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    <copyright>Copyright © 2026. National Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved.</copyright>
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    <managingEditor>tris-trb@nas.edu (Bill McLeod)</managingEditor>
    <webMaster>tris-trb@nas.edu (Bill McLeod)</webMaster>
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      <title>Research in Progress (RIP)</title>
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      <title>A Guide for Developing Airport Cargo Handling and Warehouse Infrastructure Through Public-Private Partnerships</title>
      <link>https://rip.trb.org/View/2588322</link>
      <description><![CDATA[No abstract provided.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Tue, 12 Aug 2025 10:06:10 GMT</pubDate>
      <guid>https://rip.trb.org/View/2588322</guid>
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      <title>Guide to Analyzing Economic Impact of Changes in Air Service Connectivity</title>
      <link>https://rip.trb.org/View/2588337</link>
      <description><![CDATA[No abstract provided.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Tue, 12 Aug 2025 09:53:38 GMT</pubDate>
      <guid>https://rip.trb.org/View/2588337</guid>
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    <item>
      <title>Freight Route Management Application for the Port of Anchorage</title>
      <link>https://rip.trb.org/View/2512620</link>
      <description><![CDATA[The objective of this research is to develop and evaluate an intelligent transportation management application for improving the efficiency, safety, reliability, and cost-effectiveness of freight and fuel truck movement to/from the Port of Alaska located in Anchorage, Alaska. This is a partnership project between the City of Anchorage’s Port of Alaska and Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (DOT&PF).  Truck transportation network located at the port will be able to better route and stage cargo transport within the Port of Alaska footprint. The application could be used outside the port by truck drivers, Alaska 511, and traffic operations centers.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Fri, 21 Feb 2025 21:42:30 GMT</pubDate>
      <guid>https://rip.trb.org/View/2512620</guid>
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      <title>ACCEL-RT: Autonomous Cargo Carriers for Enhanced Logistics in Rural &amp; Tribal areas</title>
      <link>https://rip.trb.org/View/2508024</link>
      <description><![CDATA[Autonomous Cargo Carrier for Enhanced Logistics in Rural and Tribal Areas (ACCEL-RT) seeks to turn a weakness to a strength, believing that rural and Tribal communities represent some of the best possible environments for large-scale deployment of freight automation. By creating a diverse team and highly prioritizing relationships between all critical stakeholders - governments, private sector, academia, and the communities themselves - ACCEL-RT proposes a pathway from research to demonstration to deployment that will identify the rural automated vehicle (RAV) technologies that will best help communities along the I-40 Corridor in the Southwest. The research team will evaluate three categories of RAV use-cases - last mile delivery, RAVs on rural roads, and RAVs in a logistics hub - part of an overall multimodal logistics chain. The research team will bring RAVs to rural and Tribal communities in New Mexico and Oklahoma, but first we must understand what these communities actually need and want. By explicitly linking automated vehicle technologies with community engagement, ACCEL-RT hopes to create viable deployment pathways for RAVs, finding solutions that are technically feasible, cost effective, supported by public and private stakeholders, and serve critical needs in the communities, both in the Southwest and nationwide.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Mon, 10 Feb 2025 19:23:21 GMT</pubDate>
      <guid>https://rip.trb.org/View/2508024</guid>
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      <title>Sustainable Urban Freight Mobility through Optimization of Logistics Facility Locations</title>
      <link>https://rip.trb.org/View/1552809</link>
      <description><![CDATA[The growing mitigation rates towards urban zones, global use of e-commerce and advancing technologies implemented in the logistics operations are the main contributors to the constant increase of product delivery volumes, especially in metropolitan areas. Furthermore, the need for sustainable development has been highlighted, due to the great extent that the matter of environmental impacts caused by transportation systems has taken in todays’ urban centers. These aspects provide a clear indication of the urban freight transport systems’ necessity of providing reliable, cost-efficient and environmentally-friendly services. 
Logistics providers are required to address many strategic operational issues while designing their distribution networks. One of the most essential is the decision of where to position their transshipment and delivery facilities, as well as which of those facilities should serve each of the customers. The main motivation for conducting the study lies on the fact that typically freight operators locate their distribution centers outside the cities and deliver the products using trucks, traveling “door-to-door” to all the downtown destinations. This delivery approach causes many problems in urban areas, ranging from traffic congestion, increasing emissions, to higher delays. This project, considering the need for sustainability and cost-efficiency in city logistics, addresses this matter by developing a multi-objective novel mathematical framework for the capacitated facility location-allocation problem, an NP-Hard optimization problem, with the objectives of minimizing the costs for using the designated locations, the costs associated with the transportation of cargo to the allocated facilities and the distances between the chosen facilities and final destination nodes. The model selects the optimal number and locations of mini-hubs inside urban areas, where trucks will directly head from the main facility and unload the products. The products are further delivered by eco-friendly transportation means (e.g. handcarts, bicycles, self-picked up) to the final destinations, promoting sustainable delivery solutions and improving urban freight mobility.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Wed, 03 Oct 2018 17:00:17 GMT</pubDate>
      <guid>https://rip.trb.org/View/1552809</guid>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Research and Recommendations for Improving FMCSA’s HM Cargo Tank Facilities Monitoring and Enforcement Program</title>
      <link>https://rip.trb.org/View/1455561</link>
      <description><![CDATA[This research is to develop recommendations for how FMCSA could build a safety performance based monitoring capability to better meet HM cargo tank regulatory oversight and enforcement requirements. Research questions include, but are not limited to: 
•What operational capabilities need to be developed to enable a more efficient application of available FMCSA personnel, including the very scarce HMS personnel? These include data reporting requirements, database structures, and analysis algorithms. 
•What qualifications or standards are needed for enforcement personnel involved? 
•What data and algorithms are needed to best identify poorly performing entities within the industry? 
•What changes in regulations and policies are needed? 
oWhich of these initiatives does FMCSA have the authority to issue and why?
oWhich of these initiatives require a rulemaking to update the HMRs?]]></description>
      <pubDate>Fri, 17 Feb 2017 11:49:18 GMT</pubDate>
      <guid>https://rip.trb.org/View/1455561</guid>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Multimodal Freight Distribution to Support Increased Port Operations</title>
      <link>https://rip.trb.org/View/1357225</link>
      <description><![CDATA[It is projected that more containers will pass through the major ports of the mid-Atlantic region with the completion of the Panama Canal expansion, and as shippers and carriers find it more efficient to move cargo on larger container vessels.  As a result, not only is it expected that a larger number of containers will be unloaded/loaded every time a New-Panamax vessel docks at a port, it is also widely anticipated that these larger ships will concentrate among a small of number ports, particularly those that have deeper channel depths, such as the Port of Virginia. It is going to be vital to the regional economies and to the surrounding areas to be prepared to handle the anticipated increase in container traffic with energy-efficient and environmentally-friendly technologies and transport options. In particular, efficiency in handling high-volume of containers at the ports and in transporting containers beyond the ports is critical. This study will bring together researchers from multiple universities to investigate strategies to optimize container handling inside the terminals, to more heavily utilize inland waterways and rail systems, and to optimize logistics to reduce Greenhouse Gas emissions while maintaining mobility needs.  In particular, the team from Old Dominion University (ODU) will investigate port operations strategies where both rail and truck traffic in and out of the port is considered. Interactions between these transport modes, and staging and handling of containers within the port will be investigated. Motivated by the rail connectivity available at the Port of Virginia, ODU will lead the research effort that will explore the use of rail to more efficiently move cargo out of the port. The team will explore optimization and simulation methods to study various complex interactions and factors influencing the flow of containers over multiple modes. These methods will help identify more cost and energy efficient strategies to handle large volume of container traffic inside the terminals. New models will be developed to understand the feasibility and potential benefits of such strategies.  The team from VT will support research in the area of optimization of freight movement within the context of fuel consumption and emission modeling which requires the development of fuel consumption and emission models for the various types of freight modes. Virginia Tech's team will focus on developing the fuel consumption and emission models for various ground transportation modes including trucks and trains. The focus will be on developing models that can be easily calibrated using publically available data. In addition, the VT team will consider developing smart systems to reduce the energy consumption of freight transport (e.g. eco-cruise control systems, eco-adaptive cruise control systems, etc.).  While optimizations for network-wide freight logistics have been focused on either flow maximization or total system travel time minimization, little research has focused on the greenhouse gas emissions and fuel consumptions in the context of multimodal freight logistics. The team from UVA will work on formulating and developing an optimization approach for multimodal freight networks to minimize greenhouse gas emissions or fuel consumption. Implementation  Potential implementation of project outcomes During this research, the team members will work closely with the Port of Virginia, rail lines (e.g. Norfolk Southern), and the private industry. The developed tools, techniques, and solutions will be shared with them for potential implementation.  Various components and algorithms for eco-cruise control systems, eco-adaptive cruise control systems, and eco-routing systems will be developed for more energy-efficient transportation of freight. Impacts  Expected benefits and impacts  A new suite of modeling and simulation tools and methodologies is envisioned to result from this research that can be used throughout the nation to combat congestion at the ports in a post panama canal expansion era.  Development of fuel consumption and emission models for various ground transportation modes including trucks and trains.  Impacts of various modes of transporting containers on greenhouse gas emission]]></description>
      <pubDate>Thu, 11 Jun 2015 01:01:43 GMT</pubDate>
      <guid>https://rip.trb.org/View/1357225</guid>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Preserving Vital Great Lakes Infrastructure: Assessment of Asset Management Activities in Great Lakes Ports</title>
      <link>https://rip.trb.org/View/1234718</link>
      <description><![CDATA[Ports are a critical part of the freight transportation system. Port infrastructure includes the channels, wharfs, berthing areas, warehouses, cranes and cargo handling equipment, storage yards, on-site roads and rail lines/spurs, administrative buildings, and security structures. Like other infrastructure systems in the nation, ports are showing need for redevelopment, restorative maintenance, and expansion. The growth in certain markets (grain exports and wind energy imports) have demanded improved infrastructure and services. This project will explore the current state of the practice with respect to asset management principles at Great Lakes Ports through both port operators and carrier perspectives, and provide training for Great Lakes ports officials on best management practices.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Thu, 03 Jan 2013 15:18:12 GMT</pubDate>
      <guid>https://rip.trb.org/View/1234718</guid>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Improving Goods Movement in a Metropolitan Area Adjacent to a Port</title>
      <link>https://rip.trb.org/View/1229555</link>
      <description><![CDATA[Southern California and specially Los Angeles faces enormous congestion associated with increase in cargo movement from/to the regional Ports. The region has started to drown in a sea of trucks and trains. This growing congestion has elevated the costs of freight transport. Also, it resulted in greater concerns regarding environmental impacts on local communities. Considering the predicted tripling of cargo movement through the ports in the next two decades, it is crucial to develop immediate alternative arrangements for freight management. More efficient operational management of intermodal transport provides effective cargo movement and maintains environmental justice. In this study, analytical tools, such as mathematical programming, are employed to develop a new strategy for cargo movement in order to lesser congestion and environmental impact.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Thu, 03 Jan 2013 13:44:08 GMT</pubDate>
      <guid>https://rip.trb.org/View/1229555</guid>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Application of Freight Transportation and Decision Models to Scope and Compare Freight Infrastructure Investment</title>
      <link>https://rip.trb.org/View/1228092</link>
      <description><![CDATA[This project will apply a decision analytic framework in terms of cargo transportation performance to evaluate landside and waterside investment alternatives. We will employ information and models previously developed under DOT-funded projects that were focused on freight operations and develop corresponding information for infrastructure elements. This project develops a freight-focused context for considering investment choices that will enable the integration of other University Transportation Center (UTC) and similar projects. It builds upon the Delaware regional analyses of multimodal freight activity and exercises an innovative, dynamic, network optimization model aimed at improving decision-making associated with freight transport in the US.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Thu, 03 Jan 2013 13:14:25 GMT</pubDate>
      <guid>https://rip.trb.org/View/1228092</guid>
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