Roy W. Crum Distinguished Service Award

The Award recognizes outstanding achievement in the performance and production of fundamental or developmental transportation-related research. It is also a lifetime achievement award, and the recipient should be someone who has distinguished themselves through advances in transportation because of their personal portfolio of research over the course of their career.

In 1948 the Highway Research Board established an award in recognition of outstanding achievement in the field of transportation research. This award was known as the Highway Research Board Distinguished Service Award until 1952, when the Executive Committee designated it the Roy W. Crum Distinguished Service Award as a memorial to the Board's director, Roy W. Crum, who served as head of the HRB staff from 1928 until his death in 1951.

Who Can Nominate

Anyone currently or formally in the transportation research or research implementation fields.

Nomination Process

The nomination portal will be opened during the beginning in June. All nominations must be submitted no later than July 31. A single nomination may be jointly-submitted/supported by multiple nominators, but nominators must designate a corresponding nominator and all nominators must currently be or formally have been engaged in the transportation research or research implementation fields.

Nominators will be expected to summarize information on their candidate in each of the following areas: 1) Performance and production of transportation-related research; 2) Transportation advancements attributed to the candidates work; 3) Candidate’s TRB volunteer activities; and 4) Other intangibles nominators believe make their candidate eligible for this lifetime achievement award.

Summary information for a candidate within each of these areas may not exceed 400 words for a total of no more than 1,600 words per nomination. Nominators will have the option to upload their candidate’s bio or provide a link to their candidate’s bio online. Nominators should limit their nominations to no more than one candidate per nomination cycle.  Current TRB staff are not eligible to receive this award.

All nominators will be notified upon a decision by the selection committee. The award recipient will be notified in October and a formal announcement is released later in the Fall. The award is dated the year the recipient is named and is presented at the Chair’s Plenary Session at the January TRB Annual Meeting.

Selection Committee

The Selection Committee consists of the Chair and Vice Chair of the TRB Executive Committee, Chair and Vice-Chair of the TRB Division Committee, and the Executive Director of TRB.