researchreview UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN TRANSPORTATION RESEARCH INSTITUTE
JANUARY–FEBRUARY 2021
Editor’s note: In 1970, five years after UMTRI was founded, the Institute began publishing a quarterly report, the Highway Institute for Transportation Lab Reports (HIT Reports). In the 1980’s this report was renamed the UMTRI Research Review and continued as a quarterly, print publication until 2014 when it moved to an electronic format. We have redesigned the Research Review using the latest developments in electronic publishing and content delivery and are ready for a relaunch! This inaugural issue will serve as our annual report, where we will recap the research achievements and challenges of this past year.
Letter from the Director UMTRI was founded in 1965 with a $10M grant from Ford, GM, and the Automobile Manufacturers Association. At that time over 50,000 Americans were dying in traffic events every year.
“you find the very best people to lead in each discipline and then you get out of their way.”
riginally called the Highway Safety Research Institute, our founding mission was to analyze the elements of the complex and dynamic system of people, automotive vehicles and the environments in which they operate, and to develop practical and effective solutions to urgent problems of highway safety within that system.
Early research areas included attitudes of drivers, the influence of drugs and alcohol, road design, vehicle engineering, tire-road interaction, vehicle dynamics, the influence of laws and standards on driving and the stress of crashes on human bodies. Our research findings have influenced public policies, safety regulations, industry standards and product design; all have led to safer highway travel and lives saved.
From the beginning, researchers were encouraged to be bold, courageous, and seek collaborations across the university. Robert Hess, UMTRI’s founding director once said
As I look back over the past, I am struck with the relevancy of our work today. The research areas that were critical to reducing crashes and fatalities 55 years ago are as
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critical as ever. Research projects on safety belts, attitudes of drivers, and our largescale deployments to assess new technologies have evolved and continue to address the transportation and mobility needs of road users around the world. Over the past 55 years, UMTRI has grown to become one of the largest research institutes at U-M with research expenditures of $20 million annually, conducting over 1,000 research projects and collecting hundreds of terabytes of data. Continued on page 2
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