NCST Director Susan Handy - Thomas B. Deen Distinguished Lectureship at TRB and a Forthcoming Book
In recognition “for her contributions to the advancement of knowledge on travel behavior, as well as to the practice of transportation planning and education,” Susan Handy has been awarded the prestigious Thomas B. Deen Distinguished Lectureship by the Transportation Research Board.
Handy is a professor of Environmental Science and Policy, the director of the NCST, and chair of the Transportation Technology and Policy) Graduate Program. Her research focuses on relationships between transportation and land use—particularly the impact of land use on travel behavior—and on strategies for reducing automobile dependence.
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As stated in a press release from TRB, “The Deen Lectureship recognizes the career contributions and achievements of an individual in one of the areas covered by TRB’s Technical Activities Division... Honorees are invited to present overviews of their technical area of expertise.” Handy will deliver her lecture, “Shifting Gears: Reflections on the Role of Researchers in Shaping the Ideas that Shape Transportation,” on Monday, January 8, 2024, at the TRB Annual Meeting in Washington, DC.
Handy has also written a new book out now: Shifting Gears - Toward a New Way of Thinking about Transportation. In a nation facing numerous transportation challenges, Shifting Gears questions the priority given to cars across the United States. Stepping back into the history of transportation policy, Handy explores the core ideas that underlie a century of car-centric transportation policy and outlines a new way of thinking that could provide a greater array of choices for daily travel and contribute to a more sustainable future.
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Student Spotlight:
Will Reichard
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Meet Will Reichard - a Civil Engineering Ph.D. student at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Will is interested in transportation economics, transportation policy, and pedestrian safety and accessibility in the program.
In 2022, Will was awarded the Georgia Tech NCST Outstanding Student of the Year award for his research and academic accomplishments. He also received the ACSE Service Award and Outstanding Senior at Rowan University and was a recipient of the Dwight David Eisenhower Transportation Fellowship.
After receiving his Ph.D., Will hopes to extend his passion for transportation engineering into a career as a professor and foster welcoming, inclusive spaces for students to learn and grow.
Congratulations on all your accomplishments Will!
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Webinar: Uncovering the Impacts of Federal Tax Credit on EV Leasing and Purchasing
November 29, 2023 @ 10:00 AM - 11:00 AM PST | Online
Dr. Gil Tal | Director of the EV Research Center and STEPS+ at the University of California, Davis
Kelly Hoogland | Ph.D. Student at the University of California, Davis
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To mitigate climate change and air pollution, multiple US states and other countries have been setting and adjusting goals and policies aimed at shifting sales from conventional, fossil-fuel vehicles to electric vehicles. A key to developing or adjusting these policies is understanding how financial incentives affect consumers’ decisions to purchase or lease PEVs (defined as plug-in hybrid or fully electric vehicles).
Much of the published research on incentives explores their impact on vehicle purchasing but not leasing. However, leasing is important to the PEV market for several reasons: it can lower the up-front cost of PEV acquisition since consumers receive the credit at the point of payment rather than when filing taxes; it allows consumers to try the technology over a shorter “ownership” period; and it increases the turnover of PEVs on the road, creating a supply of used PEVs faster than purchasing could.
In this webinar, Dr. Gil Tal and Kelly Hoogland will share analysis on survey responses from approximately 7,000 California PEV drivers. The research aims to provide a better understanding of the impact of financial incentives on PEV leasing and purchasing.
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FISTS 2024: Forum for Innovative Sustainable Transportation Systems
February 26-28, 2024 | Bourns Technology Center Riverside, CA
| The Forum for Innovative Sustainable Transportation Systems (FISTS) is a prestigious platform proudly sponsored by the Intelligent Transportation Systems Society (ITSS). The goal of FISTS is to bring together world leaders in Intelligent Transportation Systems with a focus on the environment and sustainability. Papers will cover technological solutions, demonstrations, and policy. A variety of transportation modes will be addressed, including on-road vehicles, transit systems, shared mobility, and freight systems. | |
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Insights from the New End of Life EV Battery Policy Simulator
Dr. Alissa Kendall | Professor at the University of California, Davis
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In this webinar, Dr. Alissa Kendall shared insights from the new End of Life EV Battery Policy Simulator, a dynamic systems model that integrates economic, environmental, and social factors to develop robust policies for lithium-ion battery end-of-life management. Dr. Kendall’s presentation included the following topics: Using material flow analysis to estimate potential targets for a U.S. recycled content standard; using life cycle assessments to quantify environmental benefits of recycling lithium-ion batteries; comparing recycling to repurposing as end-of-life management strategies; and conducting expert interviews to understand stakeholder points of view regarding a circular battery economy and the lack of battery recycling mechanisms in the U.S. | |
Featured Project
End of Life Electric Vehicle Battery Policy Simulator: A Dynamic Systems, Mixed-methods Approach
The rapid growth of electric vehicles (EVs) powered by lithium ion batteries (LIBs) is a key mechanism for achieving environmental targets for greenhouse gas and air pollution mitigation in the transport sector. Given the weak economics and an uncertain future regulatory environment for LIB reuse and recycling, swift policy intervention is required for sustainable and safe end-of-life treatment of LIBs. This research proposes to develop a dynamic systems model that integrates the economic, environmental, and social factors that shape the reverse logistics process and the economics of reuse and recycling to develop robust policies for LIB end-of-life management. The model will consider reuse and recycling in the context of rapidly growing in-use stocks that include a diverse set of battery chemistries and architectures, will characterize environmental impacts and costs using life cycle methods, and will employ a mixed methods research approach incorporating qualitative research on stakeholders in the vehicle afterlife ecosystem.
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Transportation Tomorrow Forum Webinar: UC Davis Campus Travel Survey
Aakansha Jain | Ph.D. Candidate at the University of California, Davis
Justin Darr | Ph.D. Candidate at the University of California, Davis
Ramon Zavala | Transportation Demand Manager at the University of California, Davis Transportation Services
Jeffrey Bruchez | Active Modality Manager and Bicycle Program Coordinator at the University of California, Davis Transportation Services
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In a recent Transportation Tomorrow Forum webinar hosted by the UC Davis Department of Transportation Services in collaboration with the Institute of Transportation Studies (ITS-Davis), presenters discussed the Campus Travel Survey project and the results of the 2022-23 survey. Each year’s results help to inform Transportation Services on commuter trends, bicycle usage, potential infrastructure improvements, greenhouse gas emissions, and Vehicle Miles Traveled. 3,228 responses were gathered for the 2022-23 survey, providing data from 8 role groups about their residence, means of transportation, travel frequency, general attitudes, knowledge on micromobility, and more. Speakers included ITS-Davis students Aakansha Jain and Justin Darr and Ramon Zavala and Jeffrey Bruchez of Transportation Services. | |
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2023 NCST Undergraduate Summer Research Fellows
Congratulations to our twelve UC Davis Summer Undergraduate Research Fellows who recently wrapped up their twelve-week summer internships! Our fellows worked closely with UC Davis faculty, professional researchers, and graduate students on sustainable transportation research projects. Their reports and presentations are now available on our website.
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Recently Completed Research | |
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Role of Vehicle Technology on Use: Joint analysis of the choice of Plug-in Electric Vehicle ownership and miles traveled
Dr. Debapriya Chakraborty and Dr. David S. Bunch, University of California, Davis; Dr. David Brownstone, University of California, Irvine
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Understanding the preferences and behavior of electric vehicle (EV) drivers is integral to California’s climate change strategy, especially since the state hopes to have 5 million zero-emission vehicles on the road by 2030. However, there are shortcomings and contradictions in existing literature on the relationship between vehicle choice and vehicle miles traveled (VMT). This report discusses the use of a multiple discrete continuous extreme value model with 2019 California Vehicle Survey data to shed light on this relationship. The research team finds that while households inherently prefer internal combustion engine vehicles, EV usage and VMT is comparable when they are actually chosen.
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Evaluating Alternative Strategies for Traffic Reduction in Los Angeles
Dr. Antonio M. Bento, University of Southern California; Dr. Jonathan D. Hall, University of Toronto; and Kilian Heilmann, Lyft, Inc.
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Traffic congestion is one of the largest negative externalities in economics: the more drivers using a system, the lower the average speed will be for everyone. The social costs of congestion in Los Angeles, for example, are $2,408 a year for the typical working driver. Using big data from freeway detectors, vehicle accident counts, and real-time routing data from Google Maps, the research team developed a novel instrumental variables framework to identify the causal relationship between speed and density, the first to do so for a major American metropolitan area. The research also has important findings for congestion pricing, indicating an optimal toll of 33 cents at peak times, and as low as zero for off-peak periods.
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All Aboard! Easier Transit Travel with Standardized Payments
Katherine Turner, Staly Chin, Andrea Nguyen, and Dr. Susan Pike, University of California, Davis
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Digital payments are increasingly popular around the world, including among transit agencies. For example, California’s Integrated Travel Project seeks to, among other things, incorporate open-loop payments. Closed-loop payments rely on payment methods that can only be used at that specific system, while open-loop payments allow people to use forms of payment they already use elsewhere, like prepaid debit cards, conventional credit cards, and digital wallets. UC Davis researchers surveyed 21 transit operating agencies in California to learn more about their views on open-loop payments: how efficient they might be, how difficult they are to implement, and how accessible/usable they are for the general public. | |
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Local Option Sales Taxes, Metropolitan Planning Organizations, and SB 375: A Question of Priorities
Dr. Elisa Barbour and Noah Thoron, University of California, Davis
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California SB 375 calls for coordinating transportation investment with land use planning to promote sustainability and efficiency. The implementation of SB 375 is in large part up to Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs). A popular method local governments use to raise transportation funding is the local option sales tax (LOST), which is a sales tax approved by voters for a temporary period to fund transportation projects. Such projects include highways and road maintenance. However, there is a disconnect in California between LOSTs and MPOs: while the planning organizations must abide by and implement SB 375, LOSTs do not. This raises the question: since LOSTs are such a popular way of raising transportation money, do they help or hinder MPOs reach SB 375 goals? This UC Davis research team seeks to answer that question through analysis of LOST ballot measures, case studies of LOST measures in San Diego, San Francisco, and Sacramento, patterns in LOST expenditures, and MPO spending allocation. | |
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Evaluating Accessibility of Los Angeles Metropolitan Area Using Data-Driven Time-Dependent Reachability Analysis
Dr. Cyrus Shahabi and Dr. Seon Ho Kim, University of Southern California
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Accessibility to people, goods, services, and places is important for the development of and public health in a city. How cities facilitate accessibility through distribution of services and transport systems can affect many other measures of human development and well-being. Accessibility in urban areas is difficult to quantify, especially because so many factors contribute to accessibility or inaccessibility. USC researchers solve this problem by constructing time-dependent isochrone maps to quantify accessibility of city blocks through transport systems and traffic flow. Unlike other studies of this problem, this approach is entirely driven by real-world data, not mathematical graph theory.
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The National Center for Sustainable Transportation is a consortium of leading universities committed to advancing an environmentally sustainable transportation system through cutting-edge research, direct policy engagement, and education of our future leaders. Consortium members: University of California, Davis; California State University, Long Beach; Georgia Institute of Technology; Texas Southern University; University of California, Riverside; University of Southern California; and University of Vermont. | | | | |
