See a ScienceDirect article you need? Follow the prompts and when you see a screen like this click "Continue" for full text!

Thanks to a new ScienceDirect contract the VDOT Research Library has reconfigured VDOT's subscription to create a new "self-service" experience that gives employees desktop access to full-text articles and book chapters.

We all know that some of the best technical journals in transportation are published by Elsevier through ScienceDirect, right?  Well, effective immediately nearly all 16 million articles and chapters from 4,100 journals and 39,000 e-Books in that platform are accessible through VDOT's subscription for direct download by VDOT employees. 

Because it includes journals in health and social sciences, don't be surprised if you see some articles that may not seem so relevant to transportation professionals.  We're now letting you make that call!  However, we are in the process of compiling a list of "Core Journals" most frequently requested by your VDOT peers, and you might be surprised to see helpful titles not only on engineering and materials science, but also on economics, construction, safety, human factors, environmental topics, urban planning, and much more. 

If you've been a library user for a while, you may recall that in 2015 we established a deposit account for ScienceDirect articles, but only library staffers could download articles at that time. The best we could do was give you a clunky online request form and deliver what you requested.  To our surprise, we still got hundreds of requests!

Prior to that VDOT employees had to request ScienceDirect articles through the library's Document Delivery Serivce, a tremendous service, but one which often took even longer to get articles into your hands.  Don't get me wrong, we'll still deliver any article to you, especially if it saves you time or energy.  But these days we know you're all about convenience!

What You Should Do Next:

1. If you use ScienceDirect journals, why not Create a Free Account? (Requires use of your VDOT e-mail address.)

2. Check out this handy ScienceDirect Quick-Start Guide we created to help you get going.

3. If you find an article you need, we ask you to review the abstract carefully to be sure it is worth the click (since the library's account will be debited).

4. If so, when you see wording that says "Please select continue to access this article under your organization's agreement with Elsevier" feel free to click away!

Questions?  Feel free to contact us at any time.  

We are here to help!

Ken Winter
(434) 962-8979
VDOT Research Library