Good news for the Transportation Research Thesaurus!
by Sandy Tucker, Texas Transportation Institute, Texas A & M University

NCHRP Will Fund Improvements to the Transportation Research Thesaurus

At its March meeting the AASHTO Standing Committee on Research selected a project to develop improvements to the Transportation Research Thesaurus (TRT) for the FY 2006 National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP). The major objective of the project is to develop database tables that will allow the Transportation Research Board (TRB) to maintain and update the TRT in-house and that will integrate the TRT with the new TRIS system for record creation.

TRB published the Transportation Research Thesaurus in 2001 as NCHRP Report 450. Since then the authoritative version has resided with the contractor for the original thesaurus project, CDB Enterprises. Upon completion of the follow-on project, TRB will be able to assume the management of its valuable asset. TRIS indexers will be able to select terms from the most up-to-date version, which will be integrated with the rest of the system that they use for creating TRIS records.

The TRB Committee on Library and Information Science for Transportation developed the problem statement, which was submitted by Nina McLawhorn of the Wisconsin Department of Transportation and Bill Carr of the District of Columbia Department of Transportation.

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Government Transportation Resources and Information Committee Roundtable (GTRIC)
by Nelda Bravo, Director, U.S. National Transportation Library

June 5, 2005
Special Libraries Association
Toronto

The 2005 GTRIC Roundtable presents speakers representing the various collaborative efforts that make transportation librarianship work despite political, fiscal, or geographic distances. Hear how Finland and its Nordic counterparts are working to help strengthen transportation libraries in the Baltic countries; what’s new with the OECD’s International Transportation Research Documentation database, and how libraries in the Midwest are collaborating to support their user community. Another interesting collaboration is the U.S. Federal Highway Administration’s Turner-Fairbank Highway Research Center (TFHRC) Technical Resource Center’s work with Minnesota DOT and the U.S. National Transportation Library.

Take a look at what’s going on outside the library that may affect what you do. The U.S. Federal Highway Administration’s “Highways for Life” program, if authorized, hopes to change the way projects are constructed and plans on making content management a part of the process. TRB’s National Cooperative Highway Research Program is a research intensive process that involves most U.S. State DOTs at some point. How did that TRT project get submitted to NCHRP for integration with TRIS and what does it mean that it was selected by AASHTO SCOR? Come hear one of Canada’s best exports enlighten us on NCHRP.

DIALOG will update us on what’s new with the technologies and services in the industries that they represent.

Also on the agenda are updates on TRB’s TRIS database and the new system redesign, a status report on the Transportation Information Management Policy Study. Also scheduled is an update on the U.S. National Transportation Library, which is now housed in the recently formed Research and Innovative Technology Administration.

As always, GTRIC is a full day of networking among transportation libraries, talking about collaboration, resources, and tools. See you in Toronto!

And many thanks to our sponsors for making this session possible:
CCH, OCLC, and SWETS

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Membership News

News of Division members

Roberto Sarmiento, Head, Northwestern University Transportation Library, was recently awarded the Dominican University Exemplary Service Award. This award is presented to volunteers who give extraordinary service to Dominican and thereby promote the spirit of the university. Roberto received this award for his years of service and promotion on behalf of Dominican's Graduate School of Library and Information Science. Congratulations, Roberto!

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