Transportation engineering is the application of technology and scientific principles to the design, operation, planning and management of transportation infrastructure, mobility service, traffic, and travelers for various travel modes, in order to provide for the safe, efficient, rapid, comfortable, convenient, economical, and environmentally sustainable movement of people and goods.
Through advanced sensing, communication, and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies, transportation engineering also focuses on the provision of on-demand, personalized, and shared mobility services using electrical, connected and automated vehicles. To this end, data-driven approach, optimization, and game theory are fundamental tools to understand and predict the evolution of emerging transportation systems and their roles in smart city development.
Led by Professor Sharon Di, the department’s research in transportation engineering aims to help decision-makers to understand the upcoming changes and prepare for effective planning and management of next-generation transportation systems. It has recently focused on the following representative projects:
- Understanding and modeling the emerging transportation systems which are radically evolving driven by the rapid growth of various transportation mobility forms (e.g., e-hailing, car sharing, autonomous taxi)
- Leveraging large data collected from various traffic sensors to understand transformation in travel supply and demand
- Planning and operating multi-modal transportation systems
