Center for Truck and Bus Safety
About CTBS
The Center for Truck and Bus Safety specializes in providing high quality education and research focusing on a variety of safety issues involving heavy truck and bus operations. The Center conducts research and development efforts to advance the state of knowledge in the truck and bus safety domain and provides pragmatic solutions to real-world problems.
Some of our recent projects have been directed at driver and vehicle safety regulations including the Hours-of-Service Regulations for Commercial Vehicle Drivers and the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards. The center also strives to provide practical recommendations and guidelines, based on the results of our studies, which can be used by both government and industry to improve safety.
About the Director
Dr.
Richard J. Hanowski is the Director of the Center for Truck and Bus Safety
at VTTI. He has formal training in human factors engineering, systems design,
safety, research methods, experimental design, statistics, training, and
human computer interaction. His experience includes transportation human
factors with heavy and light vehicles, laboratory and field testing, real-time
automobile and heavy vehicle simulation, advanced system development and
testing, design guideline development, and human performance evaluation.
Dr. Hanowski is the author of more than 80 publications including journal articles, conference papers, book chapters, and technical reports. He has received several research awards including the 2000 and 1997 First Place Award for Outstanding Research in the Physical Sciences and Engineering at Virginia Tech.
Current Work
Study of Heavy Vehicle Crashes and Near-Crashes In Support of
the Development of Crash Reduction Countermeasures: Phase II (8-Truck) Study
This study is collecting naturalistic driving data that can be used to investigate light vehicle and heavy vehicle (LV-HV) interactions and other issues related to commercial motor vehicle (CMV) crash risk.
Commercial Motor Vehicle Driving Simulator Validation (Sim Val) Study Phase II
The "SimVal" study is testing the effectiveness of a driver training simulator for purposes of commercial motor vehicle driver training and testing. The study will also assess the potential use of simulators in commercial driver licensing. This project is being performed in support of the CMV driver safety program of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA).
More Current Research Examples:
- Study of Driver Performance/Acceptance Using Aspheric Mirrors in Light Vehicle Applications
- FMCSA Driver and Management Research Study
- Development and Assessment of a Driver Fatigue Monitoring System
- Development of a Performance Specification for Indirect Visibility Systems on Heavy Trucks
- Enhancement of Camera/Video Imaging Systems (CVIS) for Heavy Trucks
- Commercial Motor Vehicle Driver Risk Factors Study
- Synthesis Report on the Impact of Behavior-Based Safety Techniques on Commercial Vehicle Drivers
Previous Work
Drowsy Driver Warning System Field Operational Test (DDWS FOT)
A Drowsy Driver Warning System (DDWS) detects physiological and/or performance indications of driver drowsiness and provides feedback to drivers regarding their states of drowsiness. The primary goal of this FOT was to determine the safety benefits and operational capabilities, limitations, and characteristics of the DDWS. Over 12 TB of data were collected in this study, making this the largest on-road data collection effort ever conducted by the U.S. DOT.
Safety and Productivity Impacts of New Hours-of-Service Rules
VTTI and subcontractor Hendrix Consulting conducted a 1-year project for the American Transportation Research Institute (ATRI) to analyze the safety and productivity impacts of the new commercial driver hours-of-service (HOS) rules which became effective on January 4, 2004.
More Previous Research Examples:
- Commercial Vehicle Data Collection and Countermeasures Assessment Research Project: Phase I
- Survey of Convex Mirror Use in the Fleet