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TRB Transportation Research E-Newsletter*
February 19, 2013
* Please note that the appearance of the newsletter on TRB's website is different than that distributed to a subscriber's e-mail system; however, the content is the same. Subscribing to the TRB E-Newsletter is free. The opinions expressed in reports highlighted in TRB's Transportation Research E-Newsletter are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Transportation Research Board.
TRB News
Public Transportation Senior Program Officer Position Available in TRB's Technical Activities Division
February 14, 2013
TRB’s Technical Activities Division has an opening for a Senior Program Officer (SPO) to work in the area of public transportation. Specifically, the SPO will work in the areas of transit management, performance, capacity, and quality of service; public transportation planning, development, marketing, and fare policy; bus, rail transit, and paratransit services; public transportation for rural areas, intercity, major activity centers, and intermodal transfer facilities; emerging and innovative public transport and technologies; and transportation demand management. A listing of minimum requirements, full job duties, and application information are available on the National Academies’ Office of Human Resources webpage.
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Preservation and Maintenance Senior Program Officer Position Available in TRB's Technical Activities Division
February 14, 2013
TRB’s Technical Activities Division has an opening for a Senior Program Officer (SPO) to work in the areas of preservation and maintenance of transportation facilities, with an emphasis on highways. Specifically, the SPO will work in the areas of management, personnel, equipment, and materials for preservation and maintenance; preservation and maintenance of structures, bridges, pavements, roadsides, and signs/markings; corrosion; work zone traffic control; and winter maintenance.A listing of minimum requirements, full job duties, and application information are available on the National Academies’ Office of Human Resources webpage.
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TRB Webinar: Learning about and Using the Updated TRID Interface
February 15, 2013
TRB will conduct a webinar on February 20, 2013, from 2 p.m.- 3 p.m. ET that will provide users of TRB’s TRID Database with information about navigating with an updated interface and new search functions. Participants must register in advance of the webinar, there are no professional credits associated with this webinar, and there is no fee to register for this webinar. In January 2013, TRB released an updated interface for the TRID Database and added search functions such as drop down lists for selecting search terms, searching by first and last names, and searching for more than one TRB subject area all helping to provide users with more powerful search functions.
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TRB Webinar: Renewable Energy Guide for Highway Maintenance Facilities
February 14, 2013
TRB will conduct a webinar on February 27, 2013 from 2 p.m.- 3:30 p.m. ET that will highlight TRB’s National Cooperative Highway Research Program report: Renewable Energy Guide for Highway Maintenance Facilities, which provides information on renewable energy technologies and strategies for individuals involved in planning and developing maintenance facilities. Participants must register in advance of the webinar, and there is a fee for non-TRB Sponsor employees. A certificate for 1.5 Professional Development Hours (PDH) will be provided to attendees who register and attend the webinar as an individual. This webinar is pending approval for Certification Maintenance credits by the American Institute of Certified Planners.
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7th International Visualization in Transportation Symposium: Visualization for Big Data
February 14, 2013
TRB is sponsoring the 7th International Visualization in Transportation Symposium: Visualization for Big Data on October 23-25, 2013, in Irvine, California. The goal of the 2013 Symposium is to advance innovation in visualization for transportation applications through the exchange of information, to create a collaborative environment that promotes ideas for action that evolves our ability to address those needs, and to foster the integration of visualization into mainstream practice.
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2nd Conference of Transportation Research Group of India*
February 15, 2013
TRB is cosponsoring the 2nd Conference of Transportation Research Group (CTRG)of India on December 12-15, 2013, in Agra, India. The conference is designed to facilitate information exchange among transportation researchers, educators, managers, policymakers from India and all over the world. The conference will address all forms of passenger and freight transport at the urban, regional, inter-city, and rural levels. Abstracts from individual or groups wishing to present at the meeting are due no later than March 15, 2012.
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RFP: Optimizing the Risk and Cost of Materials QA Programs
February 15, 2013
TRB’s National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP) has issued a request for proposals to develop a methodology for establishing a materials quality assurance (QA) program that optimizes risk and cost by providing appropriate types, levels, and frequencies of testing for transportation projects across their full range of type, size, complexity, and project-delivery method. Proposals are due April 4, 2013.
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Recently Released TRB Publications
Rockfall: Characterization and Control
February 14, 2013
TRB's Rockfall: Characterization and Control addresses rockfall hazard identification and evaluation, investigation process, mitigation options, and maintenance and management programs. The 600-plus page publication includes a DVD with video clips of rockfall field tests and several historical movies documenting rockfall field activities. Rockfall is an important, ongoing socioeconomic issue at many locations worldwide. Accelerated development accompanying population growth, with the associated increased demands for energy, mining, forestry, agricultural, and recreational activities, has caused communities and civil infrastructure to expand onto marginal lands, where evaluations of potential rockfall hazards and appropriate countermeasures are often difficult.
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Preparing Peak Period and Operational Profiles—Guidebook
February 15, 2013
TRB’s Airport Cooperative Research Program (ACRP) Report 82: Preparing Peak Period and Operational Profiles—Guidebook describes a process and includes software for converting annual airport activity forecasts into forecasts of daily or hourly peak period activity. The two excel-base software modules are designed to help estimate current and future design day aircraft and passenger operation levels based on user-defined design day parameters.
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Guidelines for Preparing Peak Period and Operational Profiles
February 15, 2013
TRB’s Airport Cooperative Research Program (ACRP) Web-Only Document 14: Guidelines for Preparing Peak Period and Operational Profiles documents the research effort that produced ACRP Report 82: Preparing Peak Period and Operational Profiles—Guidebook, which describes a process and includes software for converting annual airport activity forecasts into forecasts of daily or hourly peak period activity.
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Guide for the Process of Managing Risk on Rapid Renewal Projects
February 14, 2013
TRB’s second Strategic Highway Research Program (SHRP 2) Renewal Project R09 has released a prepublication, non-edited draft version of a report titled Guide for the Process of Managing Risk on Rapid Renewal Projects that describes a formal and structured risk management approach specifically for rapid renewal design and construction projects that is designed to help adequately and efficiently anticipate, evaluate, and address unexpected problems or “risks” before they occur.
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Pavement Management 2012, Volume 1
February 16, 2013
TRB’s Transportation Research Record: Journal of the Transportation Research Board, No. 2304 consists of 22 papers that explore network-level falling weight deflectometer survey; sustainability of perpetual pavement designs; roughness progression in wavebands for highways; pavement rehabilitation and management decisions; traffic-speed deflectometers; asphalt damage and cracking development; modeling pavement conditions of multilane roads; optimum pavement deflection test spacings; network-level flexible pavement management; material-specific inflation rates in life-cycle cost analysis; and pavement performance models.
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Pavement Management 2012, Volume 2
February 18, 2013
TRB’s Transportation Research Record: Journal of the Transportation Research Board, No. 2305 consists of 18 papers concerned with the design of flexible and rigid pavements. Specific topics discussed with regard to rigid pavements include warping and drying shrinkage models; Mechanistic-Empirical Pavement Design Guide (MEPDG) procedure for two-lift composite concrete pavements; temperature gradients for ultrathin bonded concrete overlays on asphalt pavements; mechanistic-empirical continuously reinforced concrete pavement (CRCP) design approach with modified punchout models; concrete slab curling effects on joint load transfer responses; concrete pavement joint diagnostics using ultrasonic tomography; CRCP terminal anchorages to protect bridge structures; and joint load transfer for jointed precast concrete pavements.
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Nondestructive Testing to Identify Concrete Bridge Deck Deterioration
February 14, 2013
TRB’s second Strategic Highway Research Program (SHRP 2) Report S2-R06A-RR-1: Nondestructive Testing to Identify Concrete Bridge Deck Deterioration identifies nondestructive testing technologies for detecting and characterizing common forms of deterioration in concrete bridge decks. The report also documents the validation of promising technologies, and grades and ranks the technologies based on results of the validations.
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Strategic Approaches at the Corridor and Network Level to Minimize Disruption from the Renewal Process: WISE User Guide
February 17, 2013
TRB’s second Strategic Highway Research Program (SHRP 2) Renewal Project R11 has released a prepublication, non-edited draft version of a report titled Strategic Approaches at the Corridor and Network Level to Minimize Disruption from the Renewal Process: WISE User Guide, which explains how to use the work zone impact and strategy estimator (WISE)--a decision support software system designed to help evaluate the impact of work zones and determine strategies to reduce those impacts.
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Strategic Approaches at the Corridor and Network Level to Minimize Disruption from the Renewal Process
February 17, 2013
TRB’s second Strategic Highway Research Program (SHRP 2) Renewal Project R11 has released a prepublication, non-edited draft version of a report titled Strategic Approaches at the Corridor and Network Level to Minimize Disruption from the Renewal Process. The report documents the development of the work zone impact and strategy estimator (WISE)--a decision support software system designed to help evaluate the impact of work zones and determine strategies to reduce those impacts.
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Finance, Pricing, Economics, and Equity Issues, 2012
February 14, 2013
TRB’s Transportation Research Record: Journal of the Transportation Research Board, No. 2297 consists of 21 papers that examine transportation finance, pricing, economics, and equity issues. Specific topics include a marginal-cost vehicle mileage fee; equity of fees for vehicle miles; relationships between vehicle miles and economic activity; equity effects of congestion pricing; impact fee effects on urban form and congestion; willingness to pay for high-occupancy toll lanes; traveler pay for managed-lane travel; managed arterials; impact of peak and off-peak tolls; risk allocation in toll highway concessions; valuing public-sector revenue risk exposure in transportation public-private partnerships; risk measurement for pay-as-you-drive automobile insurance; and benefit-cost analysis of information technology tools for program management.
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Metropolitan Transportation Planning: The Evolving Legacy and an Abbreviated History of the First 50 Years
February 19, 2013
A featured article in the November-December 2013 issue of the TR News present the developments, influences, and workings that have shaped the practice of metropolitan transportation planning during the last 50 years. The urban planning provisions of the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1962 were considered pivotal in the transition of the highway program from a rurally oriented, civil engineering–based activity to a new framework that had a major urban component and that was multimodal, interdisciplinary, and involved local officials.
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Traveler Response to Transportation System Changes Handbook, Third Edition: Chapter 1, Introduction
February 13, 2013
TRB’s Transit Cooperative Research Program (TCRP) Report 95: Traveler Response to Transportation System Changes: Chapter 1 -- Introduction contains a four-level “Table of Contents” for the 16 published TCRP Report 95 chapter/volumes, describes the Traveler Response Handbook and its development, offers guidance to the prospective Handbook users, and includes two Handbook appendices plus known errata.
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Federal Research News
State Research News
Congestion Survey
February 14, 2013
The Washington State Department of Transportation has released a report that examines the public’s use of the state’s traveler information services and describes how the public learns about freeway congestion information.
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Polyester Polymer Concrete Overlay
February 14, 2013
The Washington State Department of Transportation has released a report that details a trial application of polyester polymer concrete to determine possible repair strategies for pavement damaged from extensive studded tire wear.
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University Research News
Research Implementation of the SMART SIGNAL System on Trunk Highway 13
February 14, 2013
The University of Minnesota Center for Transportation Studies has released a report that discusses a new set of interfaces are developed for the Systematic Monitoring of Arterial Road Traffic and Signals (SMART)-SIGNAL system including new prototypes of a data collection unit and a refined web-based user interface.
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International Research News
Train Driver Selection—Implementation Phase: Summary Report
February 14, 2013
The Rail Safety and Standards Board in Great Britain has released a report that discusses a train driver psychometric assessment, specifically selection criteria that are relevant to train driving and an assessment method for each criterion and associated pass marks.
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Improving the Realism in the VTI Driving Simulators
February 14, 2013
VTI, the Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute, has released a report that discusses development and implementation of vibration, noise, and graphics of a new driving simulator model.
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In the Know
Hearing on the Federal Role in America’s Infrastructure
February 14, 2013
On February 13, 2013, the U.S. House of Representatives’ Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure held a hearing to highlight the federal role in strengthening the nation’s infrastructure, including the need for a new Water Resources Development Act, reauthorization of passenger rail safety and reform legislation, and preparation for the next surface transportation reauthorization.
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