Database Usage
Subscription database use as measured by full-text downloads continued to climb this quarter, reaching an all-time record of 4,684. Last quarter's total downloads were above average at 3,494 and the quarter before was even higher at 3,798. These numbers point to the growing importance of VDOT employee direct access to full-text online subscription resources. That trend has been growing for well over a decade. The 5-year average for downloads last year it was around 3,200/quarter but with this quarter's statistics reached a new high of 3,434/quarter. Leading all resources (as is typically the case) are databases focused on engineering and technical topics. This quarter the lead resource was ASTM Compass, followed by Transportation Research Record (TRR), ASCE Library and Knovel. TRR downloads were also at a record high for reasons that are not clear. The 5-year average for TRR downloads is about 250 downloads is quarter but this quarter we saw a record 629 downloads. TRR was the library's first subscription resource, acquired through VDOT's TRB membership in 2007 and managed by the library since then.
The VDOT Research Library continues to expand access to key resources through desktop access to subscriptions. VDOT employees have access to 22 database subscriptions (19 of those are "full text") and because we serve the entire VDOT community, these resources see steady usage. The table below shows the number of downloads per month this quarter (averaging 1,553/month), the highest ever recorded.
| Subscription Downloads By VDOT: FY24 Q1 | ||||
| July | August | September | Total | |
| ASTM Compass | 878 | 809 | 757 | 2,444 |
| Transportation Research Record | 273 | 152 | 204 | 629 |
| ASCE Library | 129 | 175 | 172 | 476 |
| Knovel | 162 | 167 | 134 | 463 |
| Skillsoft Books | 197 | 86 | 93 | 376 |
| Non-Subscription Downloads (Library Catalog) | 25 | 42 | 76 | 143 |
| EBSCO Business Source Corporate Plus | 4 | 11 | 35 | 50 |
| * EBSCO eBooks | 3 | 19 | 14 | 36 |
| EBSCO Business Book Summaries | 10 | 12 | 10 | 32 |
| ScienceDirect | 8 | 6 | 11 | 25 |
| ** Miscellaneous journals | 5 | 1 | 4 | 10 |
| Monthly Totals | 1,694 | 1,480 | 1,510 | 4,684 |
* The EBSCO eBooks category combines three EBSCO eBook collections: Harvard Business Review Press, BussinessCore and EngineeringCore.
** The Miscellaneous journals category includes journals from the ICE Virtual Library collection, Taylor & Francis, ACI and Corrosion.
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