Public-Sector Research and Development
[Highlights]
Innovation in the public sector is a particular challenge. Public agencies are understandably risk-averse in matters involving safety, which, as noted earlier, is a paramount concern of transportation policy makers. Moreover, public procurement practices, which often depend on producing detailed specifications and awarding contracts to the lowest bidder, inhibit the introduction of new concepts, technologies, and practices. For these reasons, the classic federal model of investing in basic research and assuming that the private sector will draw on the fruits of these efforts to innovate does not work well in the largely public-sector environment of transportation systems. Entrepreneurs have little incentive to take risks when they face high barriers to market entry and relatively low assurance that they can derive profit from the introduction of new products.
In transportation infrastructure in particular, which has such a large public presence, government must therefore be more involved in the funding of research to ensure that the public will reap the benefits of improved products, services, and technologies being developed throughout the private economy. Likewise, in the emerging field of intelligent transportation systems (ITS), in which numerous firms are offering new products and services, federal applied research, demonstrations, and support for open standards are needed to facilitate the procurement of those products and services by public agencies.
Applied transportation research programs have historically been modally oriented. There is some logic to this approach because each mode is characterized by a different blend of public and private involvement as well as a different degree of federal responsibility and focus. The federal government owns and operates the air traffic control system and is the major, but not exclusive, provider of harbor vessel management; with minor exceptions, however, it does not own or operate highways, transit, railroads, or pipelines. Highway and transit infrastructure is owned and operated by the 50 states, hundreds of major cities, and tens of thousands of counties and towns. Research programs, like the modes, are also decentralized, none more so than in the case of highways, where the federal program is one among the 50 state programs.
Because of the modal orientation of federal and state transportation research programs, the Transportation Research Board (TRB) reports on transportation research policy have tended to have a similar focus, addressing research related to highways, transit, rail, airports, and marine transportation. TRB committees have also examined federal strategic planning for research and development (R&D) across all modes, for the environment, and for transportation statistics.