Keynote speeches
Distinguished researchers and practitioners will give keynote speeches on the resilience of transportation systems.
Contents of this section will be updated with confirmed keynote speakers
Distinguished researchers and practitioners will give keynote speeches on the resilience of transportation systems.
Contents of this section will be updated with confirmed keynote speakers
Carol is President of Schweiger Consulting, has over 42 years of transportation experience, and is nationally and internationally recognized in applying effective and efficient transportation technologies. She has a wide-ranging and in-depth expertise in systems engineering, technology strategies for public agencies (including technology-enabled mobility services and mobility as a service), public transit and paratransit technology and traveler information strategies. She has provided over 75 transportation agencies with technology technical assistance, including developing technology strategies based on needs assessments; developing technical specifications and structured processes to procure and implement technology systems; applying systems engineering to technology projects; providing procurement and implementation assistance; and evaluating technology deployments.
Schweiger developed and delivered (via webinar) seven modules regarding transit technology standards and co-developed and was the lead instructor for five transit technology training courses for the National Transit Institute (NTI). She authored five Transit Cooperative Research Program (TCRP) Synthesis reports and authored one and co-authored two full TCRP reports.
Carol has a B.S. in Mathematics from Tufts University and an M.S. in Civil Engineering from Cornell University. She is Co-Chair of the TRB Standing Committee on Innovative Public Transportation Services and Technologies, and participates in many other relevant committees.
Two of the hottest topics being discussed in transportation circles around the globe are (1) the emerging and innovative technologies now being deployed in transport and (2) equitable transportation issues. These newer issues being addressed have been dramatically demonstrated during the past several years when the global transport community began addressing the “disruptions” caused to traditional transport planning and design. While disruptions were being addressed, the pandemic added significantly to this disruption with some transport professionals referring to this situation as being near devastation of transport. Travel behavior radically changed and recovery to a “norm” is still not clearly envisioned. This situation, in turn, led many to examine traditional planning and design of transport systems with the realization that all communities in society did not have the same benefits of accessibility and safety. The need to examine and establish ground rules to address equitable transportation across demographic and economic classes became apparent. These issues were begun to be discussed at the 5th Conference on Sustainable Urban Mobility. But now, the 6th Conference is building upon and moving forward with the knowledge of the lessons learned from the past couple years. This Keynote will highlight the latest research and technological innovations being deployed globally by transportation organizations.
The Keynote speaker, Carol Schweiger, has been a strong influential factor in advancing the transportation state of the art through her involvement in a variety of projects conducted for public transport agencies, numerous international technical committees, through speaking engagements and publications. Recently, she organized and moderated at the 2021 ITS World Congress a session entitled “Diverse, Accessible, Equitable and Inclusive Technology-Enabled Mobility” and won the award for Most Popular Special Interest Session out of over 200 sessions at the ITS World Congress. In addition, she organized and moderated two other sessions at the Congress: “ITS Data Generation and Use: How Are We Addressing Societal and Ethical Issues?” and “Equity Assessment of New Mobility Technologies: Current Status.” She has been writing an annual article for Intelligent Transport on her predictions in the area of technology-enabled mobility. Finally, she was named 2022 Woman of the Year by WTS Rhode Island.
Carol Schweiger
President, Schweiger Consulting LLC
+1 781-424-2208; carol@tech4transit.com
University of Thessaly (UTH) was founded in 1984. UTH is a prominent institution of Higher Education aiming to promote scientific knowledge through teaching and research, and to contribute to the cultural and economic development of the local community, and the society at large. It promotes scientific and academic excellence in all fields of expertise and rewards outstanding individual performances, establishing new scientific research units and fostering an environment that supports innovative actions.
Today, University of Thessaly, with 37 Departments and 8 schools, is the third biggest University in Greece, with its own identity and with a prominent position in our national educational system. University of Thessaly provides 105 undergraduate and postgraduate programs, and extra-curricular modules in specific research and business fields.
As one of Europe’s leading research universities, the Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e) was ranked in the top three of top performers in terms of impact in the Third European Report on S&T Indicators (2003). Together with Delft University of Technology and the University of Twente, TU/e constitutes the Dutch 3TUFederation. TU/e comprises 9 Faculties: Applied Physics, Architecture, Building & Planning, Biomedical Engineering, Chemical Engineering & Chemistry, Electrical Engineering, Industrial Design, Mathematics & Computer Science, Mechanical Engineering, and Technology Management. TU/e’s network of international contacts in both the academic world and industry is expanding rapidly and proving to be of mutual benefit to all participants. TU/e scientists have leading positions in international scientific networks and committees and are well-recognized experts in their fields of research. TU/e cooperates with a large number of front-rank universities all over Europe and the rest of the world. Research is organized in terms of carefully selected (inter)departmental research programs.
https://www.tue.nl/en/
Francesco Viti is head of MobiLab Transport Research Group of the Department of Engineering at the University of Luxembourg. His research activities range from mobility analysis, travel behavior, Intelligent Transportation Systems, logistics and network modelling and control. He is author of over 300 journal and conference papers. He is Associate Editor for the Journal of ITS, Transportation Research Part C, Journal of Advanced Transportation and the Journal of Big Data in Transportation.
The University of Luxembourg, founded in 2003 as the country’s first and only public university, is a multilingual, international and research-oriented institution. About 56% of its students are foreigners, originating from over 100 different nations. It is ranked among the top 250 universities in the Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings and 12th among the Young Universities.
Link: https://wwwen.uni.lu
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/uni.lu
Twitter: https://twitter.com/uni_lu
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/school/university-of-luxembourg
Rosaldo J. F. Rossetti is an Associate Professor with the Department of Informatics Engineering at the University of Porto, Portugal. He is a member of the Department’s Executive Committee and a member of the Directive Board of the Artificial Intelligence and Computer Science Laboratory. He served as a member of the Board of Governors of the IEEE ITS Society during term 2011-2013 and is currently a co-chair of IEEE ITS Society’s Artificial Transportation Systems and Simulation technical activities sub-committee, for which he was the recipient of the Best Technical Activity Committee Award, in 2017. He was appointed as a member of the steering committee of the IEEE Smart Cities Initiative, from 2013 to 2017, and currently leads the Academia Relationships of the IEEE Smart Cities’ Marketing Committee. Dr Rossetti has been an associate editor of the IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems and the ITS Department editor of the IEEE Intelligent System Magazine. His primary research interests include behavioural modelling, social simulation, and machine learning with applications to the design of sustainable socio-technical systems. He focuses on applying multi-agent systems as a modelling metaphor to address issues in artificial transportation systems, future mobility paradigms, urban smartification, and explores the potential uses of serious games and gamification in mobility systems and sustainable development. He is also a member of ACM, APPIA (the Portuguese Society for AI), and the European Social Simulation Association. He holds a PhD in Computer Science from INF-UFRGS, Brazil, and developed doctoral research studies within the Network Modelling Group at Leeds University’s Institute for Transport Studies, UK.
With origins dating back to the eighteenth century, the University of Porto (UPORTO) is currently one of the most prestigious Higher Education Institutions in Europe, encompassing 15 schools and 60 scientific research units, spread across 3 university campuses located in the city of Porto. The Faculty of Engineering (FEUP) is the largest faculty of UPORTO, with more than 8000 students, 86 courses and close to 600 faculty members and researchers across 9 departments of engineering: Chemical, Civil, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Industrial Engineering and Management, Informatics and Computing, Mechanical, Physics, Metallurgical and Materials, and Mining. FEUP’s main Research & Innovation activities span different fields, including Environment and Sea Technologies, Biotechnology, Health, Materials Technologies, Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Automation and Control, Information and Telecommunication Technologies, Systems Engineering, Energy, Quality and Food Safety, Risk Prevention and Reduction, Industrial Management, Transportation and Mobility, and Artificial Intelligence and Intelligent Systems Engineering.
FEUP is located within the Porto Innovation District, where the strong presence of engineering technologies, health sciences and entrepreneurship lend considerable impetus to the process of innovation, where UPORTO hosts its Science and Technology Park (UPTEC), a fundamental structure supporting knowledge transfer between the university and the market.
More information: www.fe.up.pt
Dr. Guohui Zhang is an Associate Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Hawai’i at Manoa (UHM). He earned his Ph.D. degree in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Washington (UW). His primary research areas include transportation system resilience analysis, large-scale transportation systems modeling, sustainable traffic network infrastructure design, planning, and operation, traffic sensing and senor data analytics, artificial intelligence in transportation, connected and autonomous vehicle system, traffic-impacted public health, cyber-transportation systems, and transportation safety and security. He has published more than 80 peer-reviewed journal articles and presented his research contributions at prestigious international and national conferences. He has been serving as a member on the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) Connected and Autonomous Vehicle (CAV) Impact Committee, the Transportation Research Board (TRB) Information Systems and Technology Committee, and as a panelist for multiple National Collaborative Highway Research Program (NCHRP) projects. He has served as an Associate Editor for four journals, as a TRB paper review coordinator, and as a referee for multiple academic journals and conferences.
Founded in 1907, the University of Hawaii at Mānoa is the flagship campus of the University of Hawaii System in the state. The University of Hawaii at Manoa is ranked in the top 50 public universities in research expenditures by the National Science Foundation. The Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU), which is based at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, ranks UHM in the range of 66/78 in the US and 151/200 globally among 23,729 universities in the world (as of July 2015). A destination of choice, students and faculty come from across the nation and the world to take advantage of UH Mānoa’s unique research opportunities, diverse community, nationally-ranked Division I athletics program, and beautiful landscape.
Eftihia G. Nathanail is Professor of Transportation Systems Design and Evaluation in the Department of Civil Engineering of the University of Thessaly. She is Director of the Division of Transport, Transportation and Environmental Management and TTLog (Traffic, Transportation and Logistics) laboratory’s founder and director. She participates as Dangerous Goods Expert at the Transport Group Inland Surface Transport, NATO, and was Committee Member of Hazardous Material Transportation (AT040) of TRB till 2021. She acted as the national representative of the European Initiatives COST-TU1004 (Modelling Public Transport Passenger Flows in the Era of Intelligent Transport Systems), and COST-TU1305 (Social networks and travel behavior”, European Cooperation in Science and Technology). Her fields of research are transportation planning, transportation system design, intelligent transportation systems, behavioral modeling, intermodal transportation, logistics, multicriteria evaluation and optimization. She has participated in various European and National projects as scientific project manager. In her recent research, she assessed the impact of smart solutions on transportation, studied systems interconnecting long and short distance transportation for passengers and freight, analysed the effect of collaborative schemes and information distributed systems on urban and interurban networks, evaluated efficiency of urban public transportation interchanges on travelers and society, coordinated the development and implementation of an educational curriculum for sustainable transport interchanges. She has done extensive research on behavior modeling and road safety and she has led one National and five local traffic safety campaigns. She is associate editor in one journal and guest editor in various special issues.
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Dr. Nikolaos Tsampieris is a Senior Manager of Innovation and Development at ERTICO ITS Europe. He holds an MEng in Electronics & Computer Engineering, an MSc in Digital Communication Systems, and a Ph.D. in Digital Signal Processing Techniques for Communication Systems. Nikolaos has extensive expertise in Communication Systems & Technologies, having assumed Senior Research and Management positions in Academia Telecommunications and Defense Industry. As ERTICO’s expert in 5G and Digitalisation, he oversees respective research and development efforts in 5G and Beyond Connectivity and participates in the coordination and execution of several EU innovation actions and proposals development in 5G for Cooperative, Connected, Automated Mobility, and Transport & Logistics. Nikolaos is representing ERTICO in several expert fora, and he has a leading role in the SHOW project, currently the biggest and most holistic real-life CCAV urban demonstration initiative in Europe.
The integration of new mobility patterns and innovations, such as Mobility as a Service (MaaS), C-ITS and Autonomous Vehicles are some of the challenges to be addressed for a more sustainable urban transport. Electrified connected and automated mobility in cities shows real potential in improving the efficiency, safety, affordability, and accessibility of mobility on the way towards ’’Vision Zero’’. New technical solutions, business models, and priority scenarios for impact assessment could enable the deployment and integration of shared, connected, cooperative, electrified fleets of autonomous vehicles in coordinated Public Transport (PT), Demand Responsive Transport (DRT), Mobility as a Service (MaaS) and Logistics as a Service (LaaS) operational chains in the urban environment.
Nikolaos Tsampieris, PhD
Senior Manager Innovation & Deployment
ERTICO
Dr. Giannis Adamos is a civil and transportation engineer, currently working as an adjunct Lecturer and postdoctoral researcher at the Departments of Civil Engineering and Planning and Regional Development of University of Thessaly (UTH).
He has participated in more 30 European and national research projects. Currently, he is a postdoctoral researcher and the project manager of four European projects: ARSINOE (2021-2025), budget UTH: 977,500 €, total budget: 15,000,000 €, NEXOGENESIS (2021-2025), budget UTH: 290,005 €, total budget: 4,998,625 €, MAGO (2021-2024), budget UTH: 265,000 €, total budget: 2,495,500 € and SMARTEN (2021-2023), budget UTH: 54,475 €, total budget: 247,331 €. He is also the Grant Holder Manager of the COST Action 20138: Network on water-energy-food nexus for a low-carbon economy in Europe and beyond – NEXUSNET (2021-2025).
Dr. Adamos has in his record more than 100 publications in scientific journals, conference proceedings and book chapters. His academic and research interests and expertise focus on sustainable transport systems and infrastructure, smart logistics, decarbonization of transport and circular economy and intelligent transport systems.
Dr. Nikolaos Gavanas is an Assistant Professor in Transport Planning and Traffic Engineering at the Department of Urban Planning and Regional Development of the University of Thessaly, Greece. He is also the Director of the Research Unit of Infrastructure, Technology Policy and Development (RUITePoD) of the University of Thessaly. He has worked as a Policy Officer at the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Research and Innovation in the fields of Transport Policy and of Societal and Ecological Transitions. He is member of the Sectoral Scientific Committee (TES) of Environment, Energy and Sustainable Mobility of the National Council for Research, Technology and Innovation (ESETEK). His scientific interests include transport planning, traffic engineering, sustainable mobility, transport innovation, infrastructure planning and appraisal and the relationship between transport and spatial development.
Technion Israel Institute of Technology
A science and technology research university, among the world’s top ten, dedicated to the creation of knowledge and the development of human capital and leadership, for the advancement of the State of Israel and all humanity.
Technion is a global pioneer in fields such as biotechnology, stem cells, space, computer science, nanotechnology, and energy. Three Technion professors have won Nobel Prizes. As Technion celebrated its cornerstone centennial in 2012, Technion City had become a modern miracle – a thriving world center of research and teaching, with 12,850 students and 80 graduate programs trailblazing excellence in research and teaching for the benefit of humanity.
https://www.technion.ac.il/en/history-of-the-technion/#
https://www.instagram.com/technion.israel/
Pnina Plaut (Associate Prof.) – is the Chair of the Graduate Program in Urban and Regional Planning at the Faculty of Architecture and Town Planning, Technion – IIT and the head of the Philip and Ethel Klutznick Center for Urban and Regional Studies. She holds a BSc in Civil Engineering, MSc in Urban and Regional Planning from the Technion, and a PhD in City and Regional Planning from the University of California, Berkeley. Fields of interests: Transportation and Land Use Planning and Policy, Impacts of Infrastructure (Transportation and Telecommunications) on Economic Development, Urban/Regional Structure and the Environment. Special interest in Social Networks, Travel Behaviour and Urban Structure. Prof. Plaut, is the Initiator, Coordinator and Chair of the EU TUD COST Action TU1305 titled: Social Networks and Travel Behaviour. Prof. Plaut is leading a research group at the Center for City and Regional Studies -CCRS devoted to the investigation of “health promoting environments” focusing on the impact of the built environment on health including: “active” transport and active living by design. She recently advised a master’s student whose thesis evaluated the urban planning factors that influence evacuation under various tsunami wave conditions using a coastal community case study. She is also supervising a master student whose thesis focuses on incorporating underground civilian shelters in city planning and outline plans. The research is exploring ways for combining civil protection in urban underground space.
The University of Southampton is one of the leading universities in the UK and is a member of the prestigious Russell Group of UK Universities. It is ranked in the top 1% of universities worldwide (QS world university rankings 2018) and in the top 15 of research-led universities in the UK (Research Excellence Framework 2014). The Transportation Research Group (TRG), based in the Faculty of Engineering and Physical Sciences, is one of the UK’s longest established and leading centres for engineering-related transport teaching and research, located at the University’s new Boldrewood Innovation Campus and consisting of some 50 academic, research and visiting staff. It has considerable expertise and activity in both fundamental and applied research, covering the areas of traffic management and control, safety, the environment, bus and rail operations, freight/logistics and walking and cycling, as well as human factors, supported by research income of some GBP 7 million. TRG’s research is multi-modal, covering both passenger and freight, whilst also examining the scope for information technology to complement or substitute transport. Facilities supporting TRG research include: (i) a driving simulator; (ii) an instrumented vehicle; (iii) an instrumented bicycle; (iv) a submarine command room simulator; (v) a transport data analysis facility; and (vi) and a 360-degree immersive Virtual Reality facility.
Dr Ioannis Kaparias graduated with a Master of Engineering (MEng) degree in Civil Engineering from Imperial College London in 2004, having spent his final year of study at RWTH Aachen University in Germany. He then joined the Centre for Transport Studies of Imperial for his PhD research on the topic of Reliable Dynamic In-vehicle Navigation, in collaboration with BMW Group, which he completed in 2008, and continued as a post-doctoral Research Associate in the same institution for a period of four years, working on a wide range of transport research projects. From 2012 he held an academic position at City, University of London, and in 2016 he joined the Transportation Research Group (TRG) of the University of Southampton as a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Transport Engineering. His research interests include traffic engineering, modelling and simulation, Intelligent Transport Systems, travel behaviour, and active travel modes. He holds an Honorary Lecturer position at the Centre for Transport Studies of Imperial College London, and acts as an independent expert for the European Commission in research and innovation activities. He currently serves as Deputy Editor-in-Chief of the IET Intelligent Transport Systems journal, and as a member of two Standing Committees of the US Transportation Research Board (on Pedestrians (ACH10) and on Human Factors of Infrastructure Design and Operations (ACH40)). His work has led to over 100 journal publications and presentations at international conferences. Aside from English and his native Greek, he also speaks German, French and Italian.
Dr. Panos Prevedouros is Professor Emeritus of Civil Engineering, University of Hawaii at Manoa. He was Department Chair (2015-2020) and Graduate Program Chair (1998-2003). PhD (1990) and M.S. (1987) in transportation engineering, Northwestern University. Diploma in Engineering (1985), Aristotle University. Envision Sustainability Professional (ENV SP, 2017.) Chair of TRB’s Freeway & Connected Automated Vehicles Simulation Subcommittee (2005-2020). Expertise in traffic engineering, ITS, driverless technologies, energy production, life-cycle analysis and sustainable infrastructure. Has published over 210 technical articles and reports, and co-authored Transportation Engineering and Planning (Prentice Hall, 1993 and 2001.) Prevedouros received roughly 20% of the vote as candidate for mayor of Honolulu in 2008 and 2010. Contact: pdp@hawaii.edu.
Globally, the need for both transportation and energy will increase. For example, the US has 80 cars per 100 people. The rest of the world has 5 cars per 100 people. There is a huge potential demand for motorization. Is electrification the future of transportation? Is wind and solar the future of energy production? These will depend on current and future choice, and realistic constraints. Local and global priorities, geopolitical issues and environmental concerns affect both transportation and energy. There are many known long influences such as climate change, protection of species, NIMBYism, local jobs, international trade, national security, and future technologies, as well as newer influences such as the Covid-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine and global supply chain problems. This presentation will untangle these influences and attempt to provide the likely answer to the question: What will transportation and energy look like around the middle for this century?
Panos D. Prevedouros, PhD
Past Chairman and Professor Emeritus
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
University of Hawaii at Manoa
Typhoons Saola and Haikui in the self-governing island of Taiwan, the city Hong Kong and other parts of southern China including Shenzhen; storm Dana as a torrential rain across Spain; heavy rains and floods in the state of Rio Grande do Sul in Brazil; flooding in Massachusetts; tropical storm Hilary with the first-ever tropical storm watch in southern California; storm Daniel, the “medicane”, in Greece, Turkey and Bulgaria which turned into the most catastrophic floods in Libya;
comprised the worst natural disasters to hit in 2023, alone, which caused widespread damage, killed tens of thousands people and left many more missing, turned streets into deadly rivers, submerged whole villages, damaged hundreds of homes, businesses and infrastructure including bridges, dams and railways.
Drought conditions prevailing across Africa, Afghanistan, Syria and other numerous states from spring to fall; heatwave in India; sea level rise in Bangladesh; devastating and intense wildfires affecting most of the provinces and territories of Canada, Russia, Mediterranean regions (Greece and the Iberian Peninsula, including Tenerife) and the island of Maui, in 2023;
caused great human and material loss, in addition to severely affecting air quality.
Ron Boénau, P.E. is a recognized national and international transportation research advisor and conference speaker with over 40 years experience with USDOT, Florida DOT and DeLeuw-Cather Transportation Engineers responsible for ITS and multimodal integrated transportation research, development, evaluations, standards setting and deployment of emerging advanced transportation technologies and innovative user services with a current focus on innovative career development.
Soora Rasouli has background in transportation engineering and is specialized in developing models on citizens’ travel behavior with special attention to the recent advances in transport technology including EV, autonomous driving and Mobility and the interaction between mobility demand and supply. Decision making under uncertainty and systematic incorporation of uncertain events into modeling of travel behavior are other aspects of her research focus. She is the chair of Urban planning and Transportation group in Eindhoven university if Technology (Tu/e) She has published about 50 papers in leading journals in transportation. She is editorial board member of Transportation Letter, Journal of Urban Planning and Development, International Journal of Urban Science, Travel Behaviour and Society and Journal of Traffic and Transportation Engineering
