FINDING INFORMATION ON TRAFFIC CONGESTION
A general Google search using the term ‘traffic congestion’ yielded 2,110,000 results, with a Wikipedia entry – a helpful, but not always reliable resource –as the first hit. The next two results, however, were FHWA sites that could be useful for reviewing the topic. There were also results from reputable university sites, but conversely, there were many sites with a definite bias and agenda. Using the same search terms with the Google Scholar option limited the results to 194,000, and included peer-reviewed reports and articles. All of the hits on the first page were citations that did not lead to electronic documents, however, which could prove frustrating to the Internet searcher.
A librarian could help the information seeker narrow the field of interest, and define the aspect of traffic congestion that he/she was actually looking for. By reviewing the library’s own collection, and calling on the resources of fellow TKN members, the librarian would be able to obtain copies of the referenced reports. Using a variety of search combinations – including terms from the reports she is collecting – the librarian would be able to search on proprietary (fee-based) databases, as well as free resources like the National Transportation Library’s TRIS database, and science-based search engines, for additional information targeted toward the specific topic. Referring the patron to the bibliographies and lists of references in the reports and articles could yield further leads. TKN members could also assist with reports and studies specific to their own states, agencies, or organizations (traffic volume tables, white papers, etc.).
A well-developed and organized TKN could offer not only networking and collaboration between its members, but could also produce tangible deliverables for the transportation community. An example of this could be an information portal, with collections of reliable resources at the user’s fingertips. Such a portal addressing congestion would conceivably break the topic into sub-topics, and might include information on:
§ Types of congestion (recurrent vs. non-recurrent)
§ Integrated corridor management
§ Creating models to predict traffic congestion
§ Recovery time / impact of incidents
§ Costs of congestion (financial and environmental)
§ Road user charges / congestion pricing / traffic restraint policies
§ Human impact and safety issues surrounding congestion and accidents
§ International studies
§ Signal timing / ramp metering
§ Transit development as a means of reducing congestion
§ Development of nuclear, walkable communities as a means of reducing travel
§ Exploration of other forms of freight transport, including rail and marine
Having such information available for “one-stop shopping” could make a search for information more seamless, efficient, and far less frustrating for the user.
PROJECT DESIGN INFORMATION
Search Need
After seeing a brief mention and photograph of a particular bridge project (environmentally sensitive bridge spanning wetlands in Madison, WI), an engineering consultant from New Zealand, facing a situation with very similar conditions, was looking for specifications of the particular bridge plan as well as the contractors and subcontractors involved. Though he called the Wisconsin DOT Library for assistance, he could have first used Google to try to find some information using perhaps the following terms: “wetlands” “bridge” “madison” “beltline.”
Current User Search Tools
A search in Google using these terms reveals a number of results, including an FHWA site (http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/environment/wetlands.htm ) that mentions the bridge project in question (South Beltline Highway, Madison WI). From his search, he would learn that the project was controversial, lengthy, and included a high level of involvement with other state agencies and involved a higher degree of environmental issues and wetland mitigation processes. He would have also discovered that the project, when finally finished, was very successful and considered ‘state of the art’ in mitigating environmental impacts with highway construction.
His search would have revealed some good background information and was a good overview of the situation, but would not have answered his questions. He needed information in this case that was behind a firewall, perhaps an example of the deep web.
Solution:
By contacting the librarian at Wisconsin DOT, he, in essence, contacted a conduit for some of the internal departmental information he was seeking. The librarian was able to provide a contact name of a person in the Wisconsin DOTs Structures Bureau for further reference. But the librarian also navigated the department’s intranet site, and was able to retrieve the bridge plan specifications (along with names of the contractors involved) from their internal bridge database. Since the database was on the intranet, it was subject to open records and the documents (in .pdf format) were emailed to a very grateful customer.
TKN involvement
Upon further searching, the librarian also revealed that the contractors involved worked on a very large bridge project in the northern Virginia area as well as the reconstruction of the I-35 bridge in Minneapolis, MN. He also delivered the names of two fellow TKN librarians at Virginia DOT and Minnesota DOT respectively should he want to inquire about similar bridge plans at those institutions.
Whether he followed up with them is uncertain, but if he did, a well-connected network of TKN information colleagues at these other two DOTs could have perhaps supplied him with more information regarding these specific contractors and their bridge projects. This information was not readily available on the Web.
BRIDGE MAINTENANCE
With today’s search tools, looking for information about bridge maintenance often yields enormous numbers of results. The following table shows the number of results obtained when using several online search tools that are commonly used by transportation professionals.
ONLINE RESOURCE / KEYWORD SEARCH RESULTS / PHRASE (QUOTES) RESULTSGoogle / 6,130,000 / 5,670,000
Google Scholar / 860,000 / 3,830
TLCat / 2,289 / 1,954 (LC Subject Heading)
NTL Integrated Search (TRIS + NTL Digital Repository) / 7,384 / 1,267
TRB Research in Progress / 192 / 47
TRB Publications Index / 1,080 / 296
iCivilEngineer.com / 294,000 / 44,600
FHWA websites / 13,700 / 627
Scirus / 687,566 / 12,799
The numbers for transportation-specific sites are less overwhelming, so that even a more general keyword search could result in some useful documents. But the mainstream and multi-disciplinary search tools – the exclusive search tools of half of all those in fields of science, according to a 2004 Elsevier survey* - provide many more results, and finding accurate and relevant information in the deluge is nearly impossible.
Librarians and information professionals are trained to search for, access, evaluate, and organize information resources. They are able to help a customer narrow and define their specific interests, making it easier to find more relevant materials. They understand how to structure a search, to find resources that are both pertinent to the topic and from reliable sources. If the needed reports aren’t available online or in-house, they can be borrowed from another library – often from TKN partners, who have developed collaborative relationships within their associations.
But TKNs have the potential for doing far more than this. A National Transportation Knowledge Network (NTKN), composed of the regional TKNs coordinated by a well-funded National Transportation Library (NTL), could offer the transportation professional seeking information about bridge maintenance many options. He could contact his agency’s library, whose staff would be able to supply him with information quickly and thoroughly, with expanded resources developed and maintained by the TKNs. Information portals, offering a café of choices, could help them drill down to the specific topic needed, without the frustrating and time-consuming searching that even sophisticated searchers face today. Or, the customer could be self-sufficient, accessing the portals through a link on his library’s homepage, and taking a few minutes to go through a short tutorial showing him how to use the portals. In either case, the transportation professional would come away with the needed information in a manner greatly enhanced by the efforts of the TKNs.
*June, 2004 LibraryConnect newsletter