DraftSTATE OF TRB

Midyear 2010 Report

(a.k.a. “The Cheat Sheet”)

This document is being provided to the chairs of TRB Groups, Sections, committees and task forces for their information and use in planning committee activities. It is also hoped that this “State of TRB” overview will help to maximize the efficient use of available time during your meetings and/or in communications with your committee. Comments are welcome, and can be addressed to Mark Norman () or Tom Palmerlee (.

Contents

I.TRB Achieves Largest Program Level Ever

II.TRB is Gearing Up for 90th Annual Meeting

III.Research Needs Statements Database Getting Plenty of Attention

IV.Committees Make Slow but Steady Progress to Increase Diversity

V.New Tools & Resources for Committees

I.TRB Achieves Largest Program Level Ever

TRB’s programs continue to be strong technically and financially, and taken together, they constitute TRB’s largest program level ever.

Long standing TRB activities such as the TRB core program, NCHRP, TCRP, and policy studies continue to have a strong foundation and support

Newer cooperative research programs (airports, freight, hazardous materials) and SHRP2 are now in full operational and delivery mode

TRB is currently involved in a number of high visibility Academies policy studies, including unintended auto acceleration, offshore oil & gas platform inspection program of the Mineral Management Service, and Deepwater Horizon disaster blowout causes and preventive measures

Looking to the future, like many other transportation organizations, TRB faces uncertainties related to our dependence, directly and indirectly, on federal programs whose reauthorizations are pending (i.e., overdue)

II.TRB is Gearing Up for 90thAnnual Meeting

TRB committees, volunteers, and staff are ramping up for the TRB 90th Annual Meeting, to be held January 23-27, 2011 in Washington, DC

The Spotlight Theme for the meeting is “Transportation, Livability, and Economic Development in a Changing World.”

  • Committees are asked to consider this theme as they develop their sessions

Committees are again allotted 2.3 lectern sessions per committee. Poster sessions do not count against this allotment.

  • The paper submission site opened on June 1. Authors have until August 1 to submit papers.
  • All information for sessions must be entered into the TRB online Annual Meeting Planner (AMP) by October 1
  • The Technical Activities Council has authorized the development of the following cross-cutting sessions. These will not count against any committee’s session allotment.

Session Title / Lead Group
Toward More Sustainable Highway Infrastructure Preservation / Design & Construction Group
Translating Sustainability Across Modes and Phases of Transportation Decision-Making / Planning & Environment Group
Disaster Recovery/Mitigation Planning and Resilience / Planning & Environment Group
360 Degree Look at Data for Performance-Based Decision Making / TAC (on behalf of Policy & Organization Group
Transportation Systems for Livable Communities – Research Perspectives / Policy & Organization Group
America’s Climate Choices – Results of a Major NAS Study – Comprehending the Big Picture / Policy & Organization Group
Cybersecurity Best Practices – Keeping our Nation Safe from Cyber Attacks / Policy & Organization Group
Understanding Safety Culture is a Key to Improving Safety / Systems Users Group
  • Committee Chairs and authorized session planners can view sessions and workshops that have been entered into AMP by all committees to date XXX (provide URL for 2011 interactive program, or…
  • Click on “Session Planner”
  • Click on “Sessions”
  • In “Staff Number”, type in “_ _S” (underscore underscore S) and click on “Search” to get list of lectern sessions, “_ _W” for workshops, and “_ _P” for Poster Sessions

TRB is continuing to implement measures to make more of the Annual Meeting accessible to attendees as well as to those who cannot attend due to travel and other restrictions

  • For the 2010 meeting, more than 40 recorded e-sessions and visual-aidsfor presenters in all sessions were made available at no charge to employees of TRB year-round sponsor organizations
  • Based on the very positive response to this, and requests from other Annual Meeting attendees, access to these will be included as part of the registration fee for all 2011 Annual Meeting registrants
  • Plans are being made to replace the Compendium of Papers DVD with online access to these papers for Annual Meeting registrants and employees of TRB year-round sponsor organizations
  • In addition, TRB will be experimenting with equipping a small number of committee meeting rooms with conference call and internet access capabilities
  • Committees who are lucky enough to be slotted into these rooms will be asked to provide feedback to TRB on their experience which will be used to make decisions on providing these additional services for future Annual Meetings

The registration fees for the 2011 TRB Annual Meeting will be increased by five to ten percent over 2010 levels

  • As noted above, the registration fee will for the first time provide registrants with free online access to all slide presentations and the 40 to 50 sessions that will be fully recorded as e-sessions
  • The increase in the fees also makes it possible to include both Young Professional and Student non-Member reduced-fee categories as part of our efforts to attract younger and more diverse audiences to the meeting
  • This will be the first increase in registration fees since 2009
  • The 2011 registration fees are still below levels generally being charged by other transportation associations that we track

Two new Annual Meeting training webinars will be added to our collection this year - TRB New Member Orientation and training for TRB paper authors

  • These will supplement our webinars for paper review coordinators, paper reviewers, session organizers, and new Annual Meeting attendees
  • The full schedule of Annual Meeting training webinars can be found at

III.Research Needs Statements Database Getting Plenty of Attention

The TRB Research Needs Statements (RNS) database received approximately 3,000 visits (2,600 were unique visits) this past month from over 100 countries. The Technical Activities Council (TAC) asks committees to review their database entries in light of the attached analysis of RNS vs. TRB Critical Issues.

TAC has produced the attached top-down assessment of the RNS database to see how well it covers the nine TRB critical issues from the publication Critical Issues in Transportation (see Attachment 1)

  • Critical Issues like “Congestion”, “Energy, Environment, and Climate Change”, “Infrastructure”, “Emergency Preparedness, Response, and Mitigation”, and “Safety”, appear to be well covered
  • Other areas such as “Finance”, “Equity”, “Institutions”, and “Human and Intellectual Capital” appear to be less well covered

Standing committees are reminded to update, reaffirm, or delete each of their statements every three years

  • Committees have now posted 950 research needs statements in the online database
  • An automatic archiving feature will soon be added that will remove statements that have not been accessed by a committee’s RNS editor in three years
  • Archived statements can be re-set to “active” by the committee following the required review

Efforts are underway to publicize/market the database, but more are needed

  • A flyer has been developed for universities to encourage them to use the database as a source of research needs for their graduate students
  • Periodic reminders on the existence and use of the database are issued via the TRB e-Newsletter
  • The RNS database has been linked to the TRIS and Research-in-Progress websites
  • TRB has conducted webinars and developed guidance on writing quality research needs statements
  • An excellent resource for identifying research funding and preparing statements is available online at:

IV.Committees Make Slow but Steady Progressto Increase Diversity

Data show slight increases in the percentages of international, women, and minority members; and slight decreases in the percentages of young members and state DOT employees. Data Section percentages are lower than the Technical Activities Division averages for emeritus and higher for minority and state members.

At its June 2010 meeting, the Technical Activities Council voted to increasethe maximum number of Young Members a committee can appoint without it counting against the 25 member limit from two to four

  • 87 committees had reached the previous limit of two Young Members
  • This increase is effective immediately

Pilot efforts are being initiated to provide more formal mechanisms for younger members to provide input to the TRB Technical Activities Division.

  • The Planning & Environment Group and the Design & Construction Group are implementing pilot efforts during 2010
  • Both pilots will include forming a young members subcommittee and conducting one or more activities at the 2011 TRB Annual Meeting
  • These subcommittees will provide venues for young members to provide recommendations on current issues and to raise issues of importance to them
  • The results of the pilots will be reported to the TAC in January 2011 along with recommendations on expanding the effort to include the entire Division
  • The interest of young people in becoming actively involved in TRB is reflected in the record-setting 370 affirmative responses to our post Annual Meeting survey of new, young, and international attendees soliciting interest in participating in committee activities

While the overall percentage of committee members who are state DOT employees has dropped since 2006, the overall number has stayed about the same

  • This is despite the fact the state DOTs have reduced the size of their workforces in recent years
  • Measures taken by TRB staff and committee chairs to enable state DOT employees to continue to participate in activities despite severe travel restrictions have been well received
  • These measures will need to be continued and expanded in the coming years

Increasing international participation in standing committees has been designated as a TAC high priority action item

  • While not all committees are appropriate for international participation, most are. TAC requests committees, especially those with low international participation (see Attachment 2) to look for opportunities to involve international members.
  • Chairs are reminded that there are five slots reserved on every TRB Committee for international committee members which do not count against the 25 member ceiling on committee members.
  • Group and Section Chairs are also requested to include international members on their Executive Boards, where appropriate
  • A number of TRB committees have begun using social networking tools to facilitate international participation

V.New Tools & Resources for Committees

Committee Communications Coordinators, Chairs, other volunteers, and TRB staff are continuing to develop tools and resources to assist standing committee Chairs, members, and friends.

A calendar of standing committee meetings has been added to the TRB website

  • Click on “Calendar” on the top of the TRB homepage, and then “Committee Meetings” in the left hand column of the Calendar page

TRB website now makes it easier to find committees by modes and topics

  • On the TRB homepage, click on any mode or topic, and then click on “Committees” on the left-hand side of the mode/topic page to access the associated standing committees
  • Conversely, click on “Committees & Panels” on the TRB homepage and select “Standing Committees” from the drop-down menu. Click on any mode or topic to access the associated standing committees.

Papers that have been designated as “Practice Ready”are now easily accessible from the TRB homepage

  • On the TRB homepage, click on “Resources & Databases”, and then click on “Practice-Ready Papers” on the drop-down menu

Slots are still open for committees that may wish to propose and develop webinars

  • TRB webinars attract an average of more than 300 participants
  • Proposals should be sent to Lisa Marflak ()

The Committee Communications Coordinators (CCC) continue to cooperatively develop tools and share information and experiences

  • The number of committees with their own websites has increased significantly over the last year
  • Many committees are experimenting with social networking tools
  • The CCCs have developed guidelines for committee communications portfolios. These have been included in the latest Technical Activities Leadership Guide.
  • The CCCs have developed workshops on social networking and presented them at the TRB Annual Meeting and other TRB conferences
  • The CCCs are looking into online tools to facilitate developing and maintaining lists of committee Friends

Questions on these or other items can be directed to Mark Norman () and/or Tom Palmerlee ().

State of TRB Report for Committees - Midyear 2010Page 1