CLICK HERE FOR DETAILS
National Academy of Sciences TRB Committee AR020 Rolling Stock and Motive Power
Transportation Research Board: National Academy of Sciences
Tuesday, January 13, 2015
Joint Rail Conference | San Jose | March 23-26, 2015
CLICK HERE FOR DETAILS
Minutes from 2014 Annual Meeting
MINUTES OF COMMITTEE MEETING
AR020 Passenger Equipment and System Integration Committee
1:32PM January 14, 2014
Omni Shoreham Hotel, Senate Conference Room
1.
Attendance (attached)
2.
Agenda (attached)
3.
Chairman Welcome: Eloy E. Martinez, LTK
Engineering Services. AR020 Chairman
convened the Committee meeting by welcoming the members and friends to the
Annual Meeting. The attendees introduced
themselves and their affiliations. The
Chairman reviewed the agenda; then informed the Committee that the minutes of
meeting from August 14, 2013 need to be approved. There were no comments and so Bob Dorer made
a motion to approve the minutes, which was second by Kate Hunter-Zaworski.
4.
TRB Business (Scott Babbock)
Scott Babbock gave an overview of
the outstanding TRB Business.
Tri-Annual Technical Strategic Plan.
The AR020 Committee has to develop its Tri-Annual Technical Strategic
Plan (TSP). Working with the Committee
Scott will review the older tri-annual TSP and provide support in the
development of the new plan. The TSP
will provide an overview of the Committee’s historical accomplishments, its
members, activities. The Plan will also
consist of a committee plan outlining the activities of the committee, and
future outlook statement that will outline the Committee’s areas of interests,
how the Committee can contribute to research in those areas.
Member Rotation. The membership of
the Committee will be rotated in 2014.
Some members will be leaving the Committee but will remain as Friends to
the Committee while new members will be inducted into the Committee. The membership rotation list is due to Scott
by January 31, 2014. Each Committee will
be allowed to have 2 State DOT members that will not count against the
Committee’s maximum (25) member allotment.
The Committee Chair has reached out to several members who will be
leaving and those that will be joining.
The TRB will be utilizing New People Management software that will roll
out in March. This software will combine
membership and friends lists, rotation list as well as subcommittee
information.
Mid-year
Meeting. He also informed the Committee
that there are meeting spaces at the Keck Center, NAS building but reservation
for such spaces need to be booked ASAP.
The Committee has the option to meet during other industry meeting such
as the APTA Rail Conference. The
Committee will need to inform Scott of the plans for the mid-year meeting so
that he can make the arrangements.
Cooperative Research Program: Freight
Rail Cooperative Research Program funding has expired
National Cooperative Rail Research
Program was appropriated 1 year funds that will expire soon. The FRA has indicated that a request for
additional funding was made in the FY15 budget but will need approval from
Congress.
2015 Annual Meeting. “Corridor to the Future: Transportation and
Technology.” The 2015 Annual Meeting
will be at the DC Convention Center.
Committee meetings will be held at the adjacent Marriott Hotel (opens
Summer 2014). The new location will
eliminate the need for shuttles, saving TRB $150,000.00. Also, in 2105 the compendium of papers and
presentations will not be distributed on USB drives but will be available
electronically from the TRB website.
This will save TRB $200,000.
These savings will allow TRB to provide enhanced wi-fi in the convention
center and the meeting rooms at the Marriott hotel. The new meeting space will allow TRB to
effectively plan the committee meetings and sessions so that conflicts are
eliminated to the extent possible. The
Chair asked the attendees to send comments regarding the conflicts encountered
in the various sessions and meeting.
Ideas for improvements are also being solicited.
Rail
Group Executive Committee (Anthony Perl). Anthony reported that the activities
of the lower committees are reported to the Rail Group Executive
Committee. The Blue Ribbon Committee
distinction is bestowed upon committees that are innovative and forward-thinking. This year’s Blue Ribbon Committee was given
to a committee that developed ways to attract and support young members’
attendance at TRB annual meeting.
A
new subcommittee has been established that will focus on retaining new young
members, providing mentors for new members as they ponder the future of the
rail profession. This new subcommittee
will also focus on linking new members with appropriate committees and
channeling ideas to those committees.
Discuss paper review process (Bob Dorer).
Four papers were received and reviewed. The Committee Chair reminded members that
there is an obligation to provide support in the development of research needs
statements and paper review.
Highlight sessions of interest to the committee (Melissa Shurland).
Sessions of interests were not reviewed during the meeting
since most of the sessions concluded on Tuesday January 14, 2014.
Research
activities report (Eloy Martinez).
·
The Committee developed and submitted four
research needs statements that were accepted.
Special thanks were given to Committee members and friends who provided
input into the development of the research needs statements. It is the intent of the Chair to have the
Committee develop the research and session topic statements early so that
outreach to the industry for papers and presentation can be made in a timely
fashion.
·
Mike Trosino suggested a joint workshop with
AR060 on vehicle-track interaction, to be held on the Saturday or Sunday of the
Annual meeting. The workshop will focus
on the following: the effects of rail installations and joints on vehicle
dynamics, take a look at track design and vehicle design, issues in the
industry such as rail head mismatch and how it can impact vehicle dynamics. Mike volunteered to chair the session.
Participation in Joint Rail Conference (Bob Dorer).
The JRC Conference will be held April 2-4, 2014 at the
Cheyenne Mountain Resort in Colorado Spring.
The conference will be held in cooperation with TRB even though TRB is
not a sponsor. Committee members will be
asked to provide a report to the Committee following the conference.
Presentation and Discussion
Discussion of RSAC ETF – Alternative Crashworthiness
Requirements (Jeff Gordon). The FRA Rail
Safety Advisory Committee has developed requirements for high speed passenger
train operations. Tier I regulations
will be updated to codify the guidelines developed for crashworthiness of
alternatively design equipment to be operated under 125mph. Tier II regulations will be amended to allow
for travel up to 160mph. Tier III
regulations will allow for travel from 150mph up to 220mph. Operations of Tier III equipment will require
a dedicated right-of-way when the train speed exceeds 150mph, and will require
sufficient safety features when operated on shared use tracks under
125mph. Bob asked what will happen when
Tier III equipment is being used in mixed operation with Tier II. Jeff indicated that situations like those may
require a waiver
Discussion of Accessibility Activities in PRIIA 305
Committee (Melissa Shurland). The work
accomplished by the PRIIA Accessibility Working Group was presented to the US
Access Board Rail Vehicle Access Advisory Committee (RVAAC) by the FRA during
the January 9, 2014. The RVAAC was
established to review and make recommendations for the updating the current
regulations for accessibility on rail vehicles.
The RVAAC developed a list of priority items for accessibility:
communication, on-board circulation, special areas (restrooms, sleeping
compartments). Except for the features
of the sleeping compartments, this list correlates very well with the PRIIA
accessibility requirements and recommendations, and thus the FRA will remain
engaged with the RVAAC and will provide input as the PRIIA accessibility
recommendations are finalized. The FRA
is working with Oregon State University to develop engineering drawings of the
accessibility features to be used to finalize the recommendations for
approval.
Discussion of Status of Procurement of PRIIA 305 Multi-level
Units and Locomotives (Kevin Kesler).
Kevin gave a background of PRIIA Next Generation Equipment
Committee.
The bi-level passenger equipment being procured by
California DOT and the consortium of Mid-west States are in the final design
review state. Nippon Sharyo is the
manufacturer of 130 bi-level coaches.
Siemens was selected as the manufacturer of the locomotive
being procured by Illinois DOT (IDOT).
IDOT is currently undergoing Buy-America audit of the manufacturer and
suppliers. Kevin explained that the lessons learned from the design and manufacture
of the bi-level cars and locomotives will be compiled by Caltrans and IDOT, and
will be fed-back to the NGEC for review and possible incorporation into the
respective specifications.
The NGEC is currently working with American Public Transportation
Association to amend the PRIIA vehicle specification for use by commuter rail
authorities for procurement of new vehicles.
Connecticut DOT is considering use of locomotive specification.
Subcommittees Report (15 minutes)
Railroad Environmental Research Issues Subcommittee,
AR020(1) (Lee Hutchins). Lee reported
that the Subcommittee discussed possible topics for the 2015 annual
meeting. Two topics of interests are (1)
air emissions in urban area & how to account for it in the NEPA process; (2)
impact of animal crossing along the right-of-way.
Intermodal Risk Subcommittee, AR020(2) (Eloy Martinez). This is a new Subcommittee and so the meeting
focused on discussing ways to increase membership and areas of interest for
intermodal risk discussions.
Self-Powered Units Joint Subcommittee, AP070, AR020 (David
Nelson). David reported that the
Subcommittee is in its 17-18th year and so the discussion focused on whether
there is a need for the Subcommittee to continue. It was decided that there are still some
areas of interest in self-powered units to be explored. Some areas of concerns are: (1) collection of
empirical data to quantify the economic benefits of DMU, EMU, (2) use of DMU,
EMU to gain economic advantages: review of commuter rail operations and
identify changes that can improve operations and possible utilization of
DMUs/EMU.
Concluding Remarks (Chairman Martinez). The Chair inquired about the Committee’s
preference for the mid-year meeting. It
was decided that a GotoMeeting webinar would be best due to travel restriction
of some members. The Committee Chair
stated that he will finalize the member rotation list and will be sending
invitation to the new members. He
informed everyone that a meeting will be held in February to welcome the new
members and to decide who will be the lead for the Tri-annual Technical
Strategic Plan. The Chair thanked the
members and friends for attending. The
meeting adjourned at 3:20PM.
Distribution of Minutes
i. Committee
Members
ii. Section
Chair (if applicable)
iii. Group
Chair
iv. TRB
Staff Representative
Attachments
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)