The INCOSE Systems Engineering Handbook is the official INCOSE reference document for understanding systems engineering (SE) methods and conducting SE activities. Over the years, the Handbook has evolved to accommodate advances in the SE discipline and now serves as the basis for the Certified Systems Engineering Professional (CSEP) exam. Due to its evolution, the Handbook had become somewhat disjointed in its treatment and presentation of SE topics and was not aligned with the latest version of International Organization for Standardization (ISO)/International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) 15288:2008, Systems and Software Engineering. As a result, numerous inconsistencies were identified that could confuse practitioners and directly impact the probability of success in passing the CSEP exam. Further, INCOSE leadership had previously submitted v3.1 of the Handbook to ISO/IEC for consideration as a Technical Report, but was told that the Handbook would have to be updated to conform with the terminology and structure of new ISO/IEC15288:2008, Systems and software engineering, prior to being considered.

AbstractThe authors believe that better deployment of Systems Engineering (SE) would benefit the rail and transit sector. They have formed an INCOSE working group to develop guidelines which advance this objective, starting with the topic of requirements engineering.Although there is already sound guidance on requirements engineering, its influence within the sector has been limited. In hopes of changing this, the authors have created a short requirements guide, illustrated with practical examples and written in plain language. The authors' premise is that the benefits of increased accessibility outweigh any loss in comprehensiveness and precision.The guide is being produced following an iterative process involving peer review by INCOSE groups. The current working version is attached to this paper. The authors believe that following this guide would benefit rail and transit projects. The approach described may be of value to other SE practitioner trying to convince skeptics of the value of SE.

This paper explores how systems engineering is being applied to meet the growing need for an Intelligent Transportation System (ITS). There are similarities between the approaches that civil engineers take to design highways and that systems engineers take to solve complex system development problems. The process of developing a highway design can be directly correlated to the system development life cycle used in systems engineering. The progression of highway development is demonstrated to be an evolution of technologies, inventions, organizational creations, and legislative acts that has supported the development of a national interstate transportation system in the United States. The ITS is a global phenomena and is being pursued in Europe, Australia, and Japan as well as the United States. Until now, highway development has been the domain of civil engineers concerned with highway structures, materials loading, traffic patterns, and supporting facilities. However, the growing need for ITS or intelligent‐vehicle highway systems (IVHSs) requires that traditional civil engineering disciplines be integrated with computers, communications, and eventually fully automated vehicles. This paper's thesis suggests that the complex highway transportation of the 21st century can benefit from the collaboration of systems engineers and civil engineers.