Making the Nation Safer The Role of Science and Technology in Countering Terrorism (2002) / Chapter Skim
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7. Transportation Systems
7. Transportation Systems
Pages 210-237
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From page 210... ...
Many transportation facilities and structures are strategically important, serv{For a description of the range and nature of terrorist attacks in public surface transportation, see Jenkins (1997, 2001)
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From page 211... ...
Security in other modes of land and maritime transportation had been, and largely remains today, the responsibility of state and local law enforcement authorities, the many public and private entities that own and operate the transport systems, and various federal agencies responsible for port and border security. The committee urges the new TSA to take the lead in identifying coherent security systems for each mode of transportation, to work with the private and public sectors in this country and abroad in deploying these systems, and to further the development of supporting expertise and technologies.
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Widespread use of private cars and motor carriers, for instance, spurred greater investment in the highway system relative to public transportation and railroads. Likewise, travel by motor vehicle and airliners displaced demand for intercity passenger rail service in the second half of the 20th century, prompting increased government spending on airports and freeways.
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transportation sector is unmatched in the world, and a major reason for the country's high productivity and mobility. Another consequence of the emphasis on efficiency, however, is that costly security measures that promise unclear benefits or that impede operations are likely to be resisted or eschewed, whereas those that confer economic benefits are apt to be deployed and sustained.
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Sound security measures can do a lot; for instance, they can confound and deter terrorist operations, increase the likelihood of the terrorists being detected and intercepted, keep casualties and disruptions to a minimum, and reduce panic and reassure passengers in a crisis.6 What the characteristics of the transportation sector do suggest is the need for a coherent and systematic approach to security. In particular, such an approach should be shaped by (1)
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By comparison, the much more open and decentralized maritime and land transportation systems are far less amenable to such a defensive, or protective, approach. The intensive inspection and screening methods used for air transportation security, for instance, are likely to be impractical for transportation modes that require more convenient user access and have myriad points of entry.
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, will allow authorities to make better use of their limited inspection, screening, and enforcement resources. In fashioning such a layered security system that begins early in the logistics stream, the prospects of a containerized weapon being intercepted before reaching the United States, and the chances of the act being deterred in the first place, are likely to be greater than under the current system of infrequent container inspections at destination ports and other border crossings.
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Customs Service Web site at |
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Grounding of aircraft by the FAA's air traffic controllers after the September 11 attacks and the use made by forensic experts of tracking codes imprinted on U.S. mail after the anthrax attacks show that such dual-use opportunities exist and can be integrated into security planning.
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Making a long-term commitment to costly security technologies developed and deployed outside a systems context runs the risk of early and prolonged obsolescence as technologies, transportation operations, and security threats change. A more efficient, adaptable, and system-oriented approach might suggest such tactics as the randomization of security screening, the setting of traps, and the masking of detection capabilities all to allocate security resources most effectively and to create layers of uncertainty that can inhibit terrorist activity through what have been called "curtains of mystery." To minimize costly disruptions to transportation services, it may be desirable to narrow the security task to target the highest-risk actors and activities.
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Many opportunities exist for using information generated by operations (e.g., ticket reservation records, shipment manifests, passenger identification) to devise layered security systems in air and maritime transportation.
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Public transit systems that are prepared for response and recovery are less desirable targets for attackers banking on mass confusion and disorder to amplify the harm.l7 Capability to Engage in Unconventional Thinking on Threats and Responses The size, scope, and ubiquity of the transportation sector, coupled with its myriad owners, operators, and users, means that many opportunities exist for terrorists to exploit components of transport systems in many different, and novel, ways. After all, terrorists may not view individual transportation assets, infrastructure, and services in isolation and in traditional function-oriented ways but rather as tools that can be exploited for other objectives much as jet airliners and mailed letters were used as weapons delivery systems last fall.
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At the moment, numerous expert groups are offering R&D advice to transportation agencies at the federal, state, and local levels. Missing, however, is more enduring advice on how to go about establishing, implementing, and sustaining these priorities.
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Such systems research and analysis will also provide an understanding of normal patterns of transportation activity and behavior, which is essential for developing security programs that filter out trusted passengers and shippers and for designing and deploying networks of sensors in ways that enhance their accuracy and reduce the incidence of missed and false alarms. Moreover, an understanding of the operations and economics of transportation systems is crucial for finding ways to integrate security with other transportation system objectives.
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Privacy and civil rights controversies, for example, dominate the debate over data mining and biometric technologies for passenger prescreening, identification, and surveillance a debate that goes beyond the transportation sector, extending to other technology-based realms as well.20 Though technological advances will undoubtedly continue to offer many i8See Badolato (2000) and Flynn (2000a, 2000b)
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Psychological studies have sought to model criminal attitudes by interviewing perpetrators, and similar studies could presumably be directed to terrorist types in order to better understand the factors influencing their decisions to attack or avoid targets. Such knowledge could prove useful in assessing the deterrent effects of specific tactics such as the use of chemical-sniffing dogs, the randomized deployment of surveillance cameras, and 20As an example, civil-rights issues associated with automated passenger-profiling systems are discussed in the report of the White House Commission on Aviation Safety and Security (1997)
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Research on numerous such issues is clearly required to help policy makers evaluate preventive measures.21 Yet another prevention-related need is for explosives detection systems that are sensitive to a wider range of materials. At the moment, many threats are not detectable; for instance, a pouch sealed in plastic and taped on a person's body may not register with available screening devices.
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Indeed, the use of FAA' s air-traffic management system to ground aircraft on September 11 demonstrated how existing traffic operations and control systems can be used to detect terrorist attacks in progress and help manage the crisis. The fast and decisive actions taken by local traffic control centers to prevent commuter and subway trains from passing under the World Trade Center may have saved hundreds of lives.
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As noted earlier, the ability to quickly recover and reconstitute transportation services is crucial for limiting the cascading effects of terrorist attacks. This may require a range of capabilities, from the specific means to reroute traffic around the disrupted areas to well-rehearsed, regional emergency response plans that coordinate highway and public transportation systems.
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ADVICE TO THE TRANSPORTATION SECURITY ADMINISTRATION ON STRATEGIC RESEARCH AND PLANNING The Aviation and Transportation Security Act of 2001, which created TSA, set forth a series of responsibilities and deadlines for the agency, from the assumption of airline passenger and baggage screening functions to the deployment of air marshals and explosives detection systems at commercial airports. Whereas most of the act' s provisions deal exclusively with civil aviation, it also gives TSA a broader security mandate affecting all transport modes that includes the following statutory responsibilities: .
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. Advise metropolitan governments and transportation agencies on the need to develop integrated regional emergency response plans; and advise local and state transportation agencies, public transportation authorities, and related entities on how to reshape their administrative structures so as to give security prominence in their planning and decision making.
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It will also need to interact closely with other federal agencies in domains of responsibility integral to transportation (such as the Coast Guard, the Customs Service, FEMA, and the Immigration and Naturalization Service) , with international standard-setting bodies (such as the International Civil Aviation Organization, the World Customs Organization, and the International Maritime Organization)
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Recommendation 7.2: TSA should collaborate with the public and private sectors to build a strong foundation of research on human factors and transportation operations and to make the evaluation of security system concepts a central element of its collaborative research program. TSA must establish an in-house research capacity to undertake such concept evaluations and to support its own large security operations and technology acquisition programs.
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The Department of Transportation, and particularly TSA, should take steps now to build this strategic capability and ensure its permanence. In the same manner, others have urged the Office of Homeland Security to adopt such a strategic and architect-like role on a broader scale for the federal government as a whole.25 TSA's security mission does not extend beyond the transportation sector, but as the events of September 11 revealed, vulnerabilities to terrorist acts may not be limited to components within particular transportation modes and systems.
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DEDICATION The panel is indebted to the earlier work of other National Research Council committees, including reports by the National Matenals Advisory Board's Panel on Assessment of Technologies Deployed to Improve Aviation Secunty, led by Thomas Hartwick.26 In addition, the 1999 NRC report Improving Surface Transportation Security: A Research and Development Strategy, by a committee chaired by H Norman Abramson, is cited repeatedly and helped shape the panel's discussion on R&D strategies and opportunities.27 A key member of the committee that produced Improving Surface Transportation Security, Fred V
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l999b. Improving Surface Transportation Security: A Research and Development Strategy, National Materials Advisory Board, Transportation Research Board, and Computer Science and Telecommunications Board, National Academy Press, Washington, D.C.
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