The Transportation Research Board has upgraded its truck and bus safety group to full committee status thus allowing it to pursue research on major trucking safety issues such as vehicle design, carrier safety management programs, human factors, driver health and wellness.
“The crash picture of trucks is quite different from cars and involves many different factors as well,” said Professor Ronald Knipling, chairman of the newly-renamed ‘Domain of Truck & Bus Safety Research’ committee. “What we are setting out to do is evaluate the human, vehicle, roadway, operational, and organizational factors in trucking and how they affect motor carrier safety.”
Knipling, a senior research scientist at the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute, said his committee is finalizing a “circular” that will outline its research areas and goals for improving truck and bus safety. The top area on the committee’s list is finding new ways to collect and analyze truck & bus crash data so a clearer picture of trucking safety can be developed.
