http://tti.tamu.edu/documents/5-4240-01-1.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/870550
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01110636
AU - Federal Highway Administration
AU - Iowa Department of Transportation
AU - Warren County, Iowa
TI - Environmental Assessment: Iowa 92 from Interstate 35 to Indianola in Warren County, Iowa
PY - 2008/05
SP - v.p.
AB - The proposed project would consist of improvements to Iowa Highway 92 located in rural Warren County, Iowa. The proposed project would begin at Interstate 35 (I-35) and extend east for approximately 10 miles to the city of Indianola. The project corridor passes through land that is used primarily for agricultural purposes; however, rural residential homes are found throughout the length of the corridor. The new road would consist of an improved 2-lane cross-section from I-35 to just west of County Road R63. The roadway would transition to a 4-lane with turn lanes cross-section near County Road R63 and continue into Indianola. The proposed project would provide for intersection improvements, such as the addition of turning lanes, and improve the safety of the roadway by reconstructing the roadway to current design standards which would include full-width shoulders, improved sight distance and reducing the number of access points.
KW - Design standards
KW - Environmental impact analysis
KW - Geometric design
KW - Highway design
KW - Highway planning
KW - Highway safety
KW - Improvements
KW - Intersections
KW - Warren County (Iowa)
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/870255
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01110117
AU - Mitman, Meghan Fehlig
AU - Ridgway, Matthew
AU - Chira-Chavala, Ted
AU - University of California, Berkeley
AU - California Office of Traffic Safety
AU - National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
TI - A Technical Guide for Conducting Pedestrian Safety Assessments for California Cities
PY - 2008/05
SP - 58p
AB - This report presents a technical guide for use in conducting Pedestrian Safety Assessments (PSAs) for California cities. It has a threefold objective to enable communities in California to: 1) improve pedestrian safety at specific locations and citywide; 2) create safe, comfortable, accessible, and welcoming environments for pedestrians; and, 3) enhance walkability, livability, and economic vitality. Technical components of the California PSA are presented, including identifying locations for evaluation, performing field audits, identifying best practices for pedestrian, and benchmarking a city's policies, programs, and practices.
KW - California
KW - Evaluation and assessment
KW - Handbooks
KW - Manuals
KW - Pedestrian areas
KW - Pedestrian safety
KW - Pedestrians
UR - http://www.techtransfer.berkeley.edu/tse/psa_handbook.pdf
UR - https://merritt.cdlib.org/d/ark%3A%2F13030%2Fm5p307rc/1/producer%2FTT200805.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/865217
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01109937
AU - Montney, Rodney A
AU - Heinen, Robert F
AU - Wojakowski, John B
AU - Kansas Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Durability of Classed Limestone Coarse Aggregate Study, US-169, Johnson County, Kansas
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 10p
AB - The Kansas Department of Transportation (KDOT) began evaluating individual beds in limestone quarries for suitability for use in concrete pavement in 1980. Aggregates that were suitable for use in Portland Cement Concrete Pavement (PCCP) were designated as Durability Class I Aggregate. By 1986 several quarries had been evaluated and it was decided to construct a project with various Durability Classed Aggregates to prove the system that was used to classify the limestones. Class I Limestone has a 95% probability of providing 20 years of service life before the pavement is rehabilitated due to D-cracking. Although the aggregates that were requested for this project were not provided, this project does demonstrate the effectiveness of the KDOT's specification and the rapid deterioration of pavement once D-cracking becomes evident.
KW - Coarse aggregates
KW - Concrete pavements
KW - D cracking
KW - Durability
KW - Kansas Department of Transportation
KW - Limestone aggregates
KW - Service life
KW - Specifications
UR - http://www.ksdot.org/PublicLib/publicDoc.asp?ID=003772912
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/869628
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01109926
AU - Chaffe, Robert H B
AU - Solomon, Mark G
AU - Leaf, William A
AU - Preusser Research Group, Incorporated
AU - National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
TI - 2006 Seat Belt Use Estimate for Native American Tribal Reservations
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 31p
AB - The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), Indian Highway Safety Program, sponsored a project in fall 2004 to (a) establish the first baseline tribal reservation seat belt use rate, and (b) develop a methodology to use in the future to track trends and specific program effects. The planned sample included 18 reservations with 150 sites on these reservations. Ultimately, data were collected from 120 sites on 16 tribal reservations. A subsequent and comparable survey was requested by NHTSA for fall 2006. Seat belt use was observed between September and December 2006 on 15 reservations and in March 2007 on one reservation. For the tribal reservations subject to tribal law and tribal traffic law enforcement, excluding the Navajo Nation, the overall seat belt use rate was 61.8%. When results from the 2004 study are compared to the present study, there was a statistically significant increase in seat belt use. There was a very high variation in belt use across reservations, ranging from a low of 27.7% to a high of 87.8%. Nine tribal reservations had primary seat belt laws; in them, 73.1% of vehicle occupants were belted. By comparison, three tribal reservations had secondary belt laws; they averaged 59.3% belt use. For the four tribal reservations with no belt use law of any kind, only 37.2% of the vehicle occupants were belted. Tribal policy and procedures are likely responsible for current levels of seat belt use and can be most effective in establishing and improving seat belt usage levels.
KW - Data collection
KW - Indian reservations
KW - Law enforcement
KW - Native Americans
KW - Primary enforcement
KW - Seat belt use
KW - Seat belt use laws
KW - Seat belts
KW - Secondary enforcement
KW - Surveys
KW - Trend (Statistics)
KW - Tribal government
UR - http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/portal/nhtsa_static_file_downloader.jsp?file=/staticfiles/DOT/NHTSA/Traffic%20Injury%20Control/Articles/Associated%20Files/810967.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/869568
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01109884
AU - Kuhn, Michelle
AU - Lam, Jed
AU - Aeffect, Incorporated
AU - National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
TI - Increasing Seat Belt Use Among 8- to 15-Year-Olds: Volume II: Appendices
PY - 2008/05//Summary Research Report Appendices
SP - 128p
AB - The broad aim of this research project was to determine the nature and causes of non-use of seat belts among 8- to 15-year-olds, and to recommend interventions and strategic approaches to increase usage among this age group. This report summarizes findings from three phases of research: a literature review; 28 in-home family immersion interviews conducted in Illinois, Georgia, and Arizona; and detailed findings from qualitative testing of intervention concepts through 96 triads among “tweens” and teens 8 to 15 years old, six focus groups with parents in Pennsylvania, Iowa, Wisconsin, and California, and two focus groups with adult/teen influencers in Iowa and California. Interventions tested included those based on new products, community and school influence, communications, and key influencers (parents, older teens). Findings from the first and second phases of research suggested there are three segments or targets within the 8-to-15 age range with different attitudes and behaviors toward safety restraints. More specifically, 8- to 10-year-olds (younger tweens), 11- and 12-year-olds (older tweens), and 13- to 15-year-olds (young teens) seem to be motivated by different influencers and peer groups. There also appears to be a gap in messages on seat belt safety directed to parents of 8- to 15-year-olds. That is, after hearing about the importance of child safety restraints for infants, parents report almost no information on the continued importance of safety restraints and/or how to transition children to appropriate restraint systems from infant to toddler to pre-teen. Finally, in terms of messages and interventions, 8- to 15-year-olds say hearing about the consequences of not wearing seat belts from other children their age, or from slightly older youth, would make the consequences of not wearing a belt seem more real and alarming.
KW - Adolescents
KW - Attitudes
KW - Behavior
KW - Children
KW - Focus groups
KW - Intervention
KW - Interviewing
KW - Literature reviews
KW - Parents
KW - Safety education
KW - Seat belt use
KW - Seat belts
UR - http://www.nhtsa.gov/DOT/NHTSA/Traffic%20Injury%20Control/Articles/Associated%20Files/810966.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/869534
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01109875
AU - Kuhn, Michelle
AU - Lam, Jed
AU - Aeffect, Incorporated
AU - National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
TI - Increasing Seat Belt Use Among 8- to 15-Year-Olds: Volume I: Findings
PY - 2008/05//Summary Research Report
SP - 44p
AB - The broad aim of this research project was to determine the nature and causes of non-use of seat belts among 8- to 15-year-olds, and to recommend interventions and strategic approaches to increase usage among this age group. This report summarizes findings from three phases of research: a literature review; 28 in-home family immersion interviews conducted in Illinois, Georgia, and Arizona; and detailed findings from qualitative testing of intervention concepts through 96 triads among “tweens” and teens 8 to 15 years old, six focus groups with parents in Pennsylvania, Iowa, Wisconsin, and California, and two focus groups with adult/teen influencers in Iowa and California. Interventions tested included those based on new products, community and school influence, communications, and key influencers (parents, older teens). Findings from the first and second phases of research suggested there are three segments or targets within the 8-to-15 age range with different attitudes and behaviors toward safety restraints. More specifically, 8- to 10-year-olds (younger tweens), 11- and 12-year-olds (older tweens), and 13- to 15-year-olds (young teens) seem to be motivated by different influencers and peer groups. There also appears to be a gap in messages on seat belt safety directed to parents of 8- to 15-year-olds. That is, after hearing about the importance of child safety restraints for infants, parents report almost no information on the continued importance of safety restraints and/or how to transition children to appropriate restraint systems from infant to toddler to pre-teen. Finally, in terms of messages and interventions, 8- to 15-year-olds say hearing about the consequences of not wearing seat belts from other children their age, or from slightly older youth, would make the consequences of not wearing a belt seem more real and alarming.
KW - Adolescents
KW - Attitudes
KW - Behavior
KW - Children
KW - Focus groups
KW - Intervention
KW - Interviewing
KW - Literature reviews
KW - Parents
KW - Safety education
KW - Seat belt use
KW - Seat belts
UR - http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/staticfiles//DOT/NHTSA/Traffic%20Injury%20Control/Articles/Associated%20Files/810965.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/869531
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01108627
AU - Agent, Kenneth R
AU - University of Kentucky, Lexington
AU - Kentucky Transportation Cabinet
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Low-Cost Safety Measures at Signalized Intersections
PY - 2008/05//Research Report
SP - 73p
AB - The objectives of this study were to: a) identify intersections with a high number of crashes involving a driver disregarding the traffic signal, b) identify types of low-cost safety measures which may be used as a countermeasure for redlight running, and c) evaluate the effectiveness of the installation of some of these countermeasures at a sample of high crash intersections. Low-cost countermeasures such as double-red signal heads and retro-reflective backplates were installed at locations either identified as a high-crash location or by district traffic engineers. Crashes decreased at these locations with a positive public response. The investigation warrants additional use of the types of low-cost countermeasures evaluated. The type of crash analysis described in the report should be used to identify intersections with intersection characteristics and the specific crash history used to select the specific countermeasure to implement.
KW - Countermeasures
KW - High risk locations
KW - Interchanges and intersections
KW - Intersections
KW - Safety
KW - Signalized intersections
KW - Traffic safety
KW - Traffic signals
UR - http://www.ktc.uky.edu/files/2012/06/KTC_08_11_SPR_316_06_1F.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/865803
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01108416
AU - Gilbert, Hope
AU - Chaudhary, Neil K
AU - Solomon, Mark G
AU - Preusser, David F
AU - Cosgrove, Linda A
AU - Preusser Research Group, Incorporated
AU - National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
TI - Evaluation of the Reinstatement of the Universal Motorcycle Helmet Law in Louisiana
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 52p
AB - Louisiana has enacted and repealed motorcycle helmet laws many times. Louisiana first adopted an all-rider motorcycle helmet law in 1968, amended it in 1976 to require helmet use only by riders under the age of 18, and reenacted a universal helmet law in 1982. In 1999, the State amended that law to require helmet use only by motorcyclists under 18 and riders over 18 who did not have a minimum of $10,000 in medical insurance coverage. In 2004, Louisiana reinstated its universal helmet law that required all motorcyclists, riders and passengers, to wear helmets all the time. This study examined rates of motorcycle helmet usage, fatalities, and injuries. Observed helmet use rose to 100 percent after reinstatement of the universal helmet law. Helmet use in motorcycle crashes during the period (1999 – 2003) without the helmet law was 42.3% (pre-reinstatement) and increased to 87% in 2004 – 2005 (post-reinstatement). Motorcycle crashes increased from 1999 to 2005 in Louisiana. Fatal crashes decreased in 2004 for the first time since the 1999 repeal, increasing slightly in 2005, but with fewer than before the law was reinstated in Louisiana. The national trend showed a steady increase in fatal motorcycle crashes during this time period. Kentucky, a comparison State, also showed steadily increasing fatal crashes. The drop in fatal motorcycle crashes in Louisiana was not replicated in a nearby State, and is therefore likely attributable to the law change. Motorcycle fatalities had been accounting for a larger proportion of all motor vehicle fatalities in Louisiana doubling between 1999 and 2003 (4% to 9%), slightly decreasing for the first time in 2005 (8%). The proportion of fatal and serious injury motorcycle crashes to all motorcycle crashes (fatal crashes, serious injury, moderate injuries, complaint of injury, and property damage only) declined after the helmet law was reinstated in Louisiana.
KW - Crash injuries
KW - Fatalities
KW - Helmet laws
KW - Helmet use
KW - Louisiana
KW - Motorcycle helmets
KW - Reinstatement
KW - State laws
KW - Universal motorcycle helmet law
UR - http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/portal/nhtsa_static_file_downloader.jsp?file=/staticfiles/DOT/NHTSA/Traffic%20Injury%20Control/Articles/Associated%20Files/810956.pdf
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/30000/30200/30207/810956.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/868181
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01106148
AU - Balaguru, P N
AU - Nazier, Mohamed
AU - Arafa, Mohamed
AU - Center for Advanced Infrastructure and Transportation
AU - New Jersey Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Field Implementation of Geopolymer Coatings
PY - 2008/05//Final Report, Revised Edition
SP - 51p
AB - The results presented in this report deal with an evaluation of geopolymer coatings for durability and field demonstration applications. The primary objectives were to establish a temperature range in which the coating could be applied, to establish the surface conditions and requirements, and to demonstrate field applications which were done at Rutgers University campuses and on actual transportation structures. A brief description of fiber composites is presented in the introduction chapter. The study on the establishment of a temperature range is presented in Chapter 2. The durability test results under wetting and drying conditions and scaling are presented in Chapters 3 and 4, respectively, and the field applications are described in Chapter 5. Conclusions and recommendations are presented in Chapter 6. The recommended application procedure for the geopolymer coatings is presented in Appendix A.
KW - Coatings
KW - Concrete structures
KW - Durability
KW - Fiber composites
KW - Field tests
KW - Geopolymers
KW - Protective coating
KW - Scaling
KW - Strengthening (Maintenance)
KW - Surface condition
KW - Temperature
KW - Wetting and drying tests
UR - http://www.nj.gov/transportation/refdata/research/reports/FHWA-NJ-2002-011.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/865816
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01106133
AU - Folliard, Kevin J
AU - Juenger, Maria C G
AU - Schindler, Anton Karel
AU - Riding, Kyle A
AU - Poole, Jonathan L
AU - Kallivokas, Loukas F
AU - Slatnick, Samuel
AU - Whigham, Jared
AU - Meadows, J L
AU - University of Texas, Austin
AU - Texas Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Prediction Model for Concrete Behavior—Final Report
PY - 2008/05//Technical Report
SP - 77p
AB - This report summarizes work performed under Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) Project 4563, Prediction Model for Concrete Behavior. The main product developed under this project is a software program, named ConcreteWorks, which gives laboratory technicians, engineers, and contractors a tool that combines concrete design, analysis, and performance prediction to improve and optimize the performance of concrete structures. A unique feature of the testing performed is the use of rigid cracking frames. This test was developed in Germany, and measures the cracking sensitivity of a restrained dog-bone-shaped concrete specimen from the time of concrete placement. Temperature-controlled formwork is used to cure the specimen to match field conditions of mass concrete members. These frames are designed to allow fresh concrete to be cast into their formwork, which enables the study of very early-age behavior of concrete mixtures. More than 70 tests have been completed to date and these results were used to characterize the very early-age creep behavior and risk of cracking of various concretes. Mixture-specific heat of hydration values are used to accurately model the effect of various cementitious materials on the in-place concrete temperature distribution. The model has been calibrated with over 33,000 hours of temperature data collected from field sites. The software provides detailed results to check compliance with specification to control thermal cracking, alkali silica reaction, delayed ettringite formation, and service-life expectancy. This report concludes with a section aimed at implementing ConcreteWorks, with emphasis on how best to use, specify, and check compliance with mass concrete design guidelines.
KW - Alkali silica reactions
KW - Calibration
KW - Concrete
KW - Concrete performance
KW - Concrete structures
KW - Cracking
KW - Early age concrete
KW - Ettringite
KW - Heat of hydration
KW - Laboratory tests
KW - Mathematical models
KW - Service life
KW - Software
KW - Thermal degradation
UR - http://www.utexas.edu/research/ctr/pdf_reports/0_4563_1.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/865248
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01105636
AU - Juenger, Maria C G
AU - Won, Moon C
AU - Fowler, David W
AU - Suh, Chul
AU - Edson, Andre
AU - University of Texas, Austin
AU - Texas Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Effects of Supplementary Cementing Materials on the Setting Time and Early Strength of Concrete
PY - 2008/05//Technical Report
SP - 82p
AB - The substitution of a portion of cement in concrete with supplementary cementing materials (SCM), which include ground granulated blast furnace slag (GGBFS), fly ash, and silica fume, frequently results in delayed setting and low early strength. When SCM-containing concrete is placed during cold weather and/or contains certain chemical admixtures, these problems can intensify and can seriously impact the performance of a pavement. This project investigated the setting time, early strength gain, maturity, bleeding, and plastic shrinkage cracking of several concrete pavement mixtures containing SCM under different temperature conditions (mimicking summer, spring, and winter weather). The data were used to develop guidelines for identifying slow-setting mixtures and preventing their use in pavements.
KW - Admixtures
KW - Cold weather construction
KW - Concrete
KW - Concrete maturity
KW - Early strength (Concrete)
KW - Fly ash
KW - Granulated slag
KW - Setting (Concrete)
KW - Setting time
KW - Shrinkage
KW - Silica fume
KW - Slag
KW - Supplementary cementing materials
KW - Weather conditions
UR - http://www.utexas.edu/research/ctr/pdf_reports/0_5550_1.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/865201
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01105108
AU - Botch, Sabra R
AU - Chaturvedi, Arvind K
AU - Canfield, Dennis V
AU - Forster, Estrella M
AU - Federal Aviation Administration
AU - Federal Aviation Administration
TI - Vitreous Fluid and/or Urine Glucose Concentrations in 1,335 Civil Aviation
Accident Pilot Fatalities
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 11p
AB - For aviation accident investigations at the Civil Aerospace Medical Institute (CAMI), vitreous fluid and urine samples from pilot fatalities are analyzed for glucose, and in those cases wherein glucose levels are elevated, blood hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) is measured. These analyses are conducted to monitor diabetic pilots to ensure that their disease was in control at the time of accidents and to discover other pilots with undiagnosed and unreported diabetes. In this study, the prevalence of elevated glucose concentrations in fatally injured civilian pilots is evaluated. Glucose and HbA1c are measured by hexokinase and latex immunoagglutination inhibition methodologies, respectively. The former was adopted at the beginning of 1998, while the latter in the middle of 2001. The analytical results are electronically stored in the CAMI Toxicology Database. This database was searched for pilots from whom samples were received during 1998–2005 and whose vitreous fluid and/or urine glucose concentrations were measured. HbA1c levels and information on diabetic pilots were also retrieved. The probable cause and contributing factors of the associated accidents were obtained from the National Transportation Safety Board's (NTSB's) Aviation Accident Database. Out of 1,335 pilots involving 363 vitreous fluid, 365 urine, and 607 vitreous fluid and urine analyses, 43 pilots had elevated glucose in vitreous fluid (> 125 mg/dL) and/or in urine (> 100 mg/dL). Of the 20 pilots whose blood samples were analyzed, 9 had > 6% HbA1c—4 were known diabetics (HbA1c: 7.1; 8.3; 10.8; and 12.4%), and 5 were not known diabetics (HbA1c: 6.2; 8.2; 8.3; 8.6; and 13.0%). Urinary glucose levels were elevated in all 13 known hyperglycemic pilots. One pilot had a history of renal glycosuria (low renal threshold). The disease of the 13 diabetic pilots was not in control at the time of accidents. Additionally, there were a considerable number of pilots with elevated glucose (30 of 43) and HbA1c (5 of 20), suggesting undiagnosed and unreported diabetic conditions. However, health, medical condition(s), and use of medications (authorized or unauthorized) by pilots were determined by the NTSB to be the cause or a factor in 5 accidents: elevated glucose level of the pilot was a factor in 1 and incapacitation/impairment of the pilot was a cause and/or factor in 4. Greater attention is necessary in controlling diabetes by aviators in coordination with Aviation Medical Examiners.
KW - Air transportation crashes
KW - Airline pilots
KW - Aviation safety
KW - Civil aviation
KW - Crash investigation
KW - Fatalities
KW - Forensic medicine
KW - Glucose
KW - Toxicology
KW - Urine
KW - Vitreous fluid
UR - http://libraryonline.erau.edu/online-full-text/faa-aviation-medicine-reports/AM08-11.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/864532
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01105077
AU - Detwiler, Cristy
AU - Holcomb, Kali
AU - Hackworth, Carla
AU - Shappell, Scott
AU - Federal Aviation Administration
AU - Clemson University
AU - Federal Aviation Administration
TI - Understanding the Human Factors Associated With Visual Flight Rules Flight Into Instrument Meteorological Conditions
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 16p
AB - Visual Flight Rules (VFR) into Instrument Meteorological Conditions (IMC) accidents are a major concern in the aviation industry. More than 70% of the fatal weather-related accidents involved General Aviation (GA) pilots operating under visual flight rules (VFR) that continued into IMC. The purpose of this study was to pair GA accident causal factors that had been classified with the Human Factors Analysis and Classification System (HFACS) categories and traditional demographic data in an effort to present a more complete picture of VFR flight into IMC accidents. To accomplish this, GA accidents associated with VFR flight into IMC were examined to determine if there were any causal factors that set these accidents apart from the rest of GA (RoGA) accidents. GA accident data (14 CFR Part 91) from 1990-2004 were analyzed. The dataset was divided into accidents that had VFR into IMC (VFR-IMC; N = 609) cited as a cause or factor versus the rest of the GA accidents (RoGA; N = 18,528). Analyses were performed examining the human error associated with these accidents. The results indicated that skill-based errors were more prevalent in RoGA than in VFR-IMC (odds ratio = 4.167, χ2 = 332.531, p <.001). VFR-IMC pilots were more likely to commit a decision error (odds ratio = 2.062, χ2 = 77.961, p <.001); experience a perceptual error (odds ratio = 3.179, χ2 = 118.350, p <.001); and commit a violation (odds ratio = 29.960, χ2 = 2454.198, p <.001) than RoGA. The injury severity for VFR-IMC accidents was much greater than for RoGA (80.3% vs. 18.8%). RoGA pilots held a higher number of multiple certificates and earned more flight hours across the board than the VFR-IMC pilots. These data provide a more detailed view of the VFR into IMC accidents and will facilitate the development of future data-driven intervention strategies. Current interventions include weather cameras and other pilot aids for decision making with regard to weather.
KW - Air transportation crashes
KW - Aviation safety
KW - Crash causes
KW - General aviation pilots
KW - Human factors
KW - Human Factors Analysis and Classification System
KW - Instrument flying
KW - Visual flight
KW - Weather
KW - Weather-related accidents
UR - http://libraryonline.erau.edu/online-full-text/faa-aviation-medicine-reports/AM08-12.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/864530
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01104914
AU - Jung, Chulmin
AU - Bobet, Antonio
AU - Purdue University/Indiana Department of Transportation JHRP
AU - Indiana Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Post-Construction Evaluation of Lime-Treated Soils
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 252p
AB - Lime is used to treat weak subgrade soils during construction of highways. A small amount of lime (4 to 7%) is used to rapidly dehydrate and modify fine grained soils. The modification process improves workability and compactability of the soils. Although the lime modification process is primarily aimed at construction expediency, additional effects such as long-term improvement of stiffness and/or strength by pozzolanic and carbonation cementation reactions are expected. Lime treatment has been employed in Indiana over several decades, but the long-term performance of lime-treated soils has not been well quantified and no field tests have been done on roads in service. A comprehensive field investigation was carried out to determine the properties of subgrade soils treated with lime in pavements that had been in service for at least five years. Six sites were selected for the field tests. At each site, SPT, DCPT, and FWD tests were performed to evaluate the in-situ stiffness and/or strength properties of the lime-treated subgrade. Laboratory tests from soil samples taken from the SPT spoon were done to obtain index properties of the lime-treated subgrade and the lime content that remains in the soil. The long-term performance of the lime-treated subgrade at each site has been evaluated by comparing the soil indices and stiffness and/or strength properties of the lime-treated subgrade soil with those of the natural soil. In addition, the lime content of the subgrade and the natural soil were measured to establish the remaining lime in the treated subgrade and detect any leaching in the underlying soil. The research has shown the following: (1) the lime remains in the soil even after 11 years of service of the road after construction; (2) the addition of lime decreases the plasticity of the soil and increases its CBR; and (3) the construction quality observed from the field tests is highly variable.
KW - Cone penetrometers
KW - Falling weight deflectometers
KW - Foundations
KW - Indiana
KW - Limestone soils
KW - Soil stabilization
KW - Stiffness
KW - Subgrade (Pavements)
KW - Subgrade materials
UR - http://docs.lib.purdue.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1791&context=jtrp
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/864643
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01104909
AU - Basu, Dipanjan
AU - Salgado, Rodrigo
AU - Prezzi, Monica
AU - Purdue University/Indiana Department of Transportation JHRP
AU - Indiana Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Analysis of Laterally Loaded Piles in Multilayered Soil Deposits
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 152p
AB - This report focuses on the development of a new method of analysis of laterally loaded piles embedded in a multi-layered soil deposit treated as a three-dimensional continuum. Assuming that soil behaves as a linear elastic material, the governing differential equations for the deflection of laterally loaded piles were obtained using energy principles and calculus of variations. The differential equations were solved using both the method of initial parameters and numerical techniques. Soil resistance, pile deflection, slope of the deflected pile, bending moment and shear force can be easily obtained at any depth along the entire pile length. The results of the analysis were in very good agreement with three-dimensional finite element analysis results. The analysis was further extended to account for soil nonlinearity. A few simple constitutive relationships that allow for modulus degradation with increasing strain were incorporated into the analysis. The interaction of piles in groups was also studied.
KW - Bending moments
KW - Bridge foundations
KW - Finite element method
KW - Lateral loads
KW - Pile foundations
KW - Pile groups
KW - Piles (Supports)
KW - Soil mechanics
KW - Strain (Mechanics)
UR - http://docs.lib.purdue.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1802&context=jtrp
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/864547
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01104568
AU - Richardson, David N
AU - Missouri University of Science and Technology, Rolla
AU - Research and Special Programs Administration
TI - Acquisition of a High-Quality Temperature Chamber
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 83p
AB - With the Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT) beginning to implement the new Mechanistic-Empirical (M-E) Design Guide for New and Rehabilitated Pavements, the need exists for various types of testing of hot-mix asphalt (HMA) mixes used by MoDOT in its flexible pavements. In particular, the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) test protocol T 322 is utilized to determine HMA properties needed as inputs to pavement distress prediction models within the M-E Pavement Design Guide (MEPDG) Software. The primary properties derived from T 322 are creep compliance and tensile strength. These properties are determined using indirect tension methods and are temperature dependent. Creep compliance is a parameter used in the thermal cracking distress model within the MEPDG Software and is determined at 0, -10, and -20°C while tensile strength is an input to the fatigue cracking distress model and is determined at temperatures ranging from -20 to +20°C.
KW - Asphalt mixtures
KW - Cracking
KW - Creep properties
KW - Flexible pavements
KW - Hot mix asphalt
KW - Mechanistic-Empirical Pavement Design Guide
KW - Pavement distress
KW - Temperature
KW - Tensile strength
KW - Test chambers
KW - Test procedures
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/27000/27000/27007/RE169_CR.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/863376
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01104565
AU - Goldberg, Bruce
AU - Chesser, David
AU - Research and Innovative Technology Administration
TI - Sitting on the Runway: Current Aircraft Taxi Times Now Exceed Pre-9/11 Experience
PY - 2008/05//Special Report
SP - 8p
AB - Several high profile incidents have focused attention on “tarmac delays” that resulted in air travelers spending long periods of time aboard aircraft waiting to either take off or move to a gate after landing. Taxi-time data collected by the Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) for the year 2007 shows: (1) Both outbound and inbound taxi times increased noticeably in 2007 and surpassed the previous peak reached in 2000. (2) 93 percent of flights left the ground within 30 minutes of gate departure, compared to 96 percent in 1995. (3) Extended taxi times in excess of 2 hours, which occur infrequently, increased in recent years but have not reached the levels experienced in the 1999 to 2000 period. (4) The longest taxi-out times occurred during the summer. (5) Although flight volumes impact taxiing times, other factors also come into play.
KW - Aircraft
KW - Passengers
KW - Taxiing
KW - Time duration
KW - Waiting time
UR - http://www.bts.gov/publications/bts_special_report/2008_008/pdf/entire.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/863303
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01104054
AU - Federal Railroad Administration
TI - National Rail Safety Action Plan: Final Report 2005-2008
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 29p
AB - This report details the Federal Railroad Administration’s (FRA's) achievements in successfully completing all of the original elements of the National Rail Safety Action Plan (Action Plan). While the specific provisions of the Action Plan are complete, FRA’s work is not. This agency will continue with ongoing implementation of many of the individual safety efforts and will extend and enhance many other projects started under the Action Plan. In addition, the FRA is pursuing a wide range of other initiatives to improve freight and passenger rail safety, and continues to perform safety compliance and enforcement oversight.
KW - Compliance
KW - Law enforcement
KW - National Rail Safety Action Plan
KW - Oversight
KW - Plan implementation
KW - Railroad safety
KW - U.S. Federal Railroad Administration
UR - http://www.hsdl.org/?view&did=15692
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/864190
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01104044
AU - Pu, Lili
AU - Joshi, Rahul
AU - Siemens Energy and Automation, Incorporated
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Surrogate Safety Assessment Model (SSAM): Software User Manual
PY - 2008/05//Software User Manual
SP - 100p
AB - This document presents guidelines for the installation and use of the Surrogate Safety Assessment Model (SSAM) software. For more information regarding the SSAM application, including discussion of theoretical background and the results of a series of evaluation tests, see the corresponding FHWA research report entitled "Surrogate Safety Assessment Model and Validation: Final Report," FHWA-HRT-08-051.
KW - Computer program documentation
KW - Highway design
KW - Highway facilities
KW - Highway safety
KW - Surrogate Safety Assessment Model
KW - Traffic simulation
UR - http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/publications/research/safety/08050/index.cfm
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/864037
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01104038
AU - Russell, Mark A
AU - Pierce, Linda M
AU - Uhlmeyer, Jeffrey S
AU - Anderson, Keith W
AU - Washington State Department of Transportation
AU - Washington State Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - NovaChip®
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 34p
AB - An experminetal application of NovaChip® was evaluated on a section of SR-17 through the city of Soap Lake, Washington. NovaChip® was investigated as a possible substitute for Hot Mix Asphalt (HMA) Class G that is normally specified through cities on routes that only warrant a bituminous surface treatment. The NovaChip® was placed in the summer of 2001. Pavement condition survey results and visual observations revealed that the NovaChip® was effective in reducing both the frequency and severity of cracking. Ride quality has remained constant throughout the six year evaluation period and wear/rutting has been minimal. Life cycle cost analysis showed that NovaChip® is comparable to HMA Class G when analyzed on a total project cost basis, but not competitive when only the cost of the overlay is considered.
KW - Chip seals
KW - Condition surveys
KW - Life cycle costing
KW - NovaChip
KW - Pavement cracking
KW - Pavement design
KW - Pavement performance
KW - Ride quality
KW - Rutting
KW - Small cities
KW - State highways
KW - Washington (State)
KW - Wear
UR - http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/research/reports/fullreports/697.1.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/864030
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01104034
AU - Rephlo, Jennifer A
AU - Carter, Mark
AU - Rigdon, Heather
AU - Robinson, Mark D
AU - Katz, Bryan
AU - Bedsole, Lisa
AU - Philmus, Ken
AU - Science Applications International Corporation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Strategies for Improving Safety at Toll Collection Facilities
PY - 2008/05//Draft Final
SP - 64p
AB - A wide range of solutions have been developed to address the unique safety challenges of toll collection facilities. However, many of these solutions have been created by individual agencies that are geographically and institutionally isolated from one another. Consequently, while many of the techniques or strategies are quite innovative and may be applicable at other toll collection facilities, their use may not yet extend beyond a single agency. This report is the result of an effort to gather information on specific safety strategies directly from those who operate and who work in and around toll facilities. Altogether, individuals from over 35 tolling authorities were consulted, and from discussions with these individuals, 94 strategies were identified that are currently in use across the country, and that may have the potential to improve safety at toll collection facilities. This report presents these 94 strategies.
KW - Highway safety
KW - Occupational safety
KW - Strategic planning
KW - Toll booths
KW - Toll collection
KW - Toll facilities
KW - Toll plazas
UR - http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/tolling/if08005/if08005.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/864071
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01104028
AU - Goswami, Arkopal K
AU - Miller, John S
AU - Hoel, Lester A
AU - Virginia Transportation Research Council
AU - Virginia Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Airport Offsite Passenger Service Facilities: An Option for Improving Landside Access: Volume I: Definition, Background, and Opportunities
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 29p
AB - Because transportation modes are diverse, intermodal connections take several forms. They may be comprised of a major hub, such as the Virginia Inland Port, which transfers freight between the truck and rail modes, or an improvement to an existing mode, such as storage space for bicycles on buses. Between these extremes are park and ride lots, which accommodate motorists changing to a transit mode. These intermodal connection points share the common purpose of providing a “seamless” link from one mode to another. An example of an intermodal connection is the airport offsite passenger service facility, or simply an offsite facility. These facilities deliver passengers from a common location to an airport and may provide additional services such as baggage and passenger check-in. These facilities can exist at train stations, cruise line ports, resorts, or hotels or as separate facilities near major highways. Some provide passenger transportation to the airport but not baggage check-in; some provide baggage check-in but not passenger transportation to the airport; and some provide baggage and passenger check-in as well as transportation to the airport. Successful airport offsite facilities offer a benefit to both the passenger and the airport operator. Passenger benefits include the seamless transfer of people or baggage; operator benefits include the option to increase airport terminal capacity without the need to acquire additional land for parking or other terminal operations. In the past, when offsite facilities failed to provide such benefits, they ceased operations. Thus, an investment in an offsite facility is not without risk. Where successful, these facilities may offer the following public benefits: (1) an alternative airport access mode for air passengers and (2) a way to expand airport landside capacity without taking additional land. To the extent that automobile trips are replaced by public transportation, these facilities can serve (1) to improve air quality and (2) to reduce highway congestion. These opportunities suggest that offsite facilities merit consideration as one tool for improving intermodal connections. This report documents the history, categories, potential risks and benefits, and Virginia-specific opportunities associated with airport offsite passenger service facilities. A major barrier to implementation is the lack of a methodology for forecasting travel demand. A companion report entitled "Airport Offsite Passenger Service Facilities: An Option for Improving Landside Access: Volume II: A Methodology to Determine Demand for Airport Offsite Passenger Service Facilities" will present the results of a study that can assist in evaluating the potential for implementing such a facility in Virginia.
KW - Airport access
KW - Airport operations
KW - Baggage handling
KW - Landside operations (Airports)
KW - Passenger service
KW - Satellite terminals (Airports)
UR - http://www.virginiadot.org/vtrc/main/online_reports/pdf/08-r15.pdf
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/37000/37600/37655/08-r15.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/863980
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01104022
AU - Decina, Lawrence E
AU - Lococo, Kathy H
AU - Ashburn, Warren
AU - Hall, William B
AU - Rose, Janelle
AU - TransAnalytics, LLC
AU - National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
TI - Identifying Strategies to Improve the Effectiveness of Booster Seat Laws
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 127p
AB - The objective of this project was to identify strategies to improve the effectiveness of booster seat laws. The project explored the possible factors that relate to the use and nonuse of booster seats, and examined the attitudes of law enforcement officers and parents/caregivers concerning booster seat laws. As of June 2007, 38 States and the District of Columbia have included booster seat provisions in their child restraint laws. A recent NHTSA-sponsored observational survey found 41% of children age 4 to 8 restrained in boosters. A literature review uncovered the following reasons that parents/caregivers do not restrain their children in boosters: misunderstanding of the law; underestimation of risk; lack of knowledge about the benefits of booster seats; and permissive parenting style. An observational study conducted in this project found a 9.1-percentage-point increase in the use of child safety seats and booster seats for children age 4 to 8 following enactment of an enhanced child restraint law (booster seat law). Barriers to the use and enforcement of booster seat laws were addressed in focus groups with parents/caregivers and law enforcement officers. Barriers included parent/caregiver ignorance of child restraint laws and low risk perception; lack of knowledge about the safety benefits of booster seats among the public, as well as among law enforcement officers and members of the courts; low threat of being ticketed for booster seat violations; and lack of commitment to child passenger safety (CPS) by law enforcement top management. Educational, enforcement, and legislative strategies were developed to improve the effectiveness of booster seat laws. The educational strategies are teaching parents/caregivers about best practices for restraint use and the risks of inappropriate restraint use; and identification of booster seat resources for low-income groups. The enforcement strategies include enlisting support for CPS activities from chiefs of police; training law enforcement officers and judges about CPS best practices and their State laws; high-visibility enforcement of child restraint laws; recording appropriate child restraint law violation data on citations; including law enforcement officers in publicity promoting booster seat laws and best practices; and use of fear appeals in CPS messages to increase parent/caregiver risk perception. Legislative strategies are enactment of booster seat laws in all States; strengthening of booster seat laws to meet best practices; and enactment of primary booster seat laws as well as primary seat belt laws.
KW - Attitudes
KW - Best practices
KW - Booster seats
KW - Caregivers
KW - Education
KW - Focus groups
KW - Judges
KW - Law enforcement
KW - Law enforcement personnel
KW - Literature reviews
KW - Parents
KW - Risk perception
KW - State laws
KW - Strategic planning
KW - Surveys
UR - http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/staticfiles/DOT/NHTSA/Traffic%20Injury%20Control/Studies%20&%20Reports/Associated%20Files/810969.pdf
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/30000/30100/30188/810969.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/863913
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01104013
AU - Fell, James C
AU - Langston, Elizabeth A
AU - Lacey, John H
AU - Tippetts, A Scott
AU - Cotton, Ray
AU - Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation
AU - National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
TI - Evaluation of Seven Publicized Enforcement Demonstration Programs to Reduce Impaired Driving: Georgia, Louisiana, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Indiana, and Michigan
PY - 2008/05
SP - 152p
AB - Between 2000 and 2003, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration funded seven alcohol demonstration projects designed to reduce impaired driving through well-publicized and highly visible enforcement. The projects were conducted in seven States: Georgia, Louisiana, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Indiana, and Michigan. This report describes the program evaluations conducted in all seven States. In each of the seven States, funding supported increased enforcement and publicity. In Georgia, Indiana, and Michigan funding was provided for paid advertising. Each State acted as a case study because the type and amount of publicity and enforcement differed substantially. Significant reductions in crashes in the intervention States relative to surrounding States were obtained in Georgia and Tennessee, when an interrupted time-series analysis of FARS data comparing the ratio of drinking to non-drinking drivers in fatal crashes was used; however, a corresponding statistically significant reduction in alcohol-related fatalities per 100 million vehicle miles traveled was not obtained. Compared to neighboring States, Indiana and Michigan experienced significant decreases in both the ratio of drinking to non-drinking driver fatal crashes and alcohol-related fatalities per 100 million vehicle miles traveled. As compared to surrounding States, fatal crash reductions in Georgia, Tennessee, Indiana, and Michigan ranged from 11 to 20 percent. In these four States, the programs were estimated to have saved lives ranging from 25 in Indiana to 43 in Tennessee to 57 in Michigan to 60 in Georgia. The other three States showed only marginal, non-significant changes relative to their comparison jurisdictions or States. In summary, it appears that a variety of media and enforcement procedures that supplement ongoing statewide efforts can yield meaningful crash reduction effects among alcohol impaired drivers. In general, States employing sobriety checkpoints, using paid advertising and programs implemented statewide were associated with crash reductions relative to surrounding States. However, the use of saturation patrols alone did not preclude crash reduction. As each of these demonstration programs was unique and superimposed on existing State program activities targeting drinking drivers, simple relationships were not obtained between crash reductions and (a) amount, type, and target of publicity campaigns; (b) amount and type of enforcement activities; and (c) driver awareness, perceptions and self-reported behavior. Based upon previous research and some of the implications from this study, a State impaired driving enforcement program is more likely to be successful if it incorporates (a) numerous checkpoints or highly visible saturation patrols conducted routinely throughout the year along with mobilized crackdowns (at least three per year) and; (b) intensive publicity coverage of the enforcement activities, including paid advertising.
KW - Advertising
KW - Case studies
KW - Demonstration projects
KW - Drunk driving
KW - Fatalities
KW - Georgia
KW - Indiana
KW - Law enforcement
KW - Louisiana
KW - Michigan
KW - Pennsylvania
KW - Publicity
KW - Saturation patrols
KW - Sobriety checkpoints
KW - Tennessee
KW - Texas
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/30000/30200/30205/810941.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/863921
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01103994
AU - LeRoy, Aida A
AU - Morse, M Lee
AU - Iatrogen, LLC
AU - National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
TI - Multiple Medications and Vehicle Crashes: Analysis of Databases
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - v.p.
AB - Using population databases, this study analyzed the association of the impairing effects of multiple medication use, drug interactions, and drug disease interactions on motor vehicle crashes (MVCs) in individuals age 50 years and greater. The main objectives of this study were to determine the relative frequency of various combinations of medications used by those who have experienced a MVC and those who have not by analyzing proprietary and non-proprietary databases; and to conduct a case-control study of possible associations between the use of medications (and combinations thereof) and MVCs among older drivers. The results of this analysis suggest that both the kinds and number of medication exposures, and the characteristics of diseases/disorders present among study subjects may predict an increase in risk for MVCs among older adults. By demonstrating a potential link between multiple drug therapies and MVCs, this study serves to highlight the need for a more thorough examination of the relationships between drugs, diseases and the older driver. The study suggests the need for further research to elucidate the complex interplay of factors affecting aging adults and driving ability. The results of this research support the intentions of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to promote the development of educational programs to increase awareness among health care providers and older drivers regarding the potential driver impairing effects of pharmaceutical use.
KW - Aged drivers
KW - Crashes
KW - Databases
KW - Diseases and medical conditions
KW - Drug interactions
KW - Drugs
KW - Education
KW - Medication
KW - Polypharmacy
UR - http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/portal/nhtsa_static_file_downloader.jsp?file=/staticfiles/DOT/NHTSA/Traffic%20Injury%20Control/Articles/Associated%20Files/810858.pdf
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/30000/30200/30202/810858.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/863878
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01103990
AU - Hawkins, H Gene
AU - Williams, Cameron L
AU - Sunkari, Srinivasa R
AU - Texas Transportation Institute
AU - Texas Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Evaluation of Traffic Control Devices: Fourth-Year Activities
PY - 2008/05//Technical Report
SP - 108p
AB - This project was established to provide a means of conducting limited scope evaluations of numerous traffic control device issues. During the fourth year of the project, researchers completed assessments of five issues: developing an automated process for identifying the start and end of no-passing zones, developing guidelines for the use of pedestrian countdown signals, evaluating the performance of lead-free yellow thermoplastic pavement markings, developing improved guidelines for accessibility issues associated with traffic signalization, and continuing development of the "Work Zone Impacts Handbook." The automated no-passing zone activity developed a prototype method of using Global Positioning System (GPS) coordinates to identify the start and end of no-passing zones based on vertical alignment. The activity on pedestrian countdown signals synthesized available information to develop some initial guidelines. The signal accessibility and work zone impacts’ activities are producing separate documents that address those issues.
KW - Accessibility
KW - Countdown pedestrian indicators
KW - Global Positioning System
KW - Guidelines
KW - Handbooks
KW - No passing zones
KW - Road markings
KW - Signalization
KW - Thermoplastic materials
KW - Traffic control devices
KW - Work zone traffic control
UR - http://tti.tamu.edu/documents/0-4701-4.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/863669
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01103983
AU - Reinschmidt, Kenneth F
AU - Trejo, David
AU - Folliard, Kevin J
AU - Kim, Hyung-jin
AU - Texas Transportation Institute
AU - Texas Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Feasibility Study for Development of Marine Exposure Test Site: Technical Report
PY - 2008/05//Technical Report
SP - 256p
AB - Durability is a serious issue for managers of the U.S. transportation infrastructure. Work remains to be done to improve the service life, life-cycle durability, and both direct and indirect life-cycle costs of reinforced concrete, steel, and other structural materials in all environments throughout the state of Texas. For this project, researchers performed a feasibility study for the development of a marine exposure test site on the Texas gulf coast. The goals of the site are to increase the service life, reduce the capital and maintenance costs, and improve the quality, performance, and safety of transportation infrastructure in Texas through real-exposure research, experimentation, and testing of construction materials and processes. A literature survey reviews economic studies of durability problems and associated costs, including the costs nationwide and in Texas of deterioration, degradation, and corrosion, and the tangible benefits of improved durability. The project researchers visited and evaluated existing exposure test sites in the U.S. to identify site requirements and the critical success factors for a Texas marine exposure test site. A quantitative cost-benefit analysis was performed considering costs and future benefits in the short-term and long-term. The results demonstrate that the development of a Texas marine test site would be economically feasible and cost-beneficial to Texas.
KW - Benefit cost analysis
KW - Costs
KW - Durability
KW - Economic impacts
KW - Feasibility analysis
KW - Literature reviews
KW - Marine environment
KW - Marine exposure test sites
KW - Reinforced concrete bridges
KW - Salt water areas
KW - Steel bridges
KW - Test facilities
KW - Texas Gulf Coast
KW - Transportation infrastructure
UR - http://tti.tamu.edu/documents/0-5266-1.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/863670
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01102442
AU - Federal Aviation Administration
TI - Proposed replacement general aviation airport, city of Mesquite, Clark County : environmental impact statement
PY - 2008/05//Volumes held: Draft(3v)
KW - Environmental impact statements
KW - Nevada
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/862403
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01101655
AU - Schmitt, Robert L
AU - Owusu-Ababio, Samuel
AU - Denn, Kevin D
AU - University of Wisconsin, Platteville
AU - Research and Innovative Technology Administration
AU - Midwest Regional University Transportation Center
TI - Database Development for an HMA Pavement Performance Analysis System
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 55p
AB - The primary purpose of this report was to develop a database template, using the existing Wisconsin Department of Transportation (DOT) pavement management system, from which to perform pavement performance analysis using design, construction, and performance data for hot-mix asphalt (HMA) pavements. A second purpose was to investigate appropriate numerical or statistical methods that have the potential of quantifying and establishing relationships between design, construction, and performance data. A series of tasks was conducted including a review of literature, review of Wisconsin DOT databases, database integration with emphasis on performance modeling, and recommended approaches for performance modeling. The literature review found that data types collected for performance evaluation and modeling vary among agencies depending on needs, but the most common types include inventory, condition, traffic volume, and maintenance and rehabilitation. Common referencing systems between various data collection systems can facilitate data integration for pavement performance modeling; however, a major barrier for achieving full data integration is lack of common referencing systems compounded by the use of different data formats. To that end, Geographic Information System (GIS) was identified as an effective tool for data integration among various divisions within an organization. Several Wisconsin DOT databases applicable to performance modeling for HMA pavements were reviewed for primary data categories including construction, design, traffic, and performance. Semantic discrepancies among databases that impede integration were summarized, then recommendations were identified to enable simple or complex queries to relate data residing in the different databases. A GIS-based database integration was recommended using similar Wisconsin DOT GIS practices. A loose coupling approach, involving the transfer of data files between the GIS and other programs, was demonstrated using screen snapshots. Then, the integrated data were prepared for export into a statistical analysis package and the results imported back to the GIS for data visualization or display. Several statistical analysis methods to develop performance models were provided, along with reference examples for ANOVA (analysis of variance), comparison of means, and regression models. Currently there is an on-going research study with estimated completion in 2008, NCHRP Project 9-22, Beta Testing and Validation of HMA PRS, that will develop software capable of developing pavement performance models.
KW - Analysis of variance
KW - Asphalt pavements
KW - Data integration
KW - Databases
KW - Geographic information systems
KW - Literature reviews
KW - Mathematical models
KW - Pavement management systems
KW - Pavement performance
KW - Statistical analysis
KW - Wisconsin
UR - http://minds.wisconsin.edu/bitstream/handle/1793/54134/07-11_FR.pdf
UR - http://wisdotresearch.wi.gov/wp-content/uploads/06-13hmadatabase-f.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/860746
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01101654
AU - Hoppe, Edward J
AU - Whitehouse, Derek H
AU - Virginia Transportation Research Council
AU - Virginia Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Implementation of gINT Software at the Virginia Department of Transportation
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 15p
AB - A set of software tools was developed to enable staff of the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) and consultants to streamline processing of subsurface exploration data. Built around the gINT program (geotechnical database and graphics package), these tools allow generation of various geotechnical outputs with a high degree of uniformity. Capabilities include data export to GEOPAK and MicroStation, including automated post-processing, resulting in final drawings conforming to VDOT office practice. In this project, various macros and configuration files were assembled into a single installation file, allowing users to configure their workstation quickly for VDOT projects. The system has already been implemented at VDOT. The install program can be downloaded from the website of VDOT’s Materials Division at http://www.virginiadot.org/business/materials-downloaddocs. asp. A detailed instruction manual is also posted, providing step-by-step directions. The use of this software significantly reduces borehole log preparation time and ensures consistency of output, the latter resulting in a higher quality end product. It is estimated that a VDOT geologist saves approximately 2 full days of work per typical bridge project when using this software, which translates into an approximate cost savings of $600 per bridge. Truly significant savings can be realized over a longer period of time. In the past, some VDOT borehole logs generated manually on paper were not readily accessible after project completion. As a consequence, when new projects were proposed in the vicinity of existing roads and structures, the subsurface information was lacking, necessitating additional exploration, often at great expense. For example, it is estimated that many over water drilling projects can cost approximately $10,000 per day. The software developed through this project will also allow an improved archiving process, thus providing better information regarding local subsurface conditions. It will also help determine if additional boreholes are necessary. Finally, it will allow sharing of subsurface data with consultants and contractors.
KW - Boreholes
KW - Computer program documentation
KW - Cost effectiveness
KW - Data banks
KW - Data logging
KW - Data sharing
KW - Geotechnical engineering
KW - Implementation
KW - Information processing
KW - Software
KW - Subsurface exploration
KW - Virginia Department of Transportation
UR - http://www.virginiadot.org/vtrc/main/online_reports/pdf/08-r19.pdf
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/37000/37600/37656/08-r19.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/860753
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01100794
AU - Murdock, Steve H
AU - Cline, Michael
AU - Prozzi, Jolanda P
AU - Ramirez, Rick
AU - Meers, Alan
AU - McCray, John P
AU - Harrison, Robert
AU - University of Texas, San Antonio
AU - Texas Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Impacts of Current and Future Demographic Change on Transportation Planning in Texas: Second Year Interim Report
PY - 2008/05//Second Year Interim Technical Report
SP - 165p
AB - As Texas population continues to grow and as the complexities of that growth change the fundamental demographic structure of the state, transportation planners will need a better understanding of demographic data and its implications. This report provides an overview of demographic change shaping the State of Texas and analyses of how these impacts may shape transportation.
KW - Demographics
KW - Impacts
KW - Population growth
KW - Texas
KW - Transportation planning
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/860559
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01100793
AU - Lantz, Kenneth E
AU - Miller, John S
AU - Beaton, Jason S
AU - Virginia Transportation Research Council
AU - Virginia Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - A Review of the Virginia Department of Transportation's Scoping Process and Options for Potential Improvements
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 53p
AB - Transportation project scoping is a process where the project’s purpose and need, budget, schedule, and scope are developed. Interviews conducted with 27 staff representing the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT), the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), and regional planners, coupled with a review of related literature and federal legislation, suggested 10 options for improving Virginia’s scoping process. Although implementation of the first 8 options may involve, to varying degrees, both central office and district staff, the decision regarding whether or not to implement them as a matter of policy rests with VDOT’s Chief Engineer. Six options regard "changes in process" that have already been implemented in some VDOT districts or are under consideration: 1. Select a monthly project day statewide; 2. Delineate scoping-day decisions from other activities in the scoping process; 3. Consider initiatives that have already been deployed successfully in one or more VDOT districts such as the use of a risk assessment page; 4. Allow electronic submission of the scoping report; 5. Provide resources to perform scoping prior to programming (and use this information to influence which projects are placed in the transportation program); and 6. Support efforts to link planning and programming. Two options regard specific products: (1) develop a single primer that explains to an outside audience how the scoping process influences project development and is designed to improve the quality of the discussion among VDOT, localities, and other agencies regarding project scoping, and (2) consider database enhancements suggested by interviewees. The final two options regard suggestions for further research. The report gives the rationale for each option, detailing interviewees’ descriptions of how scoping is done, challenges that arise when scoping specific projects, and enhancements to scoping that have been considered in individual districts.
KW - Decision making
KW - Interviewing
KW - Literature reviews
KW - Project management
KW - Project scoping
KW - Risk assessment
KW - Transportation projects
KW - Virginia
KW - Virginia Department of Transportation
UR - http://www.virginiadot.org/vtrc/main/online_reports/pdf/08-r13.pdf
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/37000/37600/37653/08-r13.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/860524
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01100773
AU - Fitch, G Michael
AU - Craver, Vinka O
AU - Smith, James A
AU - Virginia Transportation Research Council
AU - Virginia Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Recycling of Salt-Contaminated Stormwater Runoff for Brine Production at Virginia Department of Transportation Road-Salt Storage Facilities
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 24p
AB - A large part of the Virginia Department of Transportation’s (VDOT’s) maintenance effort comprises the implementation of its snow removal and ice control program. Earlier research confirmed that VDOT captures significant volumes of salt-laden stormwater runoff at its 300+ salt storage facilities throughout the state and that the disposal options for this water are limited and costly. Although VDOT is implementing recommended management options to reduce the quantity of salt water captured, this research was undertaken to determine the possibility of recycling salt-contaminated stormwater runoff for the purpose of producing brine that can be used for pre-wetting of granular NaCl and direct application. Laboratory and field tests were conducted using bench-scale brine generation equipment. In the laboratory phase, brine was produced using tap water while hydraulic retention times and water temperatures were varied to determine how these changes would affect the quantity and quality of brine production. Stormwater runoff from a storage pond without any previous treatment was used in the field phase to allow a better estimate of the potential effects of stormwater on the quality of the brine generated. Results showed that the optimum conditions for brine production were low hydraulic retention time (high flow rates) and high temperatures. The total suspended solids present in the stormwater runoff did not diminish the quality of the brine in the field tests. Based on historic precipitation and chemical application data, VDOT appears to capture sufficient volumes of water to meet the majority of its potential brine production needs. Further, significant economic benefits can be obtained by applying this recycling strategy, with the greatest benefits resulting from generating brine for both direct application and pre-wetting. Assuming average stormwater volume collection and average total NaCl application, VDOT can save approximately $3 million each year by generating brine for pre-wetting only versus approximately $6.5 million each year by generating brine for the combination of pre-wetting and direct application.
KW - Economic benefits
KW - Field tests
KW - Laboratory tests
KW - Prewetting
KW - Recycling
KW - Runoff
KW - Salt brine
KW - Salt water disposal
KW - Sodium chloride
KW - Storage facilities
KW - Virginia Department of Transportation
UR - http://www.virginiadot.org/vtrc/main/online_reports/pdf/08-r17.pdf
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/37000/37600/37654/08-r17.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/860529
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01100765
AU - Herling, Daphne
AU - University of Montana, Missoula
AU - Montana Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Evaluation of the Montana Department of Transportation's Research Project Solicitation, Prioritization, and Selection Process
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 108p
AB - The Montana Department of Transportation (MDT) contracted the Bureau of Business and Economic Research at the University of Montana – Missoula to conduct research to determine how other states solicit, prioritize, and select research problem statements for the purpose of providing ideas for inclusion in their research programs. MDT is interested in maintaining and improving the quality of its own research process. The purpose of this report is to inform MDT of methods used by the research units in other states’ Departments of Transportation to accomplish this stage of their work, to report on the thoughts and ideas of key MDT staff, and to specifically provide recommendations on how MDT can align its problem statement solicitation, prioritization, and selection process with the strategic directions set by the department as a whole.
KW - Montana Department of Transportation
KW - Research problem statements
KW - Research projects
KW - Selection process
KW - Solicitations
KW - State departments of transportation
KW - Strategic planning
UR - http://www.mdt.mt.gov/other/research/external/docs/research_proj/research_eval/final_report.pdf
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/30000/30100/30109/FHWA_MT_final_report.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/860498
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01100752
AU - Dang, Jennifer N
AU - National Center for Statistics and Analysis
AU - National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
TI - Statistical Analysis of Alcohol-Related Driving Trends, 1982-2005
PY - 2008/05//NHTSA Technical Report
SP - 72p
AB - Overall, the percent of drivers involved in fatal crashes who had consumed alcohol and had blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of .08 or above prior to the crash steadily decreased from 1982 to 1997 and then leveled off (more or less). In an attempt to explain the 1982-1997 reduction and the 1997-2005 level trend, this report presents a statistical analysis of factors that influenced the historical alcohol-related driving trends from 1982 to 2005. The study is based on disaggregate logistic regression of imputed Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) cases from all 50 States and the District of Columbia – to predict the probability of an alcohol-related involvement given a set of independent variables. The independent variables include alcohol-related legislation (i.e., .10 BAC, .08 BAC, Administrative License Revocation, minimum-legal-drinking-age laws), demographic factors (i.e., driver’s age and gender), per capita alcohol consumption, and external factors (i.e., day of the week, time of day, roadway function class, and posted speed limit). The independent variables explain both the decrease in alcohol-related fatal crashes (where drivers involved in fatal crashes had BAC of .08 or above) from 1982 to 1997 and its leveling off after 1997. Large portions of the reduction are explained by the effect of alcohol-laws and by the demographic trends – the aging of the population and the increased proportion of female drivers. The leveling off after 1997 does not imply that the laws are becoming less effective. On the contrary, they effectively maintain the proportion of drivers in fatal crashes who had BAC of .08 or above at the time of the crash – at the lowest level since 1982.
KW - Alcohol use
KW - Blood alcohol levels
KW - Demographics
KW - Drunk driving
KW - Fatalities
KW - Fatality Analysis Reporting System
KW - Regression analysis
KW - State laws
KW - Statistical analysis
KW - Trend (Statistics)
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/30000/30200/30206/810942.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/860402
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01100212
AU - Bingham, C Raymond
AU - Hockanson, Heather M
AU - University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute
AU - University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
AU - Research and Innovative Technology Administration
TI - M-CASTL 2008 Synthesis Report: Volume 2, Teen Driver Safety
PY - 2008/05
SP - 41p
AB - Teen drivers have the highest crash rates of any age-group of drivers, with the possible exception of the very oldest drivers. Motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of morbidity and mortality among teens. Not only are teen drivers more likely to be involved in crashes, they are also more likely than any age-group of drivers to carry passengers more often and in larger numbers. As a result, crash-related injury and death among teens occurs most often to teenage passengers of teen drivers. Many factors contribute to the high crash risk of teen drivers. The purpose of this report is to review these factors and provide a synopsis of current knowledge and understanding of teen driver safety. The objective of this synopsis is to identify high priority areas and directions for research to move the field of teen driver safety forward. To accomplish this objective, topics from the literature spanning the past decade relating to teen driver safety are reviewed with the intent, not of providing a comprehensive review of all literature in this field, but of presenting a representative review of current knowledge and limitations to that knowledge, and to identify high priority areas for research in teen driver safety. Following a review of the current state of knowledge in teen driver safety, areas for future research are discussed, including: continued efforts to enhance programs that are currently having a positive effect on teen driver safety, as well as to identify additional effective programs; increased understanding of parents’ attitudes and needs viz a viz the safety of their teenage children who drive; multi-disciplinary research to develop a driver education program that is effective in increasing teen driver safety; continued program development and evaluation research in the areas of teen drink/driving, safety belt use, and risks due to teenage passengers; and research to ensure that technology that is unsafe for teen drivers is identified and eliminated from the driving situation. All of these areas must be addressed with the backdrop of what is known about adolescent development, so that programs are designed to be developmentally appropriate.
KW - Crash injuries
KW - Crash rates
KW - Driver education
KW - Drunk driving
KW - Fatalities
KW - Literature reviews
KW - Parents
KW - Passengers
KW - Research
KW - Seat belt use
KW - Syntheses
KW - Teenage drivers
KW - Traffic safety
UR - http://m-castl.org/files/2008SynthesisReport-Vol2.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/860063
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01099872
AU - Donaldson, Bridget M
AU - Baker, Andrew J
AU - Virginia Transportation Research Council
AU - Virginia Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Understanding the Environmental Implications of Cured-in-Place Pipe Rehabilitation Technology
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 25p
AB - Cured-in-place pipe (CIPP) rehabilitation is a commonly used technology for pipe repair, and transportation agencies are using CIPP technology to repair damaged pipe culverts. In typical CIPP applications, a lining tube saturated with a thermosetting resin is installed into the damaged pipe and cured with a heat source to form a pipe-within-a-pipe. This study focused on CIPP installations that use forced steam through the lining tube both to press the liner to the inside dimensions of the host pipe and to harden the resin-impregnated liner material. Of the thermosetting resins used in CIPP applications, styrene-based resins are the most common. This research focused on styrene-based CIPP products. To evaluate the potential for impacts on water quality from the steam-cured CIPP process, seven CIPP installations in surface water and stormwater conveyances were identified and observed over the course of a 1-year study in Virginia. Water samples were collected from each project site and analyzed for styrene. The results were then evaluated for compliance with established regulatory standards and published aquatic toxicity criteria. Water samples collected from pipe outlets at five of the seven CIPP installations showed detectable levels of styrene. Styrene concentrations were generally highest in water samples collected during and shortly following installation. The maximum duration that styrene was detected at any site was 88 days following the CIPP installation. Although the sites in this study were not directly linked to sources of drinking water, styrene levels at five sites were higher than the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s maximum contaminant level for drinking water of 0.1 mg/L. Styrene was detected at five sites for a minimum of 5 days to at least 71 days after installation and was detected at these sites up to 40 m downstream. Certain measurements were also found to exceed the values for EC50 (the concentration required to have a defined effect on 50 percent of a study population) or LC50 (the concentration required to kill 50 percent of a study population) for several freshwater aquatic indicator species. The findings suggest that the elevated styrene levels could have resulted from one or a combination of the following: (1) installation practices that did not capture condensate containing styrene, (2) uncured resin that escaped from the liner during installation, (3) insufficient curing of the resin, and (4) some degree of permeability in the lining material. A summary of the actions taken by the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) in response to the preliminary findings of this study is also provided in this report. VDOT suspended the use of styrene-CIPP for pipes that convey surface or stormwater while further evaluating CIPP repair and subsequently developing new requirements for these installations. The new measures include substantial modifications to VDOT’s CIPP specifications; an inspector training program; increased project oversight; and water and soil testing prior to and after CIPP installation. Reinstatement of statewide VDOT CIPP installations using the new procedures and specifications is planned for May 2008.
KW - Aquatic life
KW - Cured in place pipe
KW - Inspection
KW - Linings
KW - Pipe culverts
KW - Rehabilitation (Maintenance)
KW - Repairing
KW - Specifications
KW - Steam
KW - Styrenes
KW - Thermosetting resins
KW - Toxicity
KW - Water quality
UR - http://www.virginiadot.org/vtrc/main/online_reports/pdf/08-r16.pdf
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/37000/37600/37652/08-r16.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/859585
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01099870
AU - Abolmaali, Ali
AU - Fernandez, Raul
AU - Kamangar, Farhad
AU - Ramirez, Guillermo
AU - Le, Tri
AU - University of Texas, Arlington
AU - Texas Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Vibration Reduction and Control for Traffic Cameras: Technical Report
PY - 2008/05//Technical Report
SP - 288p
AB - This project developed two low-cost, high-efficiency image stabilization devices and algorithms to correct images transmitted from closed circuit television (CCTV) cameras to traffic management centers. The stabilization devices eliminate the requirements of high stiffness and strength for the camera poles so that lighter poles can be used. This report provides information regarding the project outcomes.
KW - Algorithms
KW - Cameras
KW - Closed circuit television
KW - Damping (Physics)
KW - Image processing
KW - Poles (Supports)
KW - Stabilization devices
KW - Television cameras
KW - Traffic control centers
KW - Vibration control
KW - Vibration isolation
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/859586
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01099044
AU - Richardson, David N
AU - Missouri University of Science and Technology, Rolla
AU - Research and Special Programs Administration
TI - Acquistion of a High-Quality Temperature Chamber
PY - 2008/05//Final Report
SP - 83p
AB - With the Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT) beginning to implement the new Mechanistic-Empirical (M-E) Design Guide for New and Rehabilitated Pavements, the need exists for various types of testing of hot-mix asphalt (HMA) mixes used by MoDOT in its flexible pavements. In particular, the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) test protocol T 322 is utilized to determine HMA properties needed as inputs to pavement distress prediction models within the M-E Pavement Design Guide (MEPDG) Software. The primary properties derived from T 322 are creep compliance and tensile strength. These properties are determined using indirect tension methods and are temperature dependent. Creep compliance is a parameter used in the thermal cracking distress model within the MEPDG Software and is determined at 0, -10, and -20 deg C while tensile strength is an input to the fatigue cracking distress model and is determined at temperatures ranging from -20 to +20 deg C.
KW - AASHTO T 322
KW - Creep
KW - Hot mix asphalt
KW - Laboratory tests
KW - Mechanistic-Empirical Pavement Design Guide
KW - Missouri
KW - Tensile strength
KW - Testing equipment
UR - http://utc.mst.edu/documents/RE169_CR.pdf
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/27000/27000/27007/RE169_CR.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/859450
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01099043
AU - National Center for Statistics and Analysis
TI - Trends in Non-Fatal Traffic Injuries: 1996 – 2005
PY - 2008/05//NHTSA Technical Report
SP - 48p
AB - An analysis of three major databases of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) shows that from 1996 through 2005, the annual number of “incapacitating” injuries due to motor vehicle crashes decreased by 25 to 28%. Incapacitating is a category of injury severity that represents the most severe non-fatal injuries. An incapacitating injury is a nonfatal injury that prevents the injured person from walking, driving, or normally continuing the activities the person was capable of performing before the injury occurred. This report utilizes three databases from NHTSA’s National Center for Statistics and Analysis (NCSA). The databases are used separately to analyze trends in non-fatal motor vehicle injuries. Data were individually examined from the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) from 1996 through 2005, the National Automotive Sampling System General Estimates System (GES) from 1996 through 2005, and 25 States in the State Data System (SDS) from 1996 through 2004. A significant reduction was seen in the overall non-fatal injury counts in each of the FARS, GES, and SDS databases. The GES and SDS annual injury counts dropped by 23% and 9% respectively, while an 11% drop in non-fatal injuries was seen in the FARS database of fatal crashes. The largest percentage decline in the FARS database (25%), GES database (28%), and SDS database (25%) occurred among the most severe injuries, referred to as incapacitating injuries. The rate of non-fatal injuries per crash also declined in each of the three databases. These reductions in non-fatal injuries seen in FARS, GES, and SDS have taken place despite a 20% increase in vehicle miles traveled. Concurrent with these declines in non-fatal injuries, the number of FARS fatalities rose by 3%. The decline in injuries noted in this report is correlated to the many improvements in vehicle safety and driver and passenger behavior that have taken place in the last decade. These improvements include, but are not limited to: an increased use of seat belts and child safety seats, reductions in drunk driving, as well as an expansion throughout the vehicle fleet of air bags and electronic stability control.
KW - Crash injuries
KW - Fatalities
KW - Fatality Analysis Reporting System
KW - General Estimates System
KW - Injury rates
KW - Injury severity
KW - National Automotive Sampling System
KW - States
KW - Trend (Statistics)
UR - http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/Pubs/810944.PDF
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/859423
ER -
TY - ABST
AN - 01461770
TI - Transportation Planning Capacity Building Program
AB - The objective of this research is to realize the research, development, and technical assistance objectives of the transportation planning capacity building (TPCB) initiative (and specifically the TPCB Programs). The FHWA requires the support of and access to multi-disciplined teams to meet the challenges of transportation planning for the twenty-first century. Services provided by the Volpe Center will be targeted at specific needs and areas of interest that will support the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) work in transportation planning capacity building as well as innovation in transportation planning processes and decision-making, transportation and land use, and transportation and community impacts. The Volpe Center will provide integrated support for transportation planning capacity building initiatives and activities via the following four program areas: (1) Assist Stakeholders in Accessing Training and education. (2) Enable Connections, Interactions, and Learning among Peers. (3) Collect/Synthesize Effective Practices and the State of the Art. (4) Assist in Solving Technical Problems.
KW - Decision making
KW - Education
KW - Integrated systems
KW - Research projects
KW - State of the art
KW - Technical assistance
KW - Technological innovations
KW - Training
KW - Transportation planning
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1229990
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01152605
AU - York, Alan
AU - Seagroves, Rick
AU - North Carolina State University, Raleigh
AU - North Carolina Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Herbicide Options for Weed Management in the North Carolina Highway Wildflower Program
PY - 2008/04/30/Final Report
SP - 66p
AB - The North Carolina Department of Transportation Roadside Environmental Unit plants wildflowers on approximately 3500 roadside acres in North Carolina. Methyl Bromide, a broad-spectrum soil fumigant, has been used to prepare roadside areas for wildflower plantings. Out of concern for the atmospheric ozone layer, a complete ban of methyl bromide production by 2005 was agreed to by 160 nations. The loss of methyl bromide facilitated the need for research to find alternative weed control herbicides. Field trials were conducted at North Carolina Department of Agriculture research stations in the piedmont and coastal plain regions of the state. Research was conducted with multiple preemergence and postemergence herbicides having differing modes of action on twenty-one wildflower species. Periodic visual evaluations were made to determine wildflower tolerance and weed control. This final year’s research concentrated on herbicides that were tolerant to the most number of wildflower species and herbicides that were labeled for use on roadsides and/or wildflower plantings. Additionally, Callisto and Staple were evaluated due to outstanding tolerance with several wildflower species. For the most part, wildflower species were more tolerant to herbicides applied preemergence. However, there was great variability with regards to tolerance among the 21 wildflower species evaluated. For example, many species were tolerant to Prowl H2O 3.8CS with the exception of red corn poppy, which was severely injured. In contrast, red corn poppy was tolerant to Callisto 4SC applied PRE and POST; however, most all other species were severely injured. No herbicide evaluated proved to be as versatile as methyl bromide with regards to tolerance. When planting wildflower species, NC DOT personnel should consider grouping species with similar herbicide tolerances in order to have an effective herbicide program.
KW - Herbicides
KW - Landscape maintenance
KW - North Carolina
KW - Weed control
KW - Wildflowers
UR - http://www.ncdot.org/doh/preconstruct/tpb/research/download/2005-09FinalReport.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/913598
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01111576
AU - Research and Innovative Technology Administration
AU - Federal Transit Administration
AU - Federal Highway Administration
AU - DART
TI - Concept of Operations for the US-75 Integrated Corridor in Dallas, Texas
PY - 2008/04/30
SP - 148p
AB - This Concept of Operations (Con Ops) for the US-75 Integrated Corridor Management (ICM) Program has been developed as part of the Federal Highway Administration, the Federal Transit Administration, and RITA (FHWA/FTA/RITA) Integrated Corridor Management Initiative. This document is intended as a high-level Con Ops for the US-75 Corridor in Dallas consisting of freeway, arterial, bus and rail networks, and serving a central business district. The purpose of this Con Ops is to answer the questions of who, what, when, where, why and how for the application of an Integrated Corridor Management System (ICM) within this corridor. This Con Ops also defines the roles and responsibilities of the participating agencies and other involved entities. The US-75 Corridor is a major north-south radial Corridor connecting downtown Dallas with many of the suburbs and cities north of Dallas. The primary Corridor consists of a freeway, continuous frontage roads, light-rail line, transit bus service, park-and-ride lots, major regional arterial streets, toll roads, bike trails, and intelligent transportation systems. A concurrent-flow, high-occupancy vehicle lane in the Corridor, opened in December 2007, added significant expansion of the intelligent transportation systems for the freeway and arterials street systems.
KW - Arterial highways
KW - Bikeways
KW - Bus transit
KW - Central business districts
KW - Concept of operations
KW - Dallas (Texas)
KW - Freeways
KW - High occupancy vehicle lanes
KW - Integrated corridor management
KW - Intelligent transportation systems
KW - Light rail transit
KW - Park and ride
KW - Toll roads
KW - Transportation corridors
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/30000/30400/30409/14390.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/870872
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01111556
AU - DART
AU - Research and Innovative Technology Administration
AU - Federal Highway Administration
AU - Federal Transit Administration
TI - High-Level Requirements for the US-75 Integrated Corridor in Dallas, Texas
PY - 2008/04/30
SP - 140p
AB - This document is intended as a listing and discussion of the high-level Requirements for the US-75 Integrated Corridor Management System (ICMS) in Dallas. This document describes what the system is to do (the functional requirements), how well it is to perform (the performance requirements), and under what conditions (non-functional and performance requirements). This document does not define how the system is to be built; that is the providence of the design document. This document pulls together requirements from a number of sources including but not limited to the Concept of Operations and constraints identified by the agencies. This document sets the technical scope of the system to be built. It is the basis for verifying the system and sub-systems when delivered via the Verification Plan. The purpose of the US-75 ICMS is to implement a multi-modal operations decision support tool enabled by real-time data and live video pertaining to the operation of freeways, arterials, tollways, and public transit. The US-75 ICMS will be a multi-agency, de-centralized operation which will utilize a set of regional systems to integrate the operations of the corridor.
KW - Arterial highways
KW - Dallas (Texas)
KW - Freeways
KW - Functional requirements
KW - Integrated corridor management
KW - Multimodal transportation
KW - Performance requirements
KW - Public transit
KW - Technical requirements
KW - Toll roads
KW - Transportation corridors
KW - Transportation operations
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/30000/30400/30408/14426.htm
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/30000/30400/30408/14426_files/14426.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/870508
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01105642
AU - Thompson, David B
AU - Cleveland, Theodore G
AU - Copula, D B
AU - Fang, Xing
AU - Texas Tech University, Lubbock
AU - Texas Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Loss-Rate Functions for Selected Texas Watersheds
PY - 2008/04/30/Technical Report
SP - 108p
AB - The purpose of this report is to present a set of results from research into loss-rate functions applicable to selected Texas watersheds. The results reported herein comprise the culmination of a set of research components for application of the unit hydrograph method for development of drainage design discharges for Texas transportation projects. A number of loss-rate methods were explored by the research teams represented by members from U.S. Geological Survey, Texas Tech University, Lamar University, and University of Houston. A variety of approaches are documented in the report, although it is left to the analyst to determine the most appropriate approach for a particular design problem.
KW - Drainage
KW - Hydraulics
KW - Hydrology
KW - Loss-rate functions (Watersheds)
KW - Runoff
KW - Texas
KW - Transportation projects
KW - Unit hydrographs
KW - Watersheds
UR - http://www.techmrt.ttu.edu/Reports/Complete%20Reports/0-4193-6.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/865210
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01115453
AU - Cluett, Chris
AU - Osborne, Leon
AU - Handman, Art
AU - Battelle Seattle Research Center
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Road Weather Management Performance Metrics
PY - 2008/04/29/Evaluation Report
SP - 41p
AB - This report presents the results of a study to identify appropriate measures of performance that can be attributed to the Federal Highway Administration’s (FHWA) Road Weather Management Program (RWMP) products and activities. Specifically, the study sought to identify performance measures that can be used to assess program success in meeting the goals of SAFETEA-LU Section 5308 pertaining to Road Weather Research and Development Program. Measuring RWMP performance is important because weather impacts transportation safety, mobility, and productivity. The focus of this effort is on identifying meaningful and implementable output and outcome metrics that address the SAFETEA-LU goals through RWMP activities. Both quantitative and qualitative performance metrics associated with program results were identified with the help of numerous stakeholders working in a variety of government and private agencies across the country. A workshop was held initially to define and discuss a potential list of metrics that were then distributed to over 250 practitioners and stakeholders through a request for information. Feedback was solicited regarding which metrics should be kept, further refined, or dropped from further consideration. Some respondents also suggested new measures. The results were analyzed and the metrics were prioritized and narrowed down into a more manageable set of measures for implementation.
KW - Highway operations
KW - Mobility
KW - Performance measurement
KW - Road Weather Management Program
KW - Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users
KW - Strategic planning
KW - Transportation planning
KW - Transportation safety
KW - Weather conditions
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/30000/30400/30472/14420.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/874806
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01108734
AU - Tawfiq, Kamal
AU - Robinson, Brenda
AU - Florida A&M University, Tallahassee
AU - Florida Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Post-Tensioned Bridge Girder Anchorage Zone Enhancement with Fiber Reinforced Concrete (FRC)
PY - 2008/04/29/Final Report
SP - 251p
AB - The main objective of this research was to investigate the use of steel fiber reinforced concrete (SFRC) in post-tensioning (PT) anchorage zones of bridge girders. The purpose of using SFRC is to enhance the overall performance and to reduce the amount of steel rebar required in the anchorage zone. Reducing steel congestion in post-tensioning anchorage zones can improve the constructability of post-tensioned bridge elements. It was the intent of this investigation of the post-tensioning anchorage zone to consider both the behavior of the local zone and the general zone when steel fiber reinforced concrete is used. To achieve the objective of this study, both experimental and analytical investigations were conducted aimed at reducing the amount of mild steel reinforcement required by the American Association of State Highway Transportation Officials (AASHTO) code in anchorage zone. The experimental part of the study involved laboratory testing of twenty-seven (27) specimens representing typical anchorage zone dimensions in post-tensioned girders. The analytical study was conducted using non-linear finite element analysis in order to have a comprehensive stress analysis of the anchorage zone with and without fiber reinforcement and mild steel.
KW - Anchorages
KW - Bridge members
KW - Girder bridges
KW - Girders
KW - Posttensioning
KW - Reinforced concrete
KW - Reinforced concrete bridges
KW - Reinforcing bars
KW - Steel fibers
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/865830
ER -
TY - ABST
AN - 01464576
TI - Development of Guidance for the Selection, Use, and Maintenance of Cable Barrier Systems
AB - Due to their proven ability to reduce fatalities and injuries as well as their initial low cost, cable barrier systems are rapidly being deployed along the roadside and in the medians of our highways. As the use of these systems has increased, experience has indicated various factors that influence system performance as well as gaps in knowledge. As the number of installations escalates around the country, there is a need to formulate guidelines and standardized practices for cable barrier systems. A variety of cable barrier systems (proprietary and generic) have been deployed across the country. In general, issues have emerged concerning performance characteristics. In addition, design differences among various available systems contribute to different performance characteristics, implementation, and maintenance requirements. A better understanding of the link between placement and performance of these systems is needed to ensure that they will meet expectations. As a result research is necessary to identify both commonalities and differences, to address knowledge gaps, and to provide guidance that will optimize performance of these systems for different field conditions.
The objective of this research is to develop guidelines for the selection, use, and maintenance of cable barrier systems. The scope of the project includes all cable barrier systems for median and roadside applications.
KW - Cable barriers
KW - Fatalities
KW - Guidelines
KW - Highway maintenance
KW - Medians
KW - Traffic safety
UR - http://www.trb.org/TRBNet/ProjectDisplay.asp?ProjectID=1640
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/1232807
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01148563
AU - Timcho, Thomas
AU - Raman, Mala
AU - O'Toole, Kevin
AU - Battelle Memorial Institute
AU - Department of Transportation
TI - Final Test Report for NTCIP 1203 v2.25 - Dynamic Message Signs (DMS) as deployed by the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT)
PY - 2008/04/25/Final Test Report
SP - 113p
AB - This report presents the results of the ITS Standards Testing Program for the field testing, assessment, and evaluation of the NTCIP standards that apply in the domain of Dynamic Message Signs (DMS). Specifically, the National Transportation Communications for ITS Protocol (NTCIP) 1203 – Object Definitions for Dynamic Messages Signs v2.25 standard, as deployed by the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) in cooperation with the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute (VTTI). This report includes both a summary of the findings produced by VDOT/ VTTI, their systems integrator and the vendors; as well as the detailed findings produced by the ITS Standards Test Team (ISTT). This report fulfills the work product specified in Task 8 of Work Order BA34012.
KW - Field tests
KW - Intelligent transportation systems
KW - Standards
KW - Variable message signs
KW - Virginia Department of Transportation
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/31000/31400/31418/14475.htm
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/31000/31400/31418/14475_files/14475.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/908317
ER -
TY - RPRT
AN - 01126256
AU - Richardson, David N
AU - Lusher, Steven Michael
AU - Missouri University of Science and Technology, Rolla
AU - Missouri Department of Transportation
AU - Federal Highway Administration
TI - Determination of Creep Compliance and Tensile Strength of Hot-Mix Asphalt for Wearing Courses in Missouri
PY - 2008/04/25/Final Report
SP - 78p
AB - Creep compliance and indirect tensile (IDT) strength of hot-mix asphalt (HMA) are the two primary inputs to the low-temperature or thermal cracking module in the new Mechanistic-Empirical Pavement Design Guide (M-E PDG) software. Creep compliance is defined as time-dependent strain per unit stress, while IDT strength is best defined as HMA strength when subjected to tension. AASHTO T 322 test protocol was used as reference for this work. However, in preparation for the laboratory work performed at the Missouri University of Science and Technology many experts were consulted as to how IDT creep/strength testing and calculations are actually being performed. Using Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT) supplied test specimens, six different plant-produced wearing (surface) course mixes were tested. Four mixes were tested at three levels of percent air voids: 4, 6.5, and 9% and two mixes were tested only at 6.5% air voids. Per requirements of the M-E PDG, creep testing was performed at 0, -10, and -20 degrees Centigrade (°C) and IDT strength testing was performed at -10°C. Additional IDT strength testing was performed at 4.4 and 21°C (40 and 70 °F) per MoDOT’s requirements. Poisson’s ratio was determined from the creep testing while tensile failure strain was determined from the IDT strength testing. Trends such as increasing creep compliance and decreasing tensile strength with increasing % air voids and/or temperature were confirmed. The presence of recycled asphalt pavement (RAP) in a mix tended to decrease the creep compliance (increase the stiffness) and increase the tensile strength compared to similar mixes without RAP.
KW - AASHTO T 322
KW - Air voids
KW - Creep compliance
KW - Creep tests
KW - Hot mix asphalt
KW - Indirect tensile test
KW - Laboratory tests
KW - Mechanistic-Empirical Pavement Design Guide
KW - Missouri
KW - Poisson ratio
KW - Recycled asphalt pavements
KW - Temperature
KW - Tensile strength
KW - Wearing course (Pavements)
UR - http://library.modot.mo.gov/RDT/reports/Ri05052/or08018.pdf
UR - http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/30000/30600/30688/or08018.pdf
UR - https://trid.trb.org/view/887413
ER -
TY - ABST
AN - 01464748
TI - Left-Turn Accommodations at Unsignalized Intersections
AB - Maximizing the potential capacity of existing roadways is a priority in light of growing traffic demands and the diminishing resources to develop more capacity. Left turns at unsignalized intersections, including driveways, cause delay and may reduce safety. The decision to install a left-turn accommodation is a complex one as state and local transportation agencies weigh the left-turn demand, the cost of the accommodation, and the anticipated operational and safety benefits. Clear and consistent application of left-turn accommodations is important for mitigating the impacts of left turns, both for reconstruction projects and for the permitting of new access points. The objectives of this research are to develop an objective and clear process for the selection of left-turn accommodations at unsignalized intersections and to provide guidance on the design of these accommodations.