How fragile is our infrastructure. New York City has survived another infrastructure event – this time a major steam pipe rupture. While our Mayor (and indeed all of us) took heart that this was not an act of terror, such events are symptomatic of a true impending crisis – large scale infrastructure failure. New York City’s utility and transportation infrastructure have components that are 100 years old or older. In the complexity of delivering services to tens of thousands of persons per square mile – 24 hours a day, those roads and pipes and subway stations are stretched to the limit. Ideally, those who first designed and installed the roads and pipes would have put in place a plan – and budget – for maintenance, upkeep and replacement. This, of course has not been done. Even today, when every engineer has a course in economics that stresses life cycle costs and the importance of maintenance,  it is difficult, in the public realm to find adequate dollars to mitigate against such extreme events as the steam pipe rupture. It is more glamorous to build a new rail line or new water distribution facility than to put dollars aside for inspection, instrumentation and old fashioned good maintenance construction techniques. As engineers, we have the responsibility to speak up – and loudly – about the need for an era of rehabilitation. The costs of keeping our infrastructure working are far less than the costs of surviving an event, and the costs or replacing failed infrastructure.
 

Pedestrian fatalities represent approximately half of all fatalities resulting from motor vehicle crashes in New York City and twenty percent of fatalities in the suburban counties of Nassau, Suffolk, Westchester, Putnam and Rockland.  To document the state of pedestrian safety in the NYMTC Region and strategies for reducing the number of pedestrian injuries and fatalities, the Safety Advisory Working Group of NYMTC sponsored a comprehensive study of the topic through the Transportation Infrastructure Research Consortium and the CUNY Institute for Transportation Systems.  The project was led by Claire McKnight, Associate Professor of Civil Engineering at the City College of New York. The team also included Kyriacos Mouskos of the CUNY Institute for Transportation Systems and Camille Kamga of UTRC.  The project managers were Chris Hardej and Aizaz Ahmed of NYMTC.

The research team gathered information about ongoing pedestrian safety planning efforts in the region and the additional needs for the region by conducting interviews with relevant local agencies and organizations.  The team also developed a catalog of countermeasures through an extensive literature review.  The final report includes the state of pedestrian safety in the region, pedestrian safety strategies and technologies including engineering methods, education, and enforcement strategies, a list of online pedestrian safety resources, and recommendations for the next steps, including how to better integrate safety into mainstream planning and traffic engineering in the region. 

Conventional bridge design includes a superstructure that rests on bearings and joints that allow it to expand and contract in response to temperature changes, while the abutments that support the bridge remain fixed.  Recently, “integral abutment bridges,” which reduce the long-term costs of bridge maintenance by eliminating the need for these bearings, have becoming widely accepted for new construction of short to medium length highway bridges in the United States.   Although they offer an economic alternative to conventional bridge designs, integral abutments present their own unique challenges. One area of concern is the development of passive pressures behind the abutment due to the cyclic loading of the soil during thermal movement of the superstructure that occurs with the change of seasons. 

For more information, please visit UTRC’s website at www.utrc2.org

Research Brief: The Cost of Transporting People in New Jersey, Phase 2

In the just-completed second phase of the project, Ozbay created a user-friendly cost analysis tool for the calculation of cost that could also be used to evaluate policy decisions.   This tool ensures that transportation planners have the right information for the efficient allocation of resources.  Planners will have the ability to examine various components in marginal costs like the operation, environmental, and accidents to create equitable solutions in developing effective pricing mechanisms.  Transportation planners could further analyze in more detail the aspects of marginal cost like operational, environmental and accidents in the system.

For more information, please visit UTRC’s website at www.utrc2.org.

The daily commute to work lies at the core of the urban transportation problem. It typically creates the greatest levels of congestion on highways and streets, and also the highest ridership levels on the transit system.  Because of this, the commute to work tends to dominate the planning process for transportation infrastructure and operations.  Cynthia Chen, Assistant Professor of Civil Engineering at the City College of New York, and Hongmian Gong, Assistant Professor of Geography at Hunter College, recently completed a study that examines trends relating to the journey to work and their implications for transportation services in the region.

The study examined three key questions. The first question concerned the impact of population and employment densities on mode choice decisions while controlling for cost variables. The second question examine whether the accessibility to transportation facilities still play a role in determining mode if the model controls for cost variables such as total travel time, which includes the access time to and from transportation facilities.  The third question investigated how tour level characteristics affect mode choice decisions for home-based work tours.  The study distinguishes itself from previous mode choice analyses by focusing on tours; most studies still focus on mode choices of a single trip.  Choices are frequently made by people based on how to combine activities as part of the trip to work via what mode of transportation. In the end, the study concluded that the built environment exerts its influence through cost variables but these factors are not as influential as the built environment direct effect on mode choices.

For more information, please visit UTRC’s website at www.utrc2.org.

On May 18th 2007, the University Transportation Research Center hosted a symposium on “The Future of Urban Transportation” at the City College of New York.   The event gathered leading scholars and practitioners in celebration of UTRC Director Robert E. Paaswell's 70th birthday and the contributions he has made to the transportation field. The presentations strategies for managing transportation systems in the face of social, economic, and environmental change, a theme that Paaswell has addressed from many angles throughout his career.

The event was hosted by Joseph Berechman, Professor and Chair of the Department of Economics at the City College of New York, and was co-sponsored by City College’s Department of Civil Engineering, Grove School of Engineering, Office of the President, and Office of the Provost; the Office of the Chancellor of the City University of New York; and the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. 

The keynote speaker was Jay Walder of McKinsey & Company, the former Managing Director of Finance and Planning at Transport for London, and Executive Director and Chief Financial Officer at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority in New York.  He spoke about how London is building and managing its transportation infrastructure in response to the internal and external changes it is confronting.

Other speakers included:
•    Michael Meyer, Georgia Institute of Technology;
•    Genevieve Giuliano, University of Southern California;
•    Will Recker, University of California, Irvine;
•    Martin Wachs, RAND Corporation;
•    Isaac Takyi, NYC Transit;
•    Sue McNeil, University of Delaware;
•    Rachel Weinberger, University of Pennsylvania; and
•    William Millar, American Public Transportation Association

A summary of the event is being prepared and will be available on UTRC’s website.

In a Visiting Scholar Seminar event on March 30, 2007, Susan Zielinski, Managing Director of the Sustainable Mobility and Accessibility Research and Transportation (SMART) Project at the University of Michigan, gave a presentation on the emerging paradigm of “New Mobility” in urban planning and research.  Zielinski explained that the greatest challenges and opportunities in improving the urban transportation system involve linking and integrating mobility systems.  “New Mobility” seeks to “connect the dots" among various transportation systems through enhanced technologies, new financial mechanisms and new physical arrangements that are networked together to create a more integrated, accessible, and environmentally sustainable system.  These strategies offer the best hope of providing attractive and competitive alternatives to the privately owned automobile.

One approach highlighted by Zielinski is the development of neighborhood-based mobility “hubs,” where a wide range of transportation services and information are provided – ranging from conventional public transit to taxis, to carshare vehicles, to bicycle repair and rental services.  She described existing examples of these in Europe, as well as efforts to implement them in Toronto and elsewhere in North America.  The network benefits of this approach are numerous and include: enhancing the competitiveness of the system’s core transit lines, while creating new business opportunities and more mobility choices for the public at relatively low cost.  Zielinski further explored how developments in New Mobility have involved telecommunication, industrialization, GIS, banking, tourism and the private sector, and discussed the opportunities for business integration that might make these approaches attractive for private sector investment.

SMART is doing collaborative research projects on New Mobility in South Africa, Banglore, India and Detroit.  These research projects explore a number of issues: innovative concepts for export, models of involvement of new business, financial models within the system, strategic alliances and marketing of new mobility, and the building of knowledge and research networks for urban transportation.   SMART's research is done using systems based analysis and on the ground solution building.

On June 6, 2007, the NYU Wagner Rudin Center for Transportation Policy and Management hosted “Delivering the Goods: The Freight Needs of a Growing Population,” a regional symposium co-sponsored by the New York Metropolitan Transportation Council, along with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey (PANYNJ), the University Transportation Research Center-Region 2, CSX, Nation’s Port, the New York City Economic Development Corporation (EDC), the Environmental Law Section of the New York State Bar Association, and the NYU Wagner Institute for Civil Infrastructure Systems (ICIS).  The event was attended by about 300 people.

The keynote address was delivered by Astrid Glynn, Commissioner of the New York State Department of Transportation.  In her remarks, she emphasized the importance of new strategies to address the growing challenge of freight movement in the New York Metropolitan Region, including regional cooperation on difficult issues of financing and interagency coordination.  She highlighted Governor Spitzer’s efforts to provide more centralized leadership on this issue through the creation of a new “Downstate Transportation Cabinet.”  She also identified three critical areas where work is needed to move these issues forward: (1) creation of a new national goods movement policy; (2) state support for freight infrastructure investment in the region; and (3) creative new financing strategies at all levels.

 Other speakers at the event included:

•  Allison L. C. de Cerreño, Director, NYU Wagner Rudin Center;

•  Robert Caton, Vice President, Airport Facilities Group, AMB Property;

•  Alice Cheng, Vice President, NYC Economic Development Corporation;

•  James Devine, President, New York Container Terminal;

•  Joel Ettinger, Executive Director, NYMTC;

•  William Goetz, Resident Vice President, CSX Transportation;

•  John Henry, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, Duane Reade, Inc.;

•  The Hon. Jerrold Nadler, U.S. House of Representatives;

•  Robert Paaswell, Director, University Transportation Research Center;

•  Mark Pisano, Executive Director, Southern California Association of Governments;

•  Anthony Shorris, Executive Director, Port Authority of New York & New Jersey; and

•  Robert Yaro, President, Regional Plan Association.

The Rudin Center is developing a summary of the symposium, which will be published later this summer.                              

Open RFPs

•  Consultant Management Estimating Tool (sponsored by NYSDOT, expressions of interest due 8/10/07).

•  Pedestrian Fatality and Severe Injury Accidents in New York City (sponsored by NYCDOT, due 8/9/07).

•  Peer Exchange (sponsored by NYSDOT, expressions of interest due 8/1/07)

•  Rt.31 / RT. 531 Economic Analysis (sponsored by NYSDOT, due 8/15/07)

Research Grant News

The following is a list of new projects awarded (so far) in 2007.  In the interest of increasing awareness of research underway regionwide, we are including projects being conducted both inside and outside the UTRC consortium.

•    Coaxial Cable Sensors for Crack Detection in Bridge Structures
 (awarded by NYSDOT to Genda Chen, University of Missouri-Rolla)*

•    Comprehensive Survey of Emerging Technology for the New York Metropolitan Area  (awarded by NYMTC to Satish Ukkusuri and José Holguín-Veras, RPI)

•    Culvert Information Management System
 (awarded by NJDOT to Jay Meegoda, Thomas Juliano, and Chi Tang, NJIT)*

•    Customer Perceptions of Transit Security
 (awarded by NJDOT to Jon Carnegie and Rick Remington, Rutgers University)*

•    Development of Biocontrols for “Phragmites australis”
 (awarded by NYSDOT to Bernd Blossey, Cornell University)*

•    Development of a Portable Petroleum By-Products Chemical Sensor - Phases 3 and 4  (awarded by NYSDOT to Michael Carpenter and Marina Petrukhina, University of Albany/SUNY)

•    Development of Post Earthquake Bridge Inspection Guidelines
 (Jerome O’Connor, University of Buffalo/SUNY)*

•     Development of Uniform Standards for Allowable Lane Closure/Web Interface
 (awarded by NJDOT to Kaan Ozbay and Bekir Bartin, Rutgers University)*

•     Dynamic Modulus of Hot Mix Asphalt
 (awarded by NJDOT to Ali Maher and Thomas Bennert, Rutgers University)*

•     Economic Competitiveness Performance Measures for Transportation
 (awarded by NYSDOT to Joseph Berechman, Robert Paaswell, and Jonathan Peters, CUNY)

•     Eliminating Barriers to Transit-Oriented Development
 (awarded by NJDOT to Jan Wells and Daniel Chatman, Rutgers University)*

•     Fatal Accident Analysis
 (awarded by NJDOT to Yusuf Mehta and H. Clay Gabler, Rowan University)*

•     Guidelines for Street Excavation and Restoration
 (awarded by NYCDOT to Neville Parker and Kolluru Subramaniam, CUNY)

•     Guidelines for Traffic Signal Energy Back-Up Systems
 (awarded by NYSDOT to William A. Wallace, RPI)

•     Load and Resistance Factor Rating Methodology
 (awarded by NYSDOT to Michel Ghosn and Anil Agrawal, CUNY)

•     Performance of Gravel Aggregates Crushed to Meet 100/95 Angularity
 (awarded by NYSDOT to Ali Maher and Thomas Bennert, Rutgers University)

•     Portable Work Zone Barrier / Balsi Beam
 (awarded by NJDOT to Robert Paaswell and Camille Kamga, CUNY; and David Washington, NJIT)

•     Recycled Concrete Aggregate
 (awarded by NJDOT to Thomas Bennert and Ali Maher, Rutgers University)*

•     Safety Roadway/Design Elements on Arterials
 (awarded by NJDOT to Kaan Ozbay and Bekir Bartin, Rutgers University)*

•     State Police LIDAR Analysis
 (awarded by NJDOT to Allen Katz, College of New Jersey)*

•     Stormwater System Monitoring & Evaluation
 (awarded by NJDOT to Qizhong Guo, Rutgers University)*

•     Tool for Analysis of Early Age Transverse Cracking of Composite Bridge Decks
 (awarded by NYSDOT to Levon Minnetyan, Clarkson University)*

•    Transit Oriented Development Benefits of the River LINE (awarded by NJDOT to Daniel Chatman and Jan Wells, Rutgers University; Robert Paaswell and Joseph Berechman, CUNY)

•    Water Quality Mitigation and Banking
 (awarded by NJDOT to Anil Agrawal and John Fillos, CUNY)

* Not a UTRC project

UTRC is currently accepting applications for a new Assistant Director for Program Management.  Please see the UTRC website at www.utrc2.org for more information.  Review of applications will continue until the position is filled.    

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey is strengthening the research, analytic, and planning capacity of the Planning Department and is now recruiting for a number of positions.  More information is available on the Port Authority's website, at www.panynj.gov.   

Robert E. Paaswell, Ph.D., P.E., Director
Camille Kamga, Ph.D., Associate Director for Administration & Information Technology
Todd Goldman, Ph.D., Associate Director for New Initiatives
Ellen Thorson, Ph.D., Senior Research Fellow
José Pillich, Communications and Outreach Coordinator and Newsletter Editor
Nadia Aslam, Administrative Assistant
Lena Marvin, Intern

UTRC Research News is published quarterly by the University Transportation Research Center, which is based at the City College of New York, 910 Marshak Hall, New York, NY 10031.  Editorial inquiries can be made by calling José Pillich at 212-650-8046.  For more information on our programs or to notify us for an address correction, please email nadia@utrc2.org.