TRB Committee ABJ80

Approved Minutes of Committee Meeting: January 1999

Statistical Methodology and Statistical Computer Software in Transportation Research, A5011

Holmes Room, Marriott Hotel

January 12, 1999

The meeting was called to order by Chairperson, Olga Pendleton, followed by self-introduction of members and friends.

1. Attendance

A roster of members and friends in attendance at the meeting is attached.

2. Agenda

The agenda is attached.

3. General Items for the Record

An announcement (attached) was prepared and distributed to all TRB committees at the annual 1999 meeting notifying them about the activities of our committee. This same announcement was distributed at the 1998 annual meeting. The purpose of the announcement was to gain the attention of TRB committees in declaring our interest in participating in professional activities of mutual interest which includes the annual paper review process. A couple of committee members strongly expressed the need for the committee to assign individuals (member or friend) to certain committees and have these individuals coordinate directly with the paper review chairs of these committees in forwarding papers to our committee requiring a statistical review. Dick Weed suggested the chair contact certain committees and communicate how our committee may provide assistance in the paper review process. These ideas deserve further discussion and should be a primary topic at the mid-year meeting in 1999.

4. Committee Program

a) Sessions

The committee sponsored two sessions at the 1999 annual meeting:

1) Session #145 (Statistical Methods for Transportation)

b) Papers

Four papers were directly sent to the committee for review. Three papers were recommended for presentation and publication and one paper was recommended for presentation only. Several committee members and friends indicated that they provided statistical reviews of papers for other committees. Also, Robert Hanson provided a list of reviewers to Bhagwant Persaud to help review papers for A3B05, Committee on Safety Data, Analysis, and Evaluation. Therefore, the four papers reviewed directly by our committee does not adequately reflect the total number of papers reviewed.

5. Committee Business

(a) Subcommitee reports

Newsletter - Robert Scopatz is seeking contributions to the newsletter. He would like the next edition of the newsletter to be printed in Spring 1999.

Web Page - Jennifer Ogle continues as the committee’s web master. Amy Chow has agreed to provide assistance to Jennifer Ogle. The current web address is: http://san-antonio.tamu.edu/TRB/statistics.htm

Survey of Statistical Software Packages - David Hunt presented the survey of statistical software packages. He is requesting committee members and friends to complete the survey and return it to him. The committee should discuss at the 1999 mid-year meeting on what are the next steps for the survey.

Special Call for Papers - Robert Scopatz will lead a special call for papers for the year 2000 meeting. The call for papers should be mailed to all relevant TRB committees by about May 15, 1999. Peter Bajorski expressed interest in the precision and accuracy of Geographic Information System data as a topic. Ted Chira-Chavala and Peter Bajorski expressed interest in the application of statistical methods for repeated measures as a topic. Four other topics mentioned were new types of software in managing large databases; “How to use and avoid the pitfalls of the Fatal Analysis Reporting System and General Estimation System”; statistical issues in travel surveys, and spatial statistical analyses.

Problem Statements - Rick Pain suggested problem statements should address research that needs to be done in transportation statistics. Ed Milton agreed to take the lead in coordinating problem statements which were due January 31, 1999. Robert Scopatz offered to submit a problem statement regarding a reference manual for non-statisticians. This manual would be used to train novices in using simple statistical methods. Someone mentioned that such a manual exist on Statsoft’s web site.

Human Factors Workshop - Simon Washington agreed to present the results of his NCHRP study “Scientific Approaches for Transportation Research” at the year 2000 workshop. Michael Griffith will propose the findings of Simon’s study as a potential workshop to the year 2000 TRB Human Factors workshop planning committee.

Mid-Year Meeting - The committee decided to have the mid-year meeting in conjunction with the annual meeting of the American Statistical Association (ASA). The ASA annual meeting will be held August 8th-12th, 1999 in Baltimore. Carolee Bush agreed to arrange for our committee to meet at the annual ASA meeting. Tim Coburn announced that our committee had a session approved for the ASA annual meeting. The session pertains to current issues in the analysis/modeling of auto emissions. Tim was able to get a full page write-up in an ASA newsletter describing our committee.

Paper Review Process - The committee needs someone to lead the coordination of the year 2000 paper review process.

Video Theater - Jennifer Ogle volunteered to lead the video theater session at the year 2000 TRB meeting. Dell Stewart will assist Jennifer. The committee should decide if they want to sponsor this session at the year 2000 meeting. We have sponsored this session for several years. If we decide to sponsor it, we need to reserve a room for the meeting by October 1, 1999.

Carolee Bush announced that the Transportation Research Information Service (TRIS) will be available by end of 1999 via Internet. She also announced the National Transportation Library which can be accessed at www.bts.gov.

Karl Kim, Simon Washington, and Olga Pendleton volunteered to represent the committee for TRB’s millennium project in preparing a white paper that discusses the current state-of-the-art in statistics and statistical issues to address in the next decade. It’s possible that problem statements could be developed from the contents of the white paper.

Someone suggested that we sponsor a contest on models of good practice for statistical analyses.