Category Archives: NTL/DOT

The Week at DOT: Feb 20 – 23, 2012

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This was a quiet week for us, mainly due to the holiday on Monday. I hope you all had a good long weekend and returned to work relaxed and happy :)

BTS released only one new data set: November 2011 Airline Traffic Data.
System Traffic Down 0.1 Percent from November 2010.
U.S. airlines carried 58.1 million scheduled domestic and international passengers in November 2011. The airlines carried 0.2 percent more domestic passengers and 1.9 percent fewer international passengers than in November 2010, resulting in a systemwide decrease of 0.1 percent. The November 2011 passenger total was 6.0 percent above that of two years ago in November 2009. See the Air Traffic Release for additional data.

Here are some good resources that I used this week to answer incoming emails, and that might be of interest to some of you:

That’s it for today! Have a great weekend, and drive safe ;)

 

The Week at DOT: Feb 13 – 16, 2012

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  • U.S. Department of Transportation’s Proposed Budget Invests $74 Billion in Safe, Efficient, and Innovative Transportation Programs – Investments Support President Obama’s Plan to Boost Economic Development and Create an America ‘Built to Last’
    [cut]
    Since NTL is part of RITA, the following paragraph is of special importance to us:
    Modernizing through Research and Innovation
    The Administration’s budget also prioritizes research, innovative programs, and technological solutions to address our transportation challenges and ensure that America remains competitive in the global marketplace. The FY 2013 budget includes more than $1 billion to modernize America’s air-traffic control system and help transition from the radar-based air traffic control system of the past to the more reliable, efficient, satellite-based system of the future, known as NextGen. The budget also proposes to strengthen the role of research and technology in transportation decision-making by moving the Research and Innovative Technology Administration (RITA) into a new Office of the Assistant Secretary for Research and Technology.
    A budget summary document is available at http://www.dot.gov/budget/2013/dot_budget_highlights_fy_2013.pdf
  • The Bureau of Transportation Statistics released December airline on-time and tarmac numbers (www.bts.gov – Airlines and Airports, 3rd box on the right side)
  • BTS updates its Airline Fuel Cost and Consumption web page with preliminary December data.
  •  Airlines Post Best December On-Time Record, Lowest December Cancellation Rate in 17 Years No Tarmac Delays Longer than Three Hours on Domestic Flights or Four Hours on International Flights in December (http://www.dot.gov/affairs/2012/dot2412.html). 
  • DOT Fines Allegiant Air for Violating DOT Airline Disability, Price Advertising Rules
    The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) today fined Allegiant Air $100,000 for violating rules protecting air travelers with disabilities, as well as the Department’s rule for full-fare advertising.

Have a great holiday weekend!

News from the US DOT

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There is always something going on here at the DOT HQ: presentations, seminars, lectures, pot-lucks, and of course talk about what has been in the press about DOT decisions. So, from now on, I’ll attempt to summarize all this stuff for you; I know that some people really like reading about our work here, so I am trying to make this a one-stop-shop location for important transportation-related events, news, press-releases etc.

This week we had two BTS press releases:
September 2011 Airline System Traffic Up 1.2 Percent from September 2010 and a new  Directive for 2012 On-Time Reporting. The second is something really exciting, because the On-Time data is one of the most popular data we have. It gives you information about (domestic) flights reported by large carriers (with at least 1% of domestic itineraries): If the flight was delayed and why, if it was diverted and if so, to where and why. You can also get a summary of which airlines/routes are the best/worst when it comes to timely flights. So  next time you plan to take a trip, check it out!

The arrest of the FAA Administrator R. Babbit was probably the event that caused the most confusion within the DOT. Here is the official statement from our Secretary, Ray LaHood:
DOT 160-11
Tuesday, December 6, 2011
Statement from U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood:

“As FAA Administrator, Randy Babbitt has been a dedicated public servant and outstanding leader. I’m proud to say that we have the safest aviation system in the world, and thanks to Randy’s stewardship, it became safer and stronger. He worked tirelessly to improve relations with the labor community and bolstered employee engagement among his 49,000 colleagues at the FAA. He led the FAA’s efforts to improve pilot training and enhance safety for the traveling public, as well as those that work in aviation. On behalf of the American people, I thank him for his service and his leadership.”
Interesting to read is also the summary of what was said about this in various newspapers and other media.

Last, but not least, for today: If you want to stay up-to-date with what is happening here at the US DOT, subscribe to the feeds that interest you the most.

Have a good weekend everyone!

Today in History

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Coming up with good Tweets and FB posts for work can be a challenge at times, especially if one has to pay attention not only to the social media etiquette but also to a federal agency’s social media policy.

The National Transportation Library’s collection includes a wonderful book called “The American Book of Days”, by Jane M. Hatch, and I use it quite often to see if any of those dates are related to transportation issues. I also found out that my birthday, April 10, marks the birthday of William Booth, the founder of the Salvation Army. He was born in 1829 in Nottingham, England (Robin Hood anyone?). 

Today, while hunting for good tweeting and posting material, I came across the web site “This Day in History“, and found out that today, back in 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the first artificial satellite.

While that is somewhat transportation-related I thought it was more appropriate to leave this topic to NASA and check for something more down to earth.

So, this day in Transportation History, President A. Lincoln observed the first balloon demonstration near Washington, DC (1861) and in 1992 a cargo plane crashed into an apartment building near an airport in Amsterdam, Holland. The first occurrence is obviously a happier event; however, the NTL has an online special collection of historial aircraft accident reports, which are quite interesting. You can find them on the Special Collections page, along with some other interesting resources.

And going back to my tweets and posts: Last week my co-worker and I held a presentation about Federal Libraries and Social Media at the Library of Congress. Our Power Point presentation will be online shortly. We’ve gotten great feedback so far, so I hope that you’ll enjoy the presentation.

FLICC/FEDLINK Presentation

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My colleague Rosalind Romain (law librarian here at NTL) and I will be presenting at a workshop facilitated by the Institute for Library Technicians, held at the Library of Congress September 29 & 30. Our presentation will focus on library technology and social media.

From the announcement:

This two-day institute, the newest offering in FLICC’s series
for federal library technicians, will begin to prepare new and seasoned technicians for the expanded roles library technicians are filling as the architecture of our libraries is changing.
In line with FLICC’s recently released “Competencies for Librarians”, this training program will feature those skills that federal library technicians need to meet the challenges of the latest trends in federal libraries.

The program will feature:

~ ROI for libraries and library technicians
~ Managing A Library: A Technicians Prospective
~ Disaster Preparedness
~ Budgeting for Federal Libraries
~ Library Technology Management and Social Media
~ Library Para-Professionalism
~ HR Competencies Assessment
~ Competencies for a Competitive Advantage

Speakers will be representing a variety of federal agencies including
the Departments of the Interior, Justice and Transportation, Law Library of Congress, Army Counterintelligence Center and the Library of Congress.

Oh, those dang outdoor signs!

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Work is slowly coming to an end for this week, which does not mean that I am just sitting around, being lazy (okay,maybe just a little bit). So I went to roam the stacks, and found two books that looked funny, weird, and interesting at the same time: “Outdoor Advertising: The Modern Marketing Force. 1929” and “Signs out of control. 1964”. The first book is “A Manual for Business Men and Others Interested in the Fundamentals of Outdoor Advertising”. The second deals with “all this talk of the sign problem”. Enjoy and have a good weekend!

FHWA Turner-Fairbank Highway Research Center

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Oh I was SO Excited! Yesterday they researchers at the TFHRC scheduled a crash test, and employees from the DOT HQ here in DC can take a shuttle and watch the test. So two of my co-workers and myself went there, met another librarian, and first got a tour of their small but really cool library. It was interesting to  see the difference between their collection and the stuff that we have here at NTL. Of course, their collection is a lot more specialized, mainly dealing with FHWA publications, research papers, reports, and all kinds or stuff, which also means they usually have a complete collection of a series of reports etc.

After having lunch we went to the observatory hill … only to learn that the test had to be rescheduled due to the weather (at least that’s what we assumed). NO rain in over three weeksm, and on crash-test day the sky opened up. Of course -.-

Oh well, there is always another opportunity to see a car crash into a wall, a metal something etc … so in the meantime I wanted to share some pictures that I took. They show the crash test site as well as two labs where researchers test bridges, concrete, and all kinds of other cool stuff. Seriously, I need to be reborn and go into engineering … Enjoy the pix!

NTL featured in “Public Roads”

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Shelfs at the NTL - Source: http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/publications/publicroads/11mayjun/01.cfm

Stacks of hardbound reference materials remain a staple among the resources available through NTL.

NTL is mentioned in an article published in “Public Roads”, May/June 2011, Vol. 74, No. 6: Masters of Information, by Jennifer Boteler.

The NTL staff (yes, I am one of them!) is proud to work for and with the transportation community and its great members, and to provide access to important documents, both as a physical and growing digital collection: http://go.usa.gov/DN1

2011 Digital Citizen Satisfaction Summit

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I was fortunate to attend the summit at the Ronald Reagan Building and Trade Center . This annual Summit, a full day of educational presentations, case studies and panels to help people who manage websites and emerging digital channels in government and non-profit organizations. The amazing speakers (the best of all Todd Park, Chief Technology Officer, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services) presented and discussed their strategies for collecting data and acting on citizen and constituent feedback to further organizational goals, and meet administrative initiatives. This was a free event, limited to government and nonprofit employees, or contractors working directly on government or nonprofit websites.

The most important message that all the speakers agreed on was that today’s citizens are multi-channel users, which means that the government will have to utilize these channels to reach as many citizens as possible. Another message that I will take to heart was said by Larry Fred, President and CEO, ForeSee Results: You can’t manage what you don’t measure. Numbers are important. They show you were you succeed and deliver great service, and they point out areas where your web site or service needs improvement.

We also learned about how web sites should be designed to provide the most usability, as well as great navigation and content. My favorite part was to learn about “screen real estate”, white noise on web sites, links, contrast, etc.

On my way home I went through my notes and was happy with what I got out of the summit. Oh, and plenty of good food was included, too!

Second Day at Work

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The second week at my new job is in full swing. So far I am loving it. The building and people are awesome.

Just wanted to let you know that I am responsible for the NTL Facebook and Twitter accounts: http://www.facebook.com/#!/nationaltransportationlibrary & http://twitter.com/#!/NatlTransLib, so like/follow me if you want. I promise I will post awesome content :D