Get FRA R&D Human Factors Announcement Updates by e-mail.

November 11, 2009

FRA's MICHAEL COPLEN ATTAINS AMERICAN EVALUATION ASSOCIATION HONOR

The American Evaluation Association (AEA) recently named Federal Railroad Administration Senior Program Manager Michael Coplen the recipient of the Alva and Gunnar Myrdal Government Award.

The association is recognizing Coplen, who started his railroading career 30 years ago as a brakeman, for dedicating the past 20 years to finding ways to improve rail safety.  He developed pilot projects that helped significantly reduce injuries, derailments and rule violation. The pilot projects also improved personal safety awareness according to AEA, an international professional association of evaluators, and were an essential component in developing FRA's risk reduction program.

"Coplen's "distinguished record of developing safety initiatives" has helped spur new national safety legislation" said FRA Administrator Joseph Szabo in a prepared statement , adding that he is the first U.S. Department of Transportation employee to receive the award.


RSSB HUMAN FACTORS RESEARCH CATALOGUE NOW ONLINE!


RSSBs Human Factors Team is pleased to announce that the sixth edition of the Human Factors research catalogue is now available.

The library is no longer on a CD ROM but available on line, which will facilitate regular updates. It includes a range of literature, focused on key issues salient to the rail industry, such as rail specific research from both the UK and international railways, research from safety critical industries such as aviation, nuclear, and chemical, and from the road vehicle driver context.

The login procedure is simple and the rewards – in terms of easy access to a huge range of interesting documents covering rail and non-rail information sources – can be considerable. For a start, in beginning to scope a new project idea and when asking ‘has this been done already?’ you may find the answer by typing in some key words and seeing what turns up! There are much more advanced search facilities if you need them. A synopsis is provided for every paper and, where copyright permission has been granted, the full paper is available. This library benefits the rail industry by its potential to increase understanding and awareness of human factors. In turn this should help reduce risk, improve business performance and, ultimately, customer satisfaction. Its papers will help to demonstrate where human factors knowledge can be usefully applied to improve safety performance. The online 2009 Human Factors Library can be found at http://www.rssbhumanfactorslibrary.co.uk

* This link is provided under the sponsorship of the United States Department of Transportation in the interest of information exchange.  Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed from the referenced site do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the United States Government, nor does mention of trade names, commercial products or organizations imply endorsement by the United States Government.  The United States Government assumes no liability for the content or use of the material contained in these linked web sites.