STA welcomes its 13th member: Laura Metaal Road Safety

18 March 2016

The STA leadership has approved membership for one of the Netherlands' leading steel manufacturing companies, Laura Metaal Road Safety.

Laura Metaal N.V. was founded in 1968 with a focus on developing opportunities like guard rail and hot rolled pressed parts for the heavy transport industry. Laura Metaal works at three sites in the Netherlands: Beverwijk, Maastricht and Eygelshoven to provide all in-house production of steel materials that are sold throughout the world.

Laura Metaal Road Safety is part of the larger organisation, Laura Metaal Holding, giving them access to high quality steel at anytime. This allowed them to receive several CE marking certificates in 2010 for both permanent and temporary road barrier systems.

The over 50 year specific focus on road safety aligns perfectly with STA's mission of promoting Smart, Sustainable and Safe Transportation Infrastructures.

Guidelines for improving road safety in emerging countries - Discussion Paper 1/2016 published

31 March 2016

Addressing road safety in the developing world is key to developing efficient, safe and secure transport system for the future in these countries.

More than 1.2 million people die every year as a result of road traffic collisions. Of these, 80% occur in low and middle-income countries where less than half the world’s registered vehicle fleet is concentrated. Unless immediate and effective action is taken, road traffic injuries are predicted to rise to an estimated 2.4 million deaths per year, making road traffic fatalities the fifth leading cause of death worldwide.

This paper takes into account the United Nation’s exiting five-pillar policy and expands on it to explore concrete actions to improve road safety.

STA presents the HIPEBA project at the TRA2016 Marketplace Poster Session (Warsaw, Poland, 18-21 April 2016)

29 March 2016

STA has confirmed that it will present HIPEBA, “High Performance Steel for Safer and More Competitive Safety Barriers”, at the TRA Poster session in the TRA2016 Marketplace. The poster will be exclusively available on 18 April 2016 at the 6th Annual Transport Research Arena whose focus on Innovative Solutions for Tomorrow’s Mobility is a strong backdrop to showcase the work of HIPEBA.

The TRA2016 Conference contributes to innovation in sustainable mobility for Europe, by bringing together all the stakeholders of the transport system.

NEWS OF INTEREST

Urban Deliveries As Easy As Hailing An Uber

In 2015 Uber demonstrated clear intentions to move into the logistics market with the trial launch of its delivery service UberRUSH, combining its ride-hailing technology with an industry worth over $242 billion. Potentially great news not just for consumers, but also urban sustainability and cleaner streets.

The ‘Sharing Economy’ puts local goods at the forefront of Uber’s approach and even allows customers to choose how much they pay. By roping in other orders, customers can essentially share costs – an option totally unavailable with traditional delivery services.

Uber wishes to expand this operation in the UK and this is great news for overly-congested cities like London. By utilising Uber’s fleet of already in-use vehicles, it removes the need for many traditional couriers to perform the final mile of delivery for small items, potentially taking extra traffic off the roads. 

The Science of Building Better Bridges

Working on this infrastructure project is Atorod Azizinamini a professor at the Florida International University College of Engineering and Computing who was named one of the White House Champions of Change honorees for his work in the field.

“Bridges appear to be simple structures,” says Azizinamini, “but they have lots of interesting problems.” We built our bridges like we built our buildings: for strength (and not necessarily for durability).

He has now created a system that allows for the replacing and retrofitting of bridges — without closing traffic, called accelerated bridge construction (ABC). It involves most construction taking place offsite, transportation of giant bridge pieces to bridge sites and then assembly on site.

Transport issues in small scale communities in Europe

ENDURANCE aims to assist cities and regions with developing Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans (SUMPs) by facilitating networking, mutual learning and sharing of experience and best practise across countries. What has been noticed recently is that there is a need to focus on small cities and towns in the Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan.

The Sustainable Urban Mobility Planning (SUMP) methodology entails a very comprehensive, intensive planning cycle that might overwhelm small cities and towns. However, small municipalities need mobility planning too and the SUMP methodology is very useful for them. If there are several towns or cities in a region, the POLY-SUMP tool can be used to make a joint SUMP.

DOT launches open data push to build National Transit Map

The United States Department of Transportation wants open data to go cross-country with the creation of a National Transit Map. Transportation Secretary Anthony R. Foxx wrote a letter to local and state transit agencies asking them to share the link to their data in a public domain. USDOT would take a periodic snapshot from the local agencies’ feeds so their routing and schedules can be incorporated into the national map.

The national map will show the stops, routes, and schedules for all transit agencies. Right now, about half of U.S. transit agencies, including almost all major cities, already collect open data and either share it through their web sites or provide it directly to private companies.

B19 Country Club, the perfect space for all your events!

B19, the event space used for the STA Annual Conference & Innovation Awards, has offered our readers the opportunity to rent their unique space that marries subtle modernity, elegance and high quality services.

Please find their pitch below:

They remain available to organise unique events: art exhibitions, weddings, parties, birthdays, anniversaries, business meetings and so forth. They also can manage all event sizes, from an intimate 2 person meetings to 350 person large soirées. Enjoy their garden setting with ample parking in a special place in Brussels.

Feel free to pay them a visit to see their event space. For additional information contact Eric Boereboom (eric@b19.be - 0471 911 911).