Last month, a team of four Portland State University (PSU) students competed in the 34th Annual Bill Kloos Traffic Bowl, hosted by the Oregon chapter of the Institute of Transportation Engineers (ITE). The PSU team took second place, with Oregon State University (OSU) as the first-place winners. Second prize was a cash award of $400, which PSU's ITE student chapter, Students in Transportation Engineering and Planning (STEP), has added to its club funds.
The funds, and the excitement of receiving a big cardboard check, weren't the only rewards for PSU team members Pabitra Kumar Roy, Elias Peters, Sammy Won, and Jacob Hoopes. They also gained experience and confidence, along with some new knowledge.
"To me, it's a great experience. Meeting new people, quizzing yourself on your academic knowledge. That's really fun, and it also helps me to correlate what I'm learning in my classes to real-life things," said Roy, who will graduate with a masters in transportation engineering this quarter. He served as the Leader of Events, Conferences, and Finance for STEP this year, and undergraduate Community, Urban Studies, and Planning (CUSP) student Sammy Won is the group's Leader of Outreach and Social Chair.
Peters, who serves as STEP's Leader of Communications and Administration this year, is a dual graduate student pursuing an M.S. Civil Engineering and a Masters of Urban and Regional Planning (MURP). He has competed in Traffic Bowl twice before, and noted that each year he feels more confident in his knowledge.
"This is my third Traffic Bowl. Every year, I'm more and more confident, because I'm learning more. I don't need to practice for Traffic Bowl as much. I'm just taking classes and being immersed in the transportation world, and then I'm like, oh, I know things now! Like, oh, that came from my class! Oh, that came from my life! That's where I feel like the value of Traffic Bowl is. If you just go to events and pay attention in class, and are connected to the transportation world somehow, you'll do decently in this," Peters said.
An Exciting Finish To The Competition
Until the final round, it was not clear which team would win. The competition finished up with a Final Jeopardy-style question in which teams wrote down their answers then chose how much to bet. The final question was on pavement engineering—a topic not commonly studied by students focused on traffic engineering or urban planning at PSU—and the PSU team decided to gamble on their answer.
"It was down to the wire, because we were ahead in the final Jeopardy—but we bet too much, and got it wrong," Peters said.
The University of Washington team answered the question correctly, but did not bet enough to put them in the lead. The winning team, Oregon State, got the question wrong, but their wager still left them in top position.
Traffic Bowl is a social evening with dinner and drinks for transportation professionals, academics, and students to connect. “It’s a great opportunity to catch up with our many alums working in the area, cheer on our students, and test our own knowledge,” said Jennifer Dill, TREC Director. Spectators at this year's event enjoyed the suspense and drama of the final moments.
"It's dinner and a show, but we're the show," Peters said.
The PSU team also took second prize last year, and won the grand prize in 2023. Peters would encourage more PSU transportation students to take part in the future.
"I feel like people get intimidated by it. It's really low stakes, and it's really fun," he said.
Portland State University's Transportation Research and Education Center (TREC) is a multidisciplinary hub for all things transportation. We are home to the Initiative for Bicycle and Pedestrian Innovation (IBPI), the data programs PORTAL and BikePed Portal, the Better Block PSU program, and PSU's membership in PacTrans, the Pacific Northwest Transportation Consortium. Our continuing goal is to produce impactful research and tools for transportation decision makers, expand the diversity and capacity of the workforce, and engage students and professionals through education, seminars, and participation in research. To get updates about what's happening at TREC, sign up for our monthly newsletter or follow us on social media.
