OTREC is pleased to announce the third issue of OTREC News. Issues of OTREC News include reports on our research projects, profiles of students and faculty, introductions to our Executive Committee and Advisory Board, updates on education programs and events, reports of partner university transportation news, and examples of exciting collaboration within our Consortium. This issue includes several special features describing ongoing research projects, the Region X Student Conference and much more. We welcome your feedback on our publications! Read the newsletter here: Newsletter Spring 2008.
OTREC was an active participant in the Region X Transportation Consortium meeting hosted by the Alaska University Transportation Center (AUTC) at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks. Hau Hagedorn, Chris Higgins, Barnie Jones and Robert Bertini were the Oregon delegation participating in the event. Meeting participants (at left) toured the Permafrost Tunnel Research Facility that is part of the Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory. Shown at right is the Oregon group, standing in front of a 30,000 year old ice lens.
Congratulations to Jennifer Dill! Dr. Dill received a Civic Engagement Award from the Center for Academic Excellence at Portland State University this spring. The award is for her work to create the Initiative for Bicycle and Pedestrian Innovation (IBPI), a collaborative partnership between the Center for Transportation Studies at PSU, the Department of Planning, Public Policy and Management at UO, and the College of Engineering at OSU. Dr. Dill was honored in an awards ceremony in late May. More about IBPI here: IBPI.
On May 15, 2008, Jennifer Dill, Associate Professor in the Nohad A. Toulan School of Urban Studies and Planning and Director of the Center for Transportation Studies at Portland State University, participated in a congressional briefing in Washington, D.C. The briefing was sponsored by the Congressional Bike Caucus and the Active Living Research program of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation on Biking Your Way to a Healthier Community. The Congressional Bike Caucus is chaired by Congressman Earl Blumenauer (OR) and Congressman Tom Petri (WI). Dr. Dill described her ongoing research of regional bike trips, tracked by GPS-equipped bicyclists. She notes that preliminary analysis shows that half of the bicycle riding happened on roads with bike lanes, off-street paths, or bicycle boulevards. She also briefly discussed policy implications and further research needs. Read Dr. Dill’s briefing here: Briefing.
OTREC was pleased to host a two day course on Roundabout Design Analysis, taught by Brian Ray and Wade Scarborough, of Kittelson & Associates, May 7-8, 2008. Professionals from around the Northwest (and Canada!) participated in the highly interactive course. This is part of OTREC’s ongoing effort to provide relevant and affordable training and education opportunities for working professionals.
On May 1, 2008, USDOT Research and Innovative Technology Administration (RITA) Administrator Paul Brubaker and Thomas Marchessault, UTC Outreach Liaison for RITA, spent the day visiting OTREC. Mr. Brubaker and Mr. Marchessault were given an overview of OTRECís web proposal and project management system, and participated in faculty project ìspotlightî demonstrations, and a special poster session with students. In the afternoon, Matthew Garrett, Director of the Oregon Department of Transportation, and Administrator Brubaker gave remarks on the future of transportation technology to an audience that included the OTREC Board of Advisors, Executive Committee, faculty, students and community transportation leaders at an OTREC reception. PSU graduate student Lisa Diercksen introduced the guests and spoke about her experience as a research assistant and OTREC Scholar. Administrator Brubaker spoke about the need for an interdisciplinary approach to transportation problems of the future, as evident in the multidisciplinary nature of OTREC programs that bring together faculty and students from civil engineering, urban studies and planning, public policy, architecture, business, computer science, environmental science, etc.
Proposals for 2008-2009 transportation research, education and technology transfer projects were due on March 14, 2008. OTREC received 50 proposals with a total request of over $3 million. Over half the proposals involve collaboration between two or more researchers, and around 14% involve collaboration between two or more campuses. This underscores OTRECís focus on collaboration and multidisciplinary initiatives. Proposals will now go through a rigorous peer-review process, with projects in total of around $2 million to be selected this summer.
Carol Wallace joined OTREC as the Fiscal Operations Coordinator in March, and we are happy to add her experience to our team! Carol has a BS in Accounting from Portland State University. She worked for ten years at Oregon State University in the College of Oceanic and Atmospheric Sciences as a grant and contract fiscal coordinator for the college and as the fiscal manager for CIOSS, a cooperative institute funded by NOAA. At OSU, Carol had oversight for over 300 grants and contracts totaling more than $28 million. She was on the Presidentís Commission on the Status of Women and the board of the Womenís Center. Carol is looking forward to working with everyone at OTREC and learning more about a new area of research ñ transportation.
The Oregon Transportation Research and Education Consortium (OTREC) now offers free podcasts (audio files in mp3 format) of the Portland State University Transportation Seminar Series. As part of their technology transfer program, podcasts from seminars given by OTREC Visiting Scholars and others are now available for download. Covering a wide array of transportation topics from policy and planning to operations and freight, recent speakers include Oregon Congressman Earl Blumenauer, Brian Taylor (UCLA), John Pucher (Rutgers University), Peter Stopher (University of Sydney), Susan Handy (UC Davis), Joseph Sussman (MIT), and Donald Shoup (UCLA). In addition, nearly 200 PSU seminars are available anywhere in the world as streaming video and downloadable video files: CTS seminars.
Faculty from all four OTREC partner campuses participated in the 2008 Northwest Transportation Conference at Oregon State University February 5-7. Under the theme of "Making the Most of What We Have: Innovations for the 21st Century," faculty served as session moderators and as roundtable members for a variety of topics. Portland State University attendees included Jennifer Dill, Peter Dusicka, Miguel Figliozzi, Hau Hagedorn, Chris Monsere, Tony Rufolo, Kristin Tufte and Brent Zenobia. University of Oregon faculty attending were Nico Larco, Marc Schlossberg and Yizhao Yang. Faculty from Oregon State University included Karen Dixon, Chris Higgins, Starr McMullen, Todd Scholz, Michael Scott and Lei Zhang. OTREC Associate Director Roger Lindgren from the Oregon Institute of Technology also attended. More information about the conference and program sessions: NWTC.