Transportation information: a review of grey literature by format, language and availability

Abstract

This article describes a research study that was replicated to confirm the research methodologies and search strategies of transportation engineers in their primary databases as the formats for access changed due to electronic releases in CD‐ROM and via the Internet. An empirical snapshot of the available transportation literature recognizing how much of it is described as grey literature is demonstrated by the retrieval of five search statements replicated in the TRIS and TRANSPORT databases. Recommendations include that libraries increase their participation in TAG and working with government agencies to encourage them to electronically publish their data for end‐user searching and that more continue to participate in cooperative collection development ventures.