RITA reaches out to you
Jerry Schneider
US DOT's Research and Innovative Technology Administration Launches
Transportation Research Collaboration Pilot Web Site
The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) Research and Innovative
Technology Administration (RITA) is building this pilot website with
a view to improving the collaborative capabilities offered to
transportation researchers and other related stakeholders both inside
and outside DOT. The initial phase of this effort will focus on
improving collaboration among the four (4) regional networks
comprising the National Transportation Knowledge Network,
approximately sixty (60) University Transportation Centers (UTCs),
and the collaborative work of Position Navigation and Timing. Other
transportation research topics entities will be added as the site
develops into a full-fledged venue for transportation research collaboration.
More online at: http://www.transportationresearch.gov/
- Jerry Schneider -
Innovative Transportation Technologies
http://faculty.washington.edu/jbs/itrans
Walter Brewer
I tried three Activity Centers that are mentioned and was denied access.
Being a taxpayer isn't enough apparently.
Walt Brewer
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Jerry Roane
Here is what I get when I try to join the discussion. Taxpayer is certainly not enough to allow you to contribute. Since you are clearly not a university or research institute no idea you might have is valid "research collaboration".
Jerry Roane
Kirston Henderson
Walt
Here is what I get when I try to join the discussion. Taxpayer is certainly not enough to allow you to contribute. Since you are clearly not a university or research institute no idea you might have is valid "research collaboration".
Kirston Henderson
MegaRail® Transportation Systems, Inc.
Jack Slade
Jack Slade
--- On Sun, 4/11/10, Kirston Henderson <kirston....@megarail.com> wrote:
> From: Kirston Henderson <kirston....@megarail.com>
> Subject: Re: [t-i] RITA reaches out to you
> To: transport-...@googlegroups.com
> Date: Sunday, April 11, 2010, 5:59 AM
>
>
> Re: [t-i] RITA reaches out to you
Jerry Schneider
I see it differently. This is a pilot project, designed to foster
greater communication among those entities (mostly University
programs) that are getting federal research money. That is a fairly
large group of people who probably have a lot to say and could
benefit from a greater exchange of news and information among those
funding and doing similar studies. There is nothing to prohibit
anyone from contacting these faculty people directly with their ideas
as most faculty are particularly open to the consideration of new
ideas that have merit and are "fundable". Sometimes they are pressed
from below by bright students, sometimes they are motivated by the
need to do research that will lead to publications which are
necessary for promotion and tenure. If you want your ideas to be
included in these University research programs, you have to convince
the relevant faculty members to write proposals for grant funds to
examine them. Most would be delighted to give you a hearing, some
might even be persuaded to undertake some research that might, or
might not, be of direct benefit to you. Desired outcomes usually
cannot be guaranteed. However, if they are positive, they can be very
helpful in making some progress toward a marketable product.
Jerry Roane
Although on the surface your last recommendation seems like it is worth a shot but when you add the money flow to this suggestion it falls down. The professors I have talked to are generally excited about the idea of TriTrack. The rub comes in who funds the research and who funds their salaries. Tenure is yet another topic that has to be considered but certainly not understood. If the professor to be approached is funded by a state university then his pay stub here says clearly the state of Texas. How can a professor promote an idea that is specific? There is a bold escape from appearing to have any ties to a company and its profit based on tax payer funds.
Said another way-- Say you are a professor who's pay stub says State of Texas on it. Now lets say some bozo (Walt, Jerry R., Jack) come bopping into your office with a novel thought. There are two strong prohibitions to accepting this not invented here (NIH) thought. The strongest is of course that the professor is supposed to be the smartest in the room and all novel ideas emanate from his trained and well honed mind. The second is a deadly fear that a state supported entity is supporting a non-state owned thought. This second law of failure also is held by all government officials. They will not support a company thought with public funds and likewise the professor will not feel comfortable lending his reputation supporting a privately owned thought.
I have talked to many professors over this attempt to get TriTrack moving and each start out enthusiastic and mention they want to be a part but deeper into the deal they have all pulled out their support and my suspicion is that either law of failure one or law of failure two are the rationale.
To get around the second law of failure, somehow transportation suppliers need to be able to bid on transportation not on road resurfacing or pot hole filling. If there was a way to structure the bid process where Kirston and I and Robert et al could bid openly in the marketplace for transportation (filled seats moved X miles) provided then perhaps law of failure two can be mitigated some. Law of failure one is pure human nature at its core and will never be eliminated but with work can be overcome slightly. It is also varies culture to culture as the Japanese hold standing on the ideas of others in higher regard than American culture. There is no me in team (is that right?) and the best way is for the professor to take idea X and add idea Y to it giving a constant upward progression but so far no luck.
I am very willing to talk to one of your colleges at your university who may want to advance transportation and is not affected by the sheer will of his personality to ignore the impediments to progress and do as you suggest they may be able to do. The point of my last barbed rant was that ideas are divorced from their creators and need to stand alone and be considered by RITA et al. If this can be accomplished we are all better off for it.
I worked with RITA and their process with zero gain and lots of time, money, printed paper in duplicate and effort wasted. I can see how a professor can spend his essence begging for some bucks to blow on grad students but I do not see how this has anything to do with the progress of transportation in a timely manor. Communication is spiffy but action is what is needed. This closed forum is about lip service or it would be open.
Jerry Roane
--
Jack Slade
Jack Slade
--- On Sun, 4/11/10, Jerry Roane <jerry...@gmail.com> wrote:
> From: Jerry Roane <jerry...@gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [t-i] RITA reaches out to you
> To: transport-...@googlegroups.com
Jerry Schneider
I see it quite differently. I'm talking about the University Research
Program. Each year, the feds indicate the kinds of topics they are
interested in funding - in a very general way. The faculty
participants examine this material to see if they have any ideas that
appear to be fundable. While in D.C. at TRB or some other meeting,
they drop in on people they know or who they think are likely to be
grant proposal reviewers to talk informally about their ideas and
interests and how well they might match up with general guidelines.
If they sense a match possibility, they will go home and look at the
current grad students and the prospective grad students to see if
there are any that look like they might be interested in and capable
of working on such a project. If they need support (most all do),
then they discuss a research approach to determine how feasible it
might be, given talent and resources.
If it looks good, the student and faculty people write a grant
proposal and submit it, along with those from other faculty members
to the Director of the University Program. A selection committee
reviews all the proposals locally and decides which ones will be
included in that University proposal. In almost every case, the feds
do not do detailed reviews of all the proposals in the bundle and if
it looks reasonable, make a grant to the University Program that is
then allocated to the various faculty who then hire the research
assistants (grad students) who do most of the work. Given the many
claims on the time of both faculty and grad students, most projects
are focused on fairly narrow topics, not grand system development
projects which require far more time and money than is usually
available. The exception to this situation is when a large
corporation like General Motors decides to fund a group at a
University (e.g. MIT) then larger scale projects involving multiple
faculty and many grad students are possible. Or, an assessment
project somewhat like the CEETI dualmode effort, can be undertaken
with a small group, using interviews and published data to make
comparisons, identify pros and cons and draw conclusions as to what
should be done next, if anything.
If you want to understand how this program works and how it spends
millions in research funds annually, you should examine the
University Research Program and the many projects that it funds. If
you want to play in this arena, then such understanding is necessary,
along with a lot of other things, for success. Here is a link to the
list of participants.
http://educ.dot.gov/utc_safetea-lu.html
Any faculty member who wants to get promoted and tenured has to bring
in grant money (state or non-state) to fund grad students and publish
papers and attend conferences, each and every year. If you want some
income during the summer, such grants offer employment during that
time. If you don't have any research or teaching assistants, you are
not likely to get promoted or tenure. If you don't get either, you
often have to look elsewhere for employment. If your research
assistants let you down, you have to take up the slack and work
overtime to get something together to present and publish. Getting
papers published is not easy as the competition is fierce and the
reviewers can easily cause you great difficulty, sometimes deserved,
sometimes not. As with most human endeavors, who you know and the
nature of your relationship can be a critical factor, in addition to
having something on the ball. Good people-skills are most helpful, as
usual. If you review the list of participants in the University
Research Program, I'm sure you will agree that some enhanced levels
of communication among the many participants could be very helpful,
some of whom are pretty far down the learning curve.
Kirston Henderson
> Added to this is the complication of Intellectual Property. Even though you
> have already done the inventing, who owns the patents if you have collabrated
> with a University to get it built and tested? If the State has funded it, will
> they try to claim it all?
>
Jack,
You are exactly correct with regard to both universities and all
branches of government. If they help develop your idea, you must first
surrender all rights to your intellectual property. I offer the recent
CEETI effort by Texas A&M University that attempted to start something
really big under this concept as a recent example. To their great surprise,
all of us inventors with ideas did not go running to their ill-conceived
door.
Nice arrangement if you are one of those flower children that just wants
to stick a flower behind your ear and give your all for humanity while, in
the case of most universities, they will attempt to gain by selling
production rights to the thing that you invented.
Bear in mind that the general mindset of most government agencies is the
total socialist notion that they really own all propriety rights.
Fortunately the founding fathers believe in private property rights and for
that reason established the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office that more
recent political operatives have been working hard to render meaningless.
It was this "dirty capitalist" idea of patents that really maee it
possible for the United States to forge so far ahead of the rest of the
world and still outshine the rest of the world in inventions that benefit us
and the rest of the world as well.
Jerry Roane
I see UT Austin CTR is not even on the list. No wonder they were disinterested. When I presented at TTI (Texas A&M) they ended up asking me for money which makes sense since they are in the business of getting money from outside to do research. Of course you can't get blood out of an onion and thus the structure is flawed.
I will go again to Texas A&M to see if this path might work. There were two professors who came to my office for a full presentation and both left my office saying they wanted to do this thing or variations on this phrase. (one engineering, one finance) I still think this is a slow and retarded way to get ideas into RITA. I expect more from RITA since they are clearly standing in the way and not leading the way to energy independence and the END of traffic. It may have nothing to do with transportation but the sociology college may be the department to explain why there is no progress and we have dirty air, insane traffic congestion and gasoline prices are on their way back to the sky. They could pre-write history as we enter the next perceived resource war.
I have my first grandson on his way and yesterday my son-in-law was telling me his concerns for his son's future life. What was America as a non-producer going to be like and how much educational advantage would he need. My wife expressed concerns that the "high school or GED" graduate would have a hard time in a world where work efficiency would drop the number of needed workers and professionals. What would become of them? --- Just things to ponder.
Jerry Roane
Kirston Henderson
> I have my first grandson on his way and yesterday my son-in-law was telling
> me his concerns for his son's future life. What was America as a
> non-producer going to be like and how much educational advantage would he
> need.
Jerry,
The way things appear to be heading, probably about like it was when my
grandparents were young back in the 1800s where the general forms of
transportation were walking, horseback if you could afford to own a horse,
in horse drawn buggies or in an occasional slow, Chinese-built, wood burning
steam locomotive pulled trains (none of that ugly diesel or coal.) However,
most of those who survive will likely live on government owned collective
farms farmed by a combination of horses and manual labor. (By then,
environmentalists will probably have ruled out drilling for that dirty oil
or mining that dirty coal or copper or most other material.) Most cities
will have become virtual ghost towns just like some in the Northern rust
belt are already becoming. Education! What is that?
Kirston
Michael Weidler
| The line is: There is no "I" in team. tEaM obviously has a me in it. |
--- On Sun, 4/11/10, Jerry Roane <jerry...@gmail.com> wrote: |
|
Jerry Roane
Good catch! Glad to see you found my humor. My kids just groan at the majority of my jokes.
Jerry Roane
Michael Weidler
| A highly unlikely scenario. Horses produce way too much methane. Using them for general transport would drastically increase the amount of GHG in the atmosphere. |
--- On Mon, 4/12/10, Kirston Henderson <kirston....@megarail.com> wrote: |
|
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