The critical importance of safety to the public transportation industry makes compliance with safety-related rules a key concern. Despite the industry’s solid safety record, one major accident stemming from rule noncompliance can call into question the safety of the entire industry. While APTA’s adoption of a voluntary standard for rule compliance in 2004 is an important step, more remains to be done. Of particular concern are safety-related rules that are designed to prevent high-consequence events, especially those where the public is affected or where there may be harm to transit agency employees. Safety-related rules apply to employees involved in the operation and maintenance of the transit system. This includes vehicle operators, dispatchers, and other operations personnel, as well as those who maintain the vehicles and track infrastructure. With few exceptions, the practices described in this report are applicable to all public transit modes and are scalable to the size of the transit agency. QinetiQ North America conducted the research for TCRP Project A-34. The research began with a comprehensive review of safety-related and organizational research that identified proven approaches for improving rules compliance in public transportation and other safety-critical industries, including the railroad, aviation, trucking, motor coach, and petrochemical industries. Using criteria relevant to public transportation, the research team selected best practices for improving safety-related rule compliance. Achieving safety-related rule compliance requires more than monitoring for noncompliance and responding to it when it occurs. It requires preventive actions designed to encourage compliant behaviour. This document suggests best practices for all of the elements of a comprehensive approach to safety-related rules compliance. The categories of best practices, which correspond to the elements of a safety-related rules compliance program, are the following: • Screening and Selecting Employees; • Training and Testing; • Communication; • Monitoring Rules Compliance; • Responding to Noncompliance; and • Safety Management. The report also presents best practices for a prototype safety reporting system for public transportation. The safety reporting systems for aviation, railroading, and firefighting as well as two systems in the public transportation industry were investigated and were the basis for the prototype safety reporting system. The focus of this investigation was on understanding how the safety reporting system was developed, stakeholder concerns during system design, key features and provisions of each, and experiences to date. (Author/publisher) This report is available online at http://onlinepubs.trb.org/onlinepubs/tcrp/tcrp_rpt_149.pdf
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