Annual Report Year 2009 - Civil and Environmental Engineering

PROGRAM AREAS
TRANSPORTATION INFRASTRUCTURE AND SYSTEMS ENGINEERING
Continued from page 39
Intelligent Transportation System (ITS)
applications; studying the causes of traffic
congestion and developing techniques to
mitigate traffic congestion; studying driver
route choice behavior; and developing a
web-based parking system for Virginia
Tech visitors.
In collaboration with the CSM research
faculty and students, over the past year
Rakha published seven peer-reviewed
journal publications, three book chapters,
had eight peer-reviewed journal publications
accepted for publication, published
nine peer-reviewed conference proceeding
publications and three reports.
Rakha also served an associate editor
for the IEEE Transactions on ITS, an
associate editor for the Journal of ITS,
as a member of the editorial board of the
Transportation Letters: The International
Journal of Transportation Research, and a
member of the TRB committee on Traffic
Flow Theory and Characteristics.
Rakha was also invited to make a presentation
at the “Symposium on the Fundamental
Diagram: 75 Years” and offered
a three-day workshop on traffic modeling
at the International Islamic University of
Malaysia.
Sam Tignor, adjunct professor, has
continued to provide leadership in developing
the NCHRP Report 600 “The
Human Factors Guidelines for Road
Systems: Design and Operational Considerations
for the Road User.” Tignor is
developing a January 2010 TRB workshop
on how to use the guideline. This will be
the second workshop associated with the
guideline development.
NCHRP Report 600, which was recently
published, is intended to provide human
factors principles and findings to the highway
designer and traffic engineer.
Tignor teaches the “Highway Transportation
Safety” and “Applied Traffic Engineering
Analysis” graduate courses.
In the past year, the Air Transportation
Systems Laboratory (ATSL) at Virginia
Tech has conducted research studies for
SAIC, the National Aeronautics and Space
Administration (NASA) and the Federal
Aviation Administration (FAA).
Antonio A. Trani, professor, and his
colleagues Nick Hinze (senior research
associate), Howard Swingle (senior scientist),
and graduate students Alan Mc-
Donald, Nola Shen, Doug Swol, and Dong
Sohn perform large-scale aviation studies.
One of the studies for SAIC involves
modeling and simulating civilian and
military traffic in the Gulf of Mexico to understand
the impact of deployment of the
Joint Strike Fighter (JSF). This study will
help Air Force, Navy and Marine planners
to better utilize the airspace resources
available at 13 airfields near Eglin Air
Force Base (located at Valparaiso Airport)
once new aircraft deployments occur in
the next decade. The study is using a sophisticated
three-dimensional simulation
model called TAAM – the Total Airspace
and Airport Model and ATSL developed
tools.
Another project for NASA is described
in a separate article on page 8.
40 | VIA REPORT | 2009