Workshop on Sustainable Transportation

Date: 30th April 2009 (Thursday); Time: 9:30 am to 3 pm
Venue: Golden Jubilee Seminar hall, Department of Civil Engineering, IISc

The term sustainable transportation is often defined in words such as this: “Sustainable transportation is about meeting or helping meet the mobility needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs.” The term is also used to describe all forms of transport which minimize fuel consumption and emissions of carbon dioxide and pollutants. Traditionally, transport and land use decisions have been made solely by elected politicians, advised by expert professionals. Life is now much more complicated. The policies are influenced by neighboring towns and cities, as well as by regional and national policies. Fewer policy decisions can now be taken solely by government. The private sector and agencies are increasingly responsible for public transport, road construction and land use decisions. Increasingly, too, those affected as users, businesses and residents expect to be fully involved in decision-making. Fortunately, we now have available a much wider range of possible policy interventions, including land use, information technology, management and pricing to add to the conventional provision of new infrastructure. However this, too, brings its challenges. We know much less about the potential of some of these newer instruments, or how well they work in different situations. This workshop will addressed these issues and also discussed a number of possible approaches to decision-making so that the cities can develop their own policies.

The guests included the MD of KSRTC, officials from BBMP, BMTC and BDA. The speakers interacted with the audience and a number of valuable guidelines for planning of bus routes, bus stops and urban planning in general were presented to the audience.

The seminar was a successful event accomplishing what it was meant to do. Dr. Prof T.G. Sitharam also promised the authorities from Northern Karnataka and officials from the above mentioned government bodies that he would provide any assistance they require in policy making and planning which as he rightly said is one of the main aims of CiSTUP.

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS:

Michael A P Taylor

Professor Michael A P Taylor is the Professor of Transport Planning and Director of the Institute for Sustainable Systems and Technologies (ISST) at the University of South Australia. His principal research and teaching interests lie in traffic systems engineering, transport planning, transport and logistics, road safety, and environmental impact assessment, with interest also in engineering management, systems engineering and operations research, computer modelling, information technology and computer science, and policy and decision-making support systems. He has strong interests in transport network analysis, transport and logistics systems modelling, transport network reliability, transport technology, Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS), and environmental impacts of road traffic (especially air pollution emissions). He has published extensively in all of the above areas, with over 320 papers, book chapters and articles, 16 books (authored or edited), and six software packages to his credit. Professor Taylor is a member of the prestigious International Advisory Committee for the International Symposia on Transportation and Traffic Theory, the Scientific Committee of the International Association for Travel Behaviour Research, the International Advisory Committee for the International Symposia on Transportation Network Reliability, and the International Scientific Committee of the World Conference on Transport Research. In addition he is a Board Member of the Eastern Asia Society for Transportation Studies. Professor Taylor is the editor of the IEAust journal Transport Engineering in Australia. He has been a guest editor of the journals Transport Reviews, Journal of Advanced Transportation and Transportation Research C. He also serves as a referee for six international journals.

Dr. Sekhar V.C. Somenahalli – biographical note

Dr. Sekhar is a key member of the Transport Systems Centre, which is one of the leading transportation research centres in Australia and is part of the Institute for Sustainable Systems and Technologies (ISST) at the University of South Australia. It is established as Australia’s foremost multi-disciplinary transport research centre, with substantial research publications each year, a large number of postgraduate students and on going track record of winning recognised research grants. Sekhar’s research focus for the past fourteen years is on various aspects of Transport planning and GIS. Sekhar has made a long and sustained contribution to research, teaching and consultancy in the fields of Transportation planning, Traffic Engineering and developed Geographic Information System (GIS) tools for planning public transport service and identifying weak network links. Sekhar currently teaches courses related to Transportation Planning and Geographic Information Systems (GIS). He has over five years of consulting experience and over fourteen years of teaching and research experience and worked in India, Malaysia and Australia. His key areas of strength include Geographic Information Systems (GIS), Transportation Planning, Public Transport Service Planning, Transport demand modelling, Traffic Management and Traffic Control. He has published in all of the above areas, with over 35 papers and articles. He has also served as a referee for number of domestic and international conference papers. Sekhar is currently International scientific committee member of the Eastern Asia Society for Transportation Studies.