The American Transportation Research Institute’s board of directors recently approved its 2020 Top Research Priorities as identified by the group’s Research Advisory Committee. Topics will include workforce, infrastructure, legal, and operational issues, which were identified in ATRI’s annual Top Industry Issues Survey.

The 2020 ATRI top research priorities include:

• Impact of Small Settlements on the Trucking Industry: A follow-on to ATRI’s work on nuclear verdicts, this study will focus on those legal settlements of less than $1 million, including their frequency, fleet responses, and the consideration of verdicts versus settlements.

• Rethinking Mileage-Based Safety Metrics: Research will examine the potential new metrics for evaluating safety performance beyond traditional rates per million vehicle miles traveled.

• Owner-Operators/Independent Contractors in the Supply Chain: Research would assess the role of O/O and ICs including the type and extent of use, and financial and operational differences to better inform policy decisions.

• Cost-Benefit Analysis of Vehicle Miles Traveled Taxes: ATRI will examine multiple data sets associated with VMT tax deployment including implementation and enforcement costs, potential evasion, and the challenges of implementing at the state and local levels.

• Impacts of Rising Insurance Costs on Industry Operational Costs: Research will dissect fleet resources and business decision-making processes to better understand what fleets are doing to cover these cost increases, from reprioritizing technology investments to cannibalizing other cost centers, such as safety.