The results of research projects are public assets, and since the federal government
may fund a portion of the research, closer scrutiny is given to the end product. Two of
the main measures for determining if a project meets research and development
performance measures are timeliness of the research project and quality in which the
project is performed. The Program Management and Quality Task Force (PM&Q) is
asking research programs in the Departments of Transportation to respond to the below
questions so that we can determine if these performance measures are being met and
how, and if not, what is the rationale why these measures are not met or are being
deviated from. The information received will be used to prepare a report which we hope
will assist research programs improve or validate their research program performance.
This survey is an update to one previously conducted in the Spring of 2019.
Non-Profit (AASHTO, TKNs, TRB, etc.)
Airport Design and Construction Narrative Research Roadmap
TRB’s Airport Cooperative Research Program (ACRP) Web-Only Document 40 outlines the key research gaps and areas of topics of interest for airports in the design and construction field over the next five years.
The research ideas generated as part of this project are organized into seven high‐level themes that represent the main areas and challenges of interest to airports in design and construction.
While design and construction are designated as their own research areas within the ACRP program, the roadmap takes a consolidated approach and combines the two in both the report and the visual representation.
The roadmap includes 40 research ideas that are categorized into seven high‐level themes: Customer Service; Integrating Advanced and/or Disruptive Technologies; Project Management, Delivery and Finance Models; Safety and Security; Sustainability and Resiliency; General Design and Construction; and Workforce Development.
The research ideas are further categorized into twelve subtopics: 1) Passenger Experience; 2) Integrating Technology and Data; 3) Finance and Revenue Development; 4) Alternative Approaches to Project Delivery Mechanisms; 5) Sustainable Design and Construction; 6) Innovative Approaches to Security / TSA Operations; 7) Construction Best Practices / Guidance and Tools; 8) Modernizing and Retrofitting Airport Facilities; 9) Construction Materials; 10) Accommodating Changing Demographics; 11) Curbside, Roadways and Vehicles; and 12) Unmanned Aerial Systems.
The completed Research Roadmap in the Area of Design and Construction of Airport Facilities includes the following products:
• An interactive version of Appendix B: Visual Research Roadmap.
• Appendix C: Research Ideas Database, which is a searchable Excel file containing ideas generated during the project.
• A PowerPoint presentation: Summary of Airport Design and Construction Research Roadmap, which describes the roadmap and related products.
Research Roadmap on Safety Issues
With the airport industry’s introduction and early adoption of safety management systems (SMS), safety processes are taking on a more proactive way of doing the business while continuously improving safety. This shift in approach will drive safety research in the near and long-term future.
The TRB Airport Cooperative Research Program’s ACRP Web-Only Document 50: Research Roadmap on Safety Issues reveals evidence of this shift, with input from the industry clearly indicating that more detailed guidance on, and the sharing of lessons learned regarding the elements and processes falling under the SMS umbrella, is needed.
Two supplemental files accompany this web-only document, including a Safety Research Topics Database and a Visual Research Roadmap.
Airport Environment Research Roadmap
BACKGROUND
As an industry-driven research program, ACRP relies on a flow of quality research ideas. Traditionally, ACRP primarily has used a bottom-up approach for these ideas, expressed as formal problem statements. ACRP’s Oversight Committee has adopted a strategic plan for the program that includes as a priority ensuring “that problem statements are of the highest quality and greatest relevance to the airport industry.” As a key step to achieving this strategic priority, ACRP is developing a series of research roadmaps, one for each of its 10 topic areas. The goal of these research roadmaps is to identify gaps in knowledge and practice, uncover key opportunities and challenges, and outline and prioritize specific research ideas needed to address these gaps. The roadmaps will also produce research ideas to be entered into ACRP’s IdeaHub, its online collaboration platform for turning ideas into problem statements to be considered for funding.
Airports face unique, numerous, and ever-evolving environmental challenges and opportunities. Common environmental topics have focused on noise, water quality, and air quality. More recently, issues related to sustainability and resiliency have emerged. A research roadmap is needed to help airport industry practitioners identify and prioritize research needs related to environmental issues.
OBJECTIVE
The objective of this research is to develop an airport environmental research roadmap. The roadmap should recommend priorities and timing, set a strategy, and provide a rationale for the recommendations. In addition, the roadmap should:
- Focus on airport environmental research needs to be undertaken within the next 5 years;
- Consider existing relevant environmental roadmaps and research recommendations;
- Consider the needs of airports of all sizes, geographies, levels and types of activity, and resource constraints;
- Recognize airports are a component of communities and intermodal transportation systems;
- Address potential positive environmental effects that airports can generate;
- Reflect priorities of a broad group of stakeholders;
- Prioritize research with consideration to ACRP’s strategic plan;
- Create environmental research ideas to be entered into ACRP’s IdeaHub for further development into problem statements; and
- Include a long-range (i.e., beyond 5 years) environmental research needs assessment that accounts for uncertainty, data limitations, emerging technologies, and evolving policies.
STATUS
Research is complete. Results are provided in ACRP Web-Only Document 45, a Dataset, and an Interactive Roadmap.
Research Roadmap for the AASHTO Council on Active Transportation
The Research Review summarizes existing and ongoing research in 22 topic areas: http://onlinepubs.trb.org/onlinepubs/nchrp/docs/NCHRP20-123-02AASHTOCATResearchReview.pdf
A spreadsheet for tracking research is available for download here (xlsx format): http://onlinepubs.trb.org/onlinepubs/nchrp/docs/NCHRP20-123-02AASHTOCATResearchRoadmapTrackingSpreadsheet.xlsx
Transportation System Resilience: Research Roadmap and White Papers
The white papers will address the questions: To be resilient in these areas, what can I do now? What should I worry about? Systems interdependencies and lifelines will be emphasized across all three white papers. White papers are pre-summit only; focused on specific actions; designed to initiate discussion; and may address some of the same topics as the CEO primer. The CEO primer is intended to guide specific actions. Both the white papers and the CEO primer have as their primary audiences state DOT CEOs and senior executives. The CEO primer should, in addressing topics such as those enumerated below, complement the three white papers that are anticipated to provide responsive overviews to the questions following the first three topics below:
- Cyber systems resilience (including unintentional effects such as space weather): What can a state DOT do now or worry about when it comes to resilient cyber systems with respect to critical functions, assets, networks, systems and people?
- Economics (both ways), maintaining a viable tax base, using DOT purchasing power to help recover the local economy (economic function of resilience, national security): What can a state DOT do now or worry about when it comes to a resilient economy where a state DOT not only contributes to but benefits from a vibrant commerce environment? What are the functions, assets, networks, and systems that are enhanced through this resiliency?
- Sea level rise/extreme weather (climate change issues, uncertainty, non-urgent): What can a state DOT do now or worry about when it comes to creating resiliency against extreme weather and/or sea level rise, and how does that DOT harness and augment its functions, assets, networks, assets, systems, and people to sustain operations through changes in weather?
- Earthquakes (including New Madrid and Northwest Subduction Zone)
- Choke points/single points of failure
- Human factors/COOP, succession planning
- Automated/connected vehicles
- Workforce development
- Drought/heat
For the purposes of this project’s construct, “functions” refers to the assignments, tasks, and positions in a state DOT that are critical to the performance of continued transportation service through any hazard or disruption; “assets” refers to the infrastructure, equipment, resources, tools, vehicles, hardware, roadways, tunnels, and facilities owned and operated by a state DOT to ensure the continued safe transport of goods and people through any hazard or disruption; “networks” refers to the relationships maintained by a state DOT with local municipalities, contractors, the private sector, and other branches of local, state and federal government to ensure continuity of transportation operations through any hazard or disruption; “systems” refers to the variety of critical technology platforms and applications, including all software utilities and electronic forms of data, utilized by state DOT personnel to operate assets and infrastructure, support functional continuity, and enable network communication and reliability through any hazard or disruption; “people” refers to the inherently necessary human resources and personnel needed by a state DOT to ensure transportation service is provided through any hazard or disruption.
Complete. Published as NCHRP Research Report 975: Transportation System Resilience: Research Roadmap and White Papers (2021).
- NCHRP Project 20-59(54) Fact Sheet: Transportation System Resilience: Research Roadmap and White Papers
Other useful resources for this project include:
Fundamental Capabilities of Effective All-Hazards Infrastructure Protection, Resilience, and Emergency Management for State Departments of Transportation (September 2015), AASHTO http://scotsem.transportation.org/Documents/SCOTSEM/Fundamental%20Capabilities%20of%20Effective.pdf
Managing Catastrophic Transportation Emergencies: A Guide for Transportation Executives (September 2015), AASHTO http://scotsem.transportation.org/Documents/SCOTSEM/Managing%20Catastrophic%20Transportation%20Emergencies.pdf
National Infrastructure Protection Plan (2006), DHS https://www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/NIPP_Plan_noApps.pdf
Transportation Systems: Critical Infrastructure and Key Resources Sector-Specific Plan as input to the National Infrastructure Protection Plan (May 2007), DHS https://www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/Transportation_Base_Plan_5_21_07.pdf
Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030, The United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction http://www.unisdr.org/we/coordinate/sendai-framework
Impacts of Connected Vehicles and Automated Vehicles on State and Local Transportation Agencies
RESEARCH OBJECTIVES
The objectives of NCHRP Project 20-102 are to (1) identify critical issues associated with connected vehicles and automated vehicles that state and local transportation agencies and AASHTO will face, (2) conduct research to address those issues, and (3) conduct related technology transfer and information exchange activities.
The list of projects funded under NCHRP 20-102 are at the bottom of this page and are included in the Summary of NCHRP 20-102 Activities
NCHRP Project 20-24(98) developed a draft research roadmap for addressing CV/AV issues. NCHRP Project 20-102(19) is updating this roadmap and has completed their review of the previous roadmap.
BACKGROUND
A request for statements of qualifications was active from December 11, 2014 to January 29, 2015. Four task-order contracts have been executed. For the individual tasks selected by the NCHRP Project 20-102 panel (listed below), the selected task-order contractors will be asked to submit competitive proposals that will be evaluated by a separate panel for each task. These task panels will also oversee the contractor’s work.
During the course of the contract, task-order contractors will be expected to submit quarterly progress reports that include: (1) brief status reports on tasks currently underway (including a table of milestones and deliverables, significant findings, a description of any problems encountered, and recommended solutions to such problems); (2) summary of significant events in the CV and AV industries that may affect the research roadmap; and (3) recommendations for updates to the research roadmap.
The NCHRP will decide in Summer 2017 whether to readvertise for task-order contractors or to extend the ones that are in place.
LISTING OF TASKS
20-102(02) Impacts of Regulations and Policies on CV and AV Technology Introduction in Transit Operations
20-102(06) Road Markings for Machine Vision
20-102(10) Cybersecurity Implications of CV/AV Technologies on State and Local Transportation Agencies
20-102(11) Mobility-on-Demand and Automated Driving Systems: A Framework for Public-Sector Assessment
20-102(16) Impacts of Connected, Automated Vehicle Technologies on Traffic Incident Management Response
20-102(17) Deployment Guidance for CV Applications in the Open Source Application Development Portal
20-102(20) Workforce Capability Strategies for State and Local Agencies
20-102(22) State and Local Impacts of Automated Freight Transportation Systems
20-102(34) Land Use Impacts of Shared and Private AVs
Rural Transportation Issues: Research Roadmap
Rural regional services are transportation services that fall in the middle ground between intercity bus service and rural public transportation. The concept was the topic of a NCHRP report [NCHRP Research Report 861: Best Practices in Rural Regional Mobility] that addressed the role of state transit program policies and regional planning agencies in the development of rural regional services. According to the report, these services improve mobility, employment, and education opportunities; provide access to healthcare and community services; and offer connectivity to the national transportation network.
Multimodal Freight Transportation Research Roadmap
Research Roadmap — Transformational Technologies (other than CV/AV)
RESEARCH PLAN
The initial phase of this work is to support TRB’s Partners in Research Symposium: Transformational Technologies in Transportation through NCHRP Project 20-113A (link below). Upon completion, the panel will determine how best to use the remaining resources.