Non-Profit (AASHTO, TKNs, TRB, etc.)

Freight Transportation Research Needs Statements, E-Circular 048

TRB Transportation Research Circular E-C048: Freight Transportation Research Needs Statements identifies critical issues in freight transportation as a resource for researchers in the freight area and serves as a seedbed for further discussion and analysis from a wider cross-section of freight practitioners.

Literature Searches and Literature Reviews for Transportation Research Projects: How to Search, Where to Search, and How to Put it all Together: Current Practices

Research projects sponsored by state departments of transportation (DOTs) routinely require a literature review as part of the research effort. The literature review is a critical portion of the research process in any field of inquiry and an important component of the final research report. For the researcher, a literature review helps to clarify the scope of the research project by creating a narrative of what is and is not known in the field and where there are areas of dispute. For the customer of the research and other readers, the review also provides valuable context, establishes the researcher?s expertise, and relates the findings of the project to what is already known.

However, investigators tasked with developing literature reviews for transportation research projects may not always be aware of the importance of the literature review or have an
adequate understanding of the necessary steps for producing a high-quality review. This may lead to the submission of literature reviews that are incomplete, unfocused, poorly explained, or otherwise inadequate. This E-circular is the result of a 2-year collaborative effort by more than 50 individuals.
The publication is aimed at all transportation researchers, including university investigators, graduate students, consultants, and practitioners at state and federal transportation agencies. The e-circular also will be useful to sponsors of research when conducting initial literature searches
and evaluating literature reviews to determine the quality of the products received.

Research Need to Research Result-Explanation

Explains the diagram of the research process from research need to research results, with links to entities referenced and a cross-link to the diagram.

This document was developed in a joint effort by the RAC Coordination and Collaboration Task Force and the TRB Conduct of Research Committee.

Strategic Issues Facing Transportation, Volume 3: Expediting Future Technologies for Enhancing Transportation System Performance

TRB’s National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP) Report 750: Strategic Issues Facing Transportation, Volume 3: Expediting Future Technologies for Enhancing Transportation System Performance presents the systematic technology reconnaissance, evaluation, and adoption methodology (STREAM).

STREAM is a process that transportation agencies can use to identify, assess, shape, and adopt new and emerging technologies to help achieve long-term system performance objectives. The process reflects relevant trends in technologies and their applications and is designed to help transportation agencies anticipate, adapt to, and shape the future.

NCHRP Report 750, Volume 3 is the third in a series of reports being produced by NCHRP Project 20-83: Long-Range Strategic Issues Facing the Transportation Industry. Major trends affecting the future of the United States and the world will dramatically reshape transportation priorities and needs. The American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) established the NCHRP Project 20-83 research series to examine global and domestic long-range strategic issues and their implications for state departments of transportation (DOTs); AASHTO’s aim for the research series is to help prepare the DOTs for the challenges and benefits created by these trends.

Other volumes in this series currently available include:
• NCHRP Report 750: Strategic Issues Facing Transportation, Volume 1: Scenario Planning for Freight Transportation Infrastructure Investment
• NCHRP Report 750: Strategic Issues Facing Transportation, Volume 2: Climate Change, Extreme Weather Events, and the Highway System: Practitioner’s Guide and Research Report>
• NCHRP Report 750: Strategic Issues Facing Transportation, Volume 4: Sustainability as an Organizing Principle for Transportation Agencies
• NCHRP Report 750: Strategic Issues Facing Transportation, Volume 5: Preparing State Transportation Agencies for an Uncertain Energy Future
• NCHRP Report 750: Strategic Issues Facing Transportation, Volume 6: The Effects of Socio-Demographics on Future Travel Demand

How To Write an Effective Research Statement

Writing an effective research statement is not a simple matter, even to transportation practitioners who face serious problems and challenges on a daily basis. The research needed might be obvious to them but difficult to describe to non-specialists. They may not have thought about how to quantify it or how to justify the needed research with respect to other agency or national priorities. A serious problem to them might not even be on a decision maker?s radar screen.

This document was written to provide some guidance on developing research statements for funding consideration. The categories below are based on those of the National Cooperative Highway Research Program, but they should be adaptable to any research funding program.

Research Funding Guidebook

Transportation research needs are broad, cutting across modes, geographic levels, and types of research. The organizations conducting transportation research and the research programs themselves are diverse. While there is considerable strength in this diversity, it can be difficult to navigate through these programs. Where can I find funding? Who is conducting research in my area of interest? Where do I find the cutting-edge research products?

To help the transportation community access research programs more efficiently, the TRB Conduct of Research Committee, the AASHTO Research Advisory Committee, TRB Staff, and transportation professionals from across the country worked together to produce Funding Sources for Transportation Research: Competitive Programs. The first version of this web resource was posted in December 2008. It will be updated regularly with additional research programs, information and updates for the existing programs, and tips and advice.

Performance Measurement Tool Box and Reporting System for Research Programs and Projects

This report documents the work performed to gather and analyze available research performance measurement information, select a balanced and broadly applicable set of these performance measures, develop tools to assist practitioners in applying these measures to their research projects and programs, and deliver these products to the community of state research program managers. The selected performance measures and the developed tools were integrated to create the Research Performance Measurement (RPM) System, composed of a web site, RPM-Web, and a complementing CD-ROM tool box, RPM-Tools. The tool set being provided within the system includes PM 101, a narrated research performance measurement tutorial; a wizard to assist in selecting research program performance measures; a compendium of data resource links; a catalog of example research benefit estimations; and automated work sheets for the practitioner to create new benefit estimations. Additional
functionalities provided in RPM-Web include historical performance information storage and the capability to generate a suite of performance reports from database information.

The web tool for state DOTs created with this project and as modified by NCHRP project 20-63B (http://apps.trb.org/cmsfeed/TRBNetProjectDisplay.asp?ProjectID=2900) can be found at https://www.rpmweb.org/rpm/.