<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?><rss version="2.0" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom"><channel><title>TRB Publications Index</title><link>http://pubsindex.trb.org/</link><atom:link href="http://pubsindex.trb.org/common/TRIS Suite/feeds/rss.aspx?s=PHNlYXJjaD48cGFyYW1zPjxwYXJhbSBuYW1lPSJsb2NhdGlvbiIgdmFsdWU9IjIiIC8%2BPHBhcmFtIG5hbWU9InN1YmplY3Rsb2dpYyIgdmFsdWU9Im9yIiAvPjxwYXJhbSBuYW1lPSJ0ZXJtc2xvZ2ljIiB2YWx1ZT0ib3IiIC8%2BPC9wYXJhbXM%2BPGZpbHRlcnM%2BPGZpbHRlciBmaWVsZD0ia2V5d29yZHMiIHZhbHVlPSImcXVvdDtOTjpOZ2dtdCZxdW90OyIgb3JpZ2luYWxfdmFsdWU9Ik5OOk5nZ210IiAvPjwvZmlsdGVycz48cmFuZ2VzIC8%2BPHNvcnRzPjxzb3J0IGZpZWxkPSJwdWJsaXNoZWQiIG9yZGVyPSJkZXNjIiAvPjwvc29ydHM%2BPHBlcnNpc3RzPjxwZXJzaXN0IG5hbWU9InJhbmdldHlwZSIgdmFsdWU9InB1Ymxpc2hlZGRhdGUiIC8%2BPC9wZXJzaXN0cz48L3NlYXJjaD4%3D" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" /><description></description><language>en-us</language><copyright>Copyright © 2015. National Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved.</copyright><docs>http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss</docs><managingEditor>tris-trb@nas.edu (Bill McLeod)</managingEditor><webMaster>tris-trb@nas.edu (Bill McLeod)</webMaster><image><title>TRB Publications Index</title><url>http://pubsindex.trb.org/Images/PageHeader-wTitle.png</url><link>http://pubsindex.trb.org/</link></image><item><title>Transit Recovery in the Aftermath of Severe Weather Events: Current State of Practice</title><link>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/2582402</link><description><![CDATA[Severe weather events impact transit agency operations, equipment, and infrastructure. In recent decades, billions of dollars of transit assets have been destroyed by climate-related disasters. This has resulted in millions of passengers being deprived of reliable transit service. TCRP Web-Only Document 70: Improving the Resilience of Transit Systems Threatened by Natural Disasters, Volume 1: A Guide (2017) offered practices for transit systems of all sizes to absorb the impacts of disaster, recover quickly, and return rapidly to providing the services that customers rely on to meet their travel needs. While transit agencies have policies to address disruptive events and severe weather, many remain without formal emergency plans. This synthesis documents the current state of practice around transit recovery plans. The synthesis identifies how often transit agencies have recovery plans, what is included in recovery plans, the timing of recovery, measurements of recovery success, and how agencies finance recovery. This report begins with a literature review synthesizing interdependencies of recovery, guidelines and resources for recovery, the recovery plans, and financing recovery. Then, a survey is discussed that was administered to 24 bus-only agencies to develop a better understanding of recovery plans at bus transportation agencies. In-depth case examples are then presented of five of the agencies to provide an overview of the agency recovery plan, typical recovery time, recovery approaches, local/community coordination, and any funding received for recovery. Lessons the agencies learned from their recovery experiences are then discussed. The report concludes with identifying recovery planning benefits, contents, community, funding, and resilience and then identifying eight areas for future research.]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 31 Jul 2025 15:26:17 GMT</pubDate><guid>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/2582402</guid></item><item><title>Routes to Regional Transit Governance: Researching the Histories of and Cataloguing the Methods Used to Establish German Verkehrsverbünde</title><link>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/2237105</link><description><![CDATA[Regional transit governance has become a topic of growing interest in some transit policy circles in the United States. There is hope that the quality of transit service can be improved by creating governance structures that transcend municipal and county borders to oversee and coordinate transit provision over entire regions. Although several studies have recorded the benefits of such governance systems and several others have explored different models, few have investigated the methods by which these structures were created. This is crucial information, as establishing such governance structures is a delicate political process with no guarantee of success. Through interviews with planners in Germany, this study investigated six German regional transit governance bodies and searched for strategic components that were instrumental to the creation of at least one regional governance structure. Five were ultimately found, which can be mixed and matched for use in strategies in regions seeking to establish regional transit governance of their own. The five strategic components found were bilateral negotiations, state intervention, large infrastructure packages, political moments, and strong leadership. Further case study research is needed to reinforce and expand this set of strategic components.]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 31 Aug 2023 13:58:48 GMT</pubDate><guid>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/2237105</guid></item><item><title>Racial Representation and Diversity on Non-Elected Transit Advisory Bodies</title><link>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/2208381</link><description><![CDATA[Non-elected advisory and planning bodies of transit agencies help planners determine the agency’s service, operations, and future developments. The Federal Transit Administration (FTA) requires reporting of the racial and ethnic makeup of those bodies to receive federal funding. This paper collects those data and compares them with the service area demographics of those agencies. This paper is an attempt to determine if those bodies are representative of the people they serve. This paper sets forth possible metrics to judge representation by and finds that most bodies in the United States are not representative, and instead over-represent the white population. This implication suggests that people of color in the United States are not being represented in the decision-making and planning processes of the transit agencies that serve them.]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 07 Jul 2023 09:23:59 GMT</pubDate><guid>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/2208381</guid></item><item><title>Key Role of Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan in the Development of Light Rail Train Networks in Central and Eastern European Countries: Case Study of LRT Networks in Romania</title><link>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1512083</link><description><![CDATA[After a golden age in middle of last the century, traditional tram systems in Central and Eastern European countries—especially behind the “iron curtain” in the former socialist countries—experienced a period of serious decline. Starting in the 1990s, industrialized municipalities had the chance to renovate and upgrade their systems to modern light rail transit (LRT) standards. Closure of some old systems was balanced by many renewed and extended networks, where the continued use of efficient electric traction remained a priority. In defining improvement programs, transport specialists applied the principles of the European Union’s (EU’s) Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan (SUMP) process to offer optimal solutions correlated with real economic conditions. This case study of the LRT networks in Romania offers detailed information about systems which have worked until today, and continue to be improved. Unfortunately, transit operators must fight for survival. Best practices adopted in some cities can be followed by the others, but support of local authorities is essential to maintain or renew tram networks. Defining the challenge for future progress of public transport are the issues of financing the operators, the infrastructural heritage of local communities, and bylaws in Romania.]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 19 Jun 2018 14:08:05 GMT</pubDate><guid>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1512083</guid></item><item><title>Public Transit Organization Adaptation and Response to Extreme Weather</title><link>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1495480</link><description><![CDATA[Extreme weather events have a highly disruptive impact on public transit systems and challenge the capacity of transit agencies to effectively respond to them. In this paper, the authors draw upon a recent nationwide survey of major public transit agencies across the United States to understand the factors that influence their scope of adjustment for adapting to anticipated extreme weather risks. The authors find that a transit agency would undertake more adaptation measures to tackle weather risks when its public officials perceive greater risks, stronger adaptive capacity, or they have experienced more severe extreme weather events recently. The authors also show that local institutional environment, in particular, political ideology, could significantly affect the scope of transit adaptation activities. Transit agencies that operate in more liberal jurisdictions tend to engage in more adaptation measures, while the ideology effect at the state level depends on the level of perceived influence from state governments.]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 22 Mar 2018 11:57:29 GMT</pubDate><guid>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1495480</guid></item><item><title>Improving the Resilience of Transit Systems Threatened by Natural Disasters, Volume 3: Literature Review and Case Studies</title><link>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1501674</link><description><![CDATA[This volume includes appendices that outline the literature reviewed and 17 case studies that explore how transit agencies absorb the impacts of disaster, recover quickly, and return rapidly to providing the services that customers rely on to meet their travel needs.The report shows how to identify and implement appropriate resilience strategies to strengthen operations and infrastructure throughout an agency. It explores ways that agencies can become more resilient through incremental adjustments in planning and small changes in what their daily operations.]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 08 Feb 2018 09:52:27 GMT</pubDate><guid>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1501674</guid></item><item><title>Comparing Road vs Transit Authority Tram/Streetcar Crash Reporting Approaches and Data</title><link>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1494380</link><description><![CDATA[Road safety is the major concern for trams in traffic. This paper compares Melbourne tram related crash reporting between Crashstats, a crash database reported by road authority (VicRoads) and the tram Incident Report System (IRS) by tram authority (Yarra Trams). Significant differences are identified; IRS only records tram-involved incidents while Crashstats records wider data e.g. pedestrian collisions with cars when accessing tram stops; this is known to be one of the largest safety concerns for streetcars.  This implies that both databases record incidents which in aggregate are critical to capture an overall picture of tram road safety. Five years crash count comparisons revealed startling Crashstats under-reporting in tram related crashes;  IRS reports 5,430 tram related crashes while Crashstats reports only 147 (97% under-reporting),  IRS report 4,240 tram to vehicle collisions vs 15 in Crashstats (99.7% under-reporting). Under-reporting for the critical Fatal and Serious Injury (FSI) crash category was particularly concerning; total tram-involved FSI are 66 in Crashstats and 433 in IRS (85% under reporting).  Crashstats report only 5 tram/vehicle FSI events while IRS reports 127 (potentially 96% under reporting). A disaggregate analysis of crash rates by location illustrated that Crashstats use of specific location for incidents acted to highlight crash hot spots better than the link based reporting for IRS.  IRS link reporting seemed to ‘hide’ some hotspots suggested by Crashstats.Overall results imply that important changes are needed in crash reporting in both databases to better understand tram related crash incidence. Implications for practice and future research are presented.]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 26 Jan 2018 09:47:11 GMT</pubDate><guid>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1494380</guid></item><item><title>Practices for Evaluating the Economic Impacts and Benefits of Transit</title><link>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1464756</link><description><![CDATA[Because of shifting demands and constrained budgets, transit agencies must consistently and defensibly document the economic impacts and benefits of their services. This synthesis provides state-of-the-practice information for transit agencies to help them in incorporating economic benefits and impacts into their decision-making processes, and to help them advocate for more sustainable funding for transit. It describes the methods used for assessing transit economic impacts and benefits, the types of effects that are covered by these methods, and the ways that agencies are using the information obtained for planning, prioritizing, funding, and stakeholder support. The report includes: (1) a review of  national reports and guides pertaining to transit economic analysis methods, (2) a review of local transit impact and benefit studies that show how economic measurement is done, (3) case examples that reveal how economic studies have been developed and applied to support broader planning and decision making, and (4) a survey of transit agencies that had past experience with economic impact or benefit studies. The literature reviews, case examples, and surveys all point to four primary roles of transit that can be documented and communicated:  a source of transportation efficiency improvement; a public service; a strategic planning and development tool; and generator of jobs and income. The case examples show that funding, management, and interest in economic evaluation of transit comes from many different types of groups including transit agencies themselves, metropolitan planning organizations, states, and community and business organizations. Studies are often completed by means of partnerships among organizations. The cases also demonstrate that although funding issues are often a motivation for initiating economic studies, they can also become a tool to aid visioning and planning. The reviews of existing studies and reports indicate the multi-modal transportation efficiency effects of transit are generally understood and often analyzed, using widely available transportation analysis and economic analysis tools. A growing number of studies are now including the value of transit as a public service that provides access to opportunities for dependent population groups and the value of transit to support urban land development. The existing body of research spans many forms of transit in a wide variety of settings and agency sizes. The surveys revealed a consensus that both economic impact and benefit studies are useful, particularly in supporting transit funding decisions. However, many survey respondents reported that they face internal funding, staff, and data challenges that have limited their ability to do more of these types of studies.]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 20 Apr 2017 09:48:27 GMT</pubDate><guid>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1464756</guid></item><item><title>Developing an ITS Technology Web Portal for Transit System Leaders</title><link>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1415705</link><description><![CDATA[This project creates a portal for transit system leaders that they can use to learn about new and emerging transit systems and technologies. The portal, designed as a one-stop resource on the American Public Transportation Association (APTA) website, provides information not only on the technologies but also their relationship to transit business practices, technology implementation issues, and adoption challenges. Portal content will be submitted by industry experts and reviewed by designated reviewers of the Tech Portal Subcommittee of APTA’s Research and Technology Committee.]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 07 Jul 2016 15:28:10 GMT</pubDate><guid>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1415705</guid></item><item><title>Measuring Transit Agency Performance Using Open Realtime Data</title><link>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1393881</link><description><![CDATA[Two recent trends in the Transit industry are (1) providing real-time information to the public, and (2) using abundant automatically collected data to measure and improve performance. This paper describes work at the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) that combines these two efforts to create an open-source public-facing platform for real-time and historical customer-weighted performance data based on the General Transit Feed Specification (GTFS) and GTFS-realtime data standard. The paper describes the data and methodology underlying the customer-weighted performance metrics, the process for calculating them in real-time using GTFS-realtime data feeds then storing the data in a performance database, and the incorporation of this performance data into the MBTA’s existing public open data portal. It also compares the results of measuring performance using GTFS-realtime data to the MBTA’s previous block-based performance system that was based on the direct track telemetry data and finds that overall the outputs from the two systems are closely correlated. This work produces open-source software that operates on open data in a common standard, the metrics described in this paper should be reproducible for any transit agency with data in the GTFS-realtime format, which has potential both as an internal tool for individual agencies and as an objective means of comparing the performance of different agencies’ services.]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 24 Feb 2016 17:07:16 GMT</pubDate><guid>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1393881</guid></item><item><title>Management and Integration of Data and Travel Demand Modeling at the Santa Clara County Congestion Management Agency</title><link>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1337080</link><description><![CDATA[The Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) is the designated Congestion Management Agency (CMA) for Santa Clara County, California. As the CMA, the VTA is responsible for managing and monitoring congestion on designated roadway facilities, and is charged with developing a comprehensive transportation improvement program among local jurisdictions that will reduce traffic congestion, improve land use decision making and improve air quality. The VTA is fairly unique in that it also is the operator of the transit system for Santa Clara County, providing bus and light rail transit services over a service area of over 326 square miles. One of the responsibilities of the VTA designated in the CMA enabling legislation is the development and maintenance of a countywide travel demand model used for estimating future transportation needs and impacts caused by growth in population and jobs. The broad range of responsibilities of the VTA places a need to have significant travel demand modeling capabilities to support the agency functions. This paper describes the overall blueprint VTA has developed to restructure the travel demand organization of the agency, with particular emphasis on the management and integration of data and the enhancement of the travel demand models in response to the evolving analysis needs of the agency. Several applications of the travel demand modeling works are also presented.]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 27 Jan 2015 11:23:56 GMT</pubDate><guid>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1337080</guid></item><item><title>Valley Metro Organizational Integration: Advancing the Future of Transportation in the Metropolitan Area of Phoenix, Arizona</title><link>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1288598</link><description><![CDATA[Seeking efficiencies, the boards of directors of Valley Metro Regional Public Transportation Authority and Valley Metro Rail, Inc., selected a single chief executive officer (CEO), Stephen R. Banta, in February 2012. Charged with creating one integrated agency, Banta embarked on an effort to advance an integrated, robust, and effective transit organization to serve transit riders and communities throughout the region. He began by engaging an expert consultant team to facilitate the effort. This paper describes the integration actions undertaken by Valley Metro leadership and the consultant team, from March 2012 and through fiscal year 2013 to create the organization needed to carry out the new agency’s mission and advance the vision of the CEO and the new leadership team. A 15-step organizational integration methodology resulted in a streamlined functional structure with more than $2 million in total salary savings. Two agencies and 10 total divisions were integrated into a single agency with six divisions. Additional efficiencies were achieved through staff reassignments and attrition, which also made it possible to reduce reliance on consultants and contractors in several functional areas of the agency. In addition to the cost savings, benefits included staffing efficiencies, administrative efficiencies through joint contracts, improved service delivery, and elevated visibility of the agency and its efforts within the local community.]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 25 Feb 2014 09:15:20 GMT</pubDate><guid>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1288598</guid></item><item><title>Advanced Wayside Energy Storage Systems for Rail Transit</title><link>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1285686</link><description><![CDATA[This Innovations Deserving Exploratory Analysis (IDEA) project explored the use of wayside energy storage systems (WESS) in rail transit systems. The analysis monetized economic and technical benefits for transit agencies but also considered other stakeholders. The costs and benefits of various applications were modeled through hypothetical simulations as well as case studies using real data from participating transit agencies: Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority and Denver Regional Transportation District. Six different WESS technologies were modeled including: flywheels, ultracapacitors, and lead acid, sodium sulfur, lithium ion, and zinc bromide batteries. The cost, benefit, and net present value (NPV) were calculated for seven simulations for a hypothetical transit system and for two case studies.  Several key findings are summarized.  First, combining applications provides benefits that result in the most attractive NPV.  Second, applications that solve a technical problem, such as to address a power quality or reliability issue, may be attractive to a transit agency even if the NPV is not positive. The important consideration is whether WESS is less expensive than the alternative technology.   Third, the results for each of the applications could be improved with a reduction in WESS capital cost, which is expected for most technologies over the next few years as they become commercially available and are produced in larger quantities. Fourth, the financial value proposition for WESS would be improved by federal capital grants or other incentives. This project analyzed the value of WESS as an investment made solely by the transit agency without capital funds from other sources.   Fifth, this analysis considered the business case for a transit agency and therefore monetized on the benefits that accrue to the transit agency. However, if a societal perspective had been modeled and other benefits were monetized, WESS would likely be much more attractive in these applications.]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 09 Jan 2014 13:17:38 GMT</pubDate><guid>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1285686</guid></item><item><title>Measuring and Benchmarking User Satisfaction with Transport</title><link>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1240976</link><description><![CDATA[Increasing attention is being given to the ability of highway departments and metropolitan planning bodies to demonstrate the value for money of scarce public funds. Over time, this has led to a shift from accounting for the inputs to the system through to what is delivered. Ultimately however, the delivery of transport improvements is in the eye of the beholder – the public. It is therefore critical to connect the information provided on the performance of the transportation system to the public’s satisfaction with the outcomes of these interventions.  This paper describes an initiative developed independently by local highways authorities in England which covers all aspects of investment except for inter-city motorway routes and rail investment (where they only have an advisory and not a management role). Despite there being no mandate for public satisfaction measures to be collected, a subscription based initiative has now been running for five years with over half of all highways authorities now engaged. This provides a rich longitudinal data set of satisfaction measures and information on citizen preferences.  The paper presents information about the data collection methods, the findings and how the data is being used in benchmarking. It also extends the discussion into the next phase of the work which is examining the extent to which investment can be linked to system performance and in turn to user satisfaction. If successful this initiative could change the landscape for the incorporation of user preferences in transportation planning and management.]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 19 Feb 2013 08:52:35 GMT</pubDate><guid>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/1240976</guid></item><item><title>Future Fleets: An Applied Model for Bus Fleet Planning Based on Energy Costs and Impacts</title><link>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/910643</link><description><![CDATA[In determining short-term bus fleet allocation and long-term bus fleet procurement, transit agencies are faced with an uncertain mix of volatile energy prices, emerging bus technologies, and pending climate change regulation.  With these considerations in mind, the authors have developed an applied model for transit operators that examines the fuel type, consumption, and emissions of the current fleet mix of the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) and provides information for an evaluation of alternative fleet mixes using dynamic inputs of operating, capital and regulatory costs.    This paper describes the model’s input and output functions based on variables such as energy, infrastructure, and emissions costs, and a range of potential vehicle technologies (e.g., diesel-hybrid, battery-electric, fuel cell).  Several scenarios are described to show how the model can be used as an analytical tool. The model illustrates sensitivity to various inputs for both short-term fleet allocation and long-term fleet procurement.  This prototype model will be undergoing further development to increase model usability and enhance functionality, allowing it to be used by transit agencies with diverse fleet characteristics and operating conditions.]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 23 Apr 2010 08:26:38 GMT</pubDate><guid>http://pubsindex.trb.org/view/910643</guid></item></channel></rss>