National Center for Wood Transportation Structures

The objective of the National Center for Wood Transportation Structures (NCWTS) is to bring together academia, government, and industry to efficiently complete research, demonstration and education that result in durable, cost-effective wood transportation structures to improve the transportation infrastructure of America and the world.

The NCWTS is located on the campus of Iowa State University (ISU) and is part of the Bridge Engineering Center. Maintained in partnership with the Forest Products Laboratory, the Federal Highway Administration, and the National Park Service (NPS), the NCWTS integrates university and government research programs and supports a national demonstration and technology transfer program. It also serves as an international center of excellence with an emphasis on the improved use, durability, and performance of wood transportation structures on primary and secondary roads and the rural transportation infrastructure. Research may be accomplished entirely by the NCWTS partners but will more commonly be accomplished through cooperative efforts with universities, government agencies, and private industry.

FPL has been involved in wood transportation structures research for over 60 years. In 1988, the traditional program expanded significantly when Congress passed the Timber Bridge Initiative (TBI). Its objective was to establish a national program to provide effective and efficient utilization of wood as a structural material for highway bridges. Responsibility for development, implementation, and administration of the program was assigned to the U.S. Forest Service. Within the program, the Forest Service established three primary program areas: demonstration bridges, technology transfer, and research. The demonstration bridge program, administered by the Forest Service National Wood in Transportation Information Center (NWITIC) in Morgantown, West Virginia, provided matching funds on a competitive basis to local governments to demonstrate timber bridge technology through the construction of demonstration bridges. The NWITIC also maintained a technology transfer program to provide assistance and state-of-the-art information related to timber bridges.

Responsibility for the research portion of the TBI program was assigned to the Forest Products Laboratory. The primary focus of TBI research was the development of new and improved technology for timber bridge materials and systems. In 1992, the FPL research program was expanded to include wood transportation structures such as noise barriers, marine facilities, retaining walls, and sign supports. At the same time, a substantial joint research program was initiated between the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) Turner-Fairbank Highway Research Center and FPL to implement the FHWA timber bridge research program mandated under the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act (ISTEA) of 1991. In subsequent years, the FHWA also initiated a substantial covered wood bridge rehabilitation and research program under the National Historic Covered Bridge Preservation Program mandated in 1999 by the Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century (TEA21) and in 2004 by the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, and Efficient Transportation Act-A Legacy for Users (SAFETA-LU). To assist in implementing this program, the FHWA developed partnerships with FPL and the NPS.

Funding for the NWITIC ended in FY 2004, leaving significant voids in research capability, education, and technical assistance to governmental agencies, industry, and research institutions. In response, FPL moved to establish the NCWTS at ISU based on more than 25 years of cooperative research between ISU and FPL in the area of wood bridges as well as their extensive expertise in transportation structures. This Center was established in FY 2007 as a university-government-industry partnership to provide greater program efficiency and leverage federal funding to maximize public benefit at minimal cost. Given the longstanding cooperative relationship with FHWA, and the developing partnership with the NPS, both agencies were also included as partners in the new NCWTS at ISU. This joint national program and the creation of the NCWTS are particularly timely and valuable because wood bridges represent more than 27% of the Nation's bridges and afford an opportunity to efficiently utilize naturally sustainable forest resources. Additionally, more than 25% of our Nation's bridges are structurally deficient or functionally obsolete. The problem is especially critical on rural road systems where wood bridges offer many advantages due to their ease of construction.

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