Staff from OTREC at Portland State University toured three partner campuses to prepare for the first round of projects under the National Institute for Transportation and Communities program, or NITC. Portland State, the University of Oregon, Oregon Institute of Technology and the University of Utah teamed up for the program, funded with a $3.5 million grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation.

The University of Utah was the first to receive a visit, March 19-20, in Salt Lake City. There, NITC executive committee member Keith Bartholomew hosted tours and meetings. Staff met with student representatives from various disciplines and with potential researchers from across campus before meeting potential community partners at the Utah Transit Authority offices. OTREC finance and communications staff members met with their University of Utah counterparts.

The meetings marked the first connection for much of the Utah faculty and OTREC staff. While the University of Oregon and Oregon Tech were already partners under the original OTREC grant, the NITC program marks Portland State and Utah’s first formal collaboration under the federal University Transportation Centers program.

On April 9, staff met with current and potential transportation researchers at the University of Oregon...

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The U.S. Department of Transportation awarded Portland State University $3.5 million for research and education on sustainable transportation topics, the department announced today. The Oregon Transportation Research and Education Consortium (OTREC), the university transportation center based at PSU, will administer the grant.

OTREC, a partnership between PSU, the University of Oregon and the Oregon Institute of Technology, will join with the University of Utah to carry out the grant. This award reaffirms OTREC’s evolution into one of the nation’s leading transportation livability research centers and provides the resources to address national problems strategically.

Research and educational programs under the grant will focus on the following topics:

  • Improving health and safety for all users
  • Increasing the efficiency and understanding of cycling, walking and transit
  • Making the best use of data, performance measures and analytical tools
  • Integrating multimodal transportation with land use
  • Taking long-term action on transportation emissions and climate change.

PSU was one of 63 applicants for 22 grants. The grant competition challenged university transportation center leaders to demonstrate the ability and experience to produce the country’s best transportation research and educational programs. “In five years, OTREC has advanced the state of research on topics such as the connections between transportation...

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PRESENTATION ARCHIVE

OVERVIEW

Gateway communities are the small towns outside of national parks, forests, scenic rivers, and ski resorts. This presentation will highlight the housing, transportation, and development challenges that these communities faced in the aftermath of the COVID 19 pandemic. Our study...

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PRESENTATION ARCHIVE

OVERVIEW

With findings from a mixed methods research study, this interdisciplinary webinar will present results from a historical public document analysis, a GIS spatial analyses, client surveys and interviews, and interviews with professionals and service providers. In 2019, the delivery of homeless sheltering services in Salt Lake County transitioned from a centralized emergency shelter to a scattered site model with multiple resource center locations, operated by multiple service providers. To understand the degree to which “proximity” to public transportation and other needed services was achieved, this study examined:

  1. how the decentralization of homeless services influenced transportation demand and mobility patterns for persons experiencing homelessness; and
  2. how transportation and mobility changes affected access to services.

Findings reveal that while the region’s homelessness services system changed, the...

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Webinar: Modeling Freeway Traffic in a Mixed Environment: Connected and Human-Driven Vehicles - Terry Yang

 

PRESENTATION ARCHIVE

Miss the webinar or want a look back?

OVERVIEW

Although connected vehicles (CVs) will soon go beyond testbeds, CVs and human-driven vehicles (HVs) will co-exist over a long period. Hence, it is critical to consider the interactions between these two types of vehicles in traffic flow modeling. In this study, we aim to develop a macroscopic model to understand how CVs would impact HVs in the traffic stream. Grounded on the second-order traffic flow model, we study the relationships among flow, density, and speed by two sets of formulations for the groups of CVs and HVs, respectively. A set of friction factors, which indicate CVs' impact to HVs, are introduced to the speed equation for accounting CV speed impacts. Then extended Kalman Filter is employed to update both model parameters and friction factors in real-time. By using CVs trajectory data as measurements, the difference between CV average speed and overall traffic mean speed will be fully accounted. The proposed model will serve as a basis for designing CV-based traffic control function,...

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PRESENTATION ARCHIVE

OVERVIEW

The aim of this research is to investigate pedestrian behavior at signalized intersections using state-of-the-art LIDAR sensing technologies and to use this data, along with vehicular data, to develop a more effective multimodal signal control system.

In the presentation, the presenters will describe a novel method of collecting pedestrian crossing behaviors at signalized intersection, discuss the findings and implications of data analytics, and introduce a novel approach to dynamic flashing yellow arrow mechanisms to reduce the conflict between left turn vehicles and crossing pedestrians.

KEY LEARNING OUTCOMES

  • Understand the framework of LiDAR sensing solutions;
  • Understand how to collect pedestrian behaviors at intersections;
  • Understand how to provide new protection for crossing pedestrians with object-tracking technologies.

THE RESEARCH

This webinar is based on a study funded by the National Institute...

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New Travel Demand Models

PRESENTATION ARCHIVE

OVERVIEW

Conventional four-step travel demand models are used by nearly all metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs), state departments of transportation, and local planning agencies, as the basis for long-range transportation planning in the United States. A flaw of the four-step model is its relative insensitivity to the so-called D variables. The D variables are characteristics of the built environment that are known to affect travel behavior. The Ds are development density, land use diversity, street network design, destination accessibility, and distance to transit. In this seminar, we will explain how we developed a vehicle ownership model (car shedding model), an intrazonal travel model (internal capture model), and mode choice model that consider all of the D variables based on household travel surveys and built environmental data for 32, 31, and 29 regions, respectively, validates the models, and demonstrates that the models have far better predictive accuracy than Wasatch Front Regional Council (WFRC)/Mountailand Association of Governments’ (MAG) current models.

In this webinar, researchers Reid Ewing and Sadegh Sabouri will...

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PRESENTATION ARCHIVE

OVERVIEW

Transportation systems play a critical role in maintaining supply chains for effective post-disaster recovery. Modeling the potential economic impact of transportation-related disruptions, therefore, is an important step to promoting pre-event communitywide recovery and resilience planning. But existing supply chain and economic impact models are cost prohibitive and overly sophisticated for use by public sector entities with limited resources. There is also limited understanding of how small and medium enterprises (SMEs) adjust to post-disaster transportation disruption and how this experience influences their future preparedness for similar events. Since SMEs make up a majority of businesses within the US, post-disaster transportation loss can significantly affect the local economy and the recovery trajectory for the entire community.

This project has two objectives:

  1. To develop a collaborative university-community partnership framework for analyzing the economic impact due to transportation disruptions in earthquake country
  2. To examine SME preparedness to such managing such disruptions...
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