Director's Message
Winter – a slow time for many – is a hectic yet rewarding season for TransNow.
January is the month for the Transportation Research Board conference and accompanying meetings in Washington DC. Many of our activities and goals come together at TRB and we get “recharged” for the calendar year. Many of our accomplishments are showcased at TRB. Our student of the year, Yao-Jan Wu came up from his new position as Research Associate at the University of Virginia to accept BOTH the CUTC Student of the Year and the Region X Michael Kyte award (as best student from Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Washington UTCs). TransNow sent an unprecedented number of students to TRB this year from UW and WSU. (In particular, Dr. Yinhai Wang’s students received an overwhelming number of acceptances from TRB this year.) In return for our help with travel funds, we ask students to tell us about their experiences and we run a contest for the best “DC photo”. Please read their responses and take a look at their photos within this newsletter. And if any of their stories touch you, please consider going online and making a gift to support students in some fashion. You can link here to make a gift to either WSU or UW.
All together the UW and WSU contributed to 63 presentations, posters or hosted events at TRB. You can read about each of them and the individual participants at our new website.
TransNow also organized this year’s Regional X Reception. Directors from 5 UTC’s welcomed students, alumni and other guests including a research group from Norway. The UW and Washington State Department of Transportation are hoping to collaborate with officials from the Norwegian Public Road Administration and SINTEF (Norway's largest research organization). They discussed cooperation and the coordination of research efforts. Areas of common interest include freight mobility, terminal operations, traffic data collection, tolling, Intelligent Transportation Systems, and winter maintenance.
In addition to the vast array of TRB related meetings, we attended the CUTC (Council of University Transportation Centers) and RITA/UTC (Research and Innovative Technology Administration/University Transportation Centers) meetings and met with one of our federal relations officers (Christy Guillion, UW) along with other key TransNow individuals – all in DC from Washington State. Then some of us spent considerable time at the airport or being rerouted home via Texas due to the heavy snow storms on the East Coast.
We are now looking towards Spring. The UW College of Engineering Discovery Days-an open house with engineering and science exhibits for all ages-will take place April 22nd-23rd at the UW Seattle Campus. TransNow will host an exhibit on "Distracted Driving" with simulators provided by State Farm Insurance. WSU will host a tour of the WSU stormwater research center in Puyallup later this spring . Participants will include transportation and environmental engineers from consulting firms and government agencies.
In June TransNow PIs will complete this year’s research projects and the Board will select the very best proposals for Year 24.