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Natural language processing methods for textual similarity using Python
2021-11-16 15:00 - 16:00 (America/New_York)
In this session, you will learn the basics of text representation in natural language processing (NLP) and various state-of-the-art NLP techniques for (semantic) textual similarity tasks. We will walk through data preparation and processing steps with language modeling tools in Python (e.g., Doc2Vec, Sentence-BERT) for computing text/document similarity and discuss several practical applications of such NLP techniques in transportation related downstream tasks.
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Roadmap to Cooperative & Automated Transportation
2021-11-16 15:00 - 15:30 (America/New_York) | Virtual, 6 MetroTech Center, Brooklyn, NY, 11201, United States
The world has placed high hopes in automated vehicle (AV) technologies in revolutionizing transportation system performance, including multiplying roadway capacity and minimizing energy consumption. However, research conducted by Dr. Xiaopeng (Shaw) Li and colleagues has found that existing production AVs exhibit comparable or even inferior performance compared to human-driven vehicles (HDV). To bridge this gap and realize the full potential of AVs, Dr. Li will propose a roadmap of cooperative & automated transportation, from optimal trajectory control in ideal conditions through a cooperative control framework incorporating edge computing and machine learning under real-world constraints. This analysis of ideal conditions (e.g., pure AV with perfect information and control) reveals critical theoretical properties specifying feasible time-space ranges of AV movements. Combined with customized mathematical programming and control methods, these properties lead to efficient solutions (e.g., in milliseconds) to real-time optimal trajectory planning problems. The solutions discussed by Dr. Li will serve as the building blocks for solving more realistic AV control problems (e.g., traffic mixed with human drivers, considering different cooperation classes, with stochasticity and errors).

Equity in Transportation Research
2021-11-12 11:00 - 13:00 (America/New_York) | Virtual, 6 MetroTech Center, Brooklyn, NY, 11201, United States
As C2SMART heads into its sixth year of projects, we seek to develop and fund projects which will be bigger and bolder than ever before. We are looking for projects which showcase possibility, address complex challenges, broaden collaboration, and directly strengthen the transportation field. Research and development projects will be external industry/agency driven, including an additional emphasis and reserve of funding for non-traditional research in the form of workshops and workforce development. There will also be dedicated funding for student-focused initiatives including cooperative education programs, student-led research projects, student entrepreneurship, and summer programs for graduate, undergraduate, and K-12 students.
Across and underlying each of these themes, however, will be an emphasis on transportation equity. Each proposal will, in some form, need to be prepared to discuss how the project will directly address equity concerns, or else include an equity performance measure of some kind.
To help researchers conceptualize what this means, and to set guidance around how UTCs can lead the way in solving transportation equity problems, C2SMART will be hosting an Equity in UTC Research panel to:

Better educate our network of PIs and researchers towards ensuring that each project has a meaningful equity component and how to factor equity concerns into its overall methodology,
Directly engage with and answer outstanding transportation equity problems that are not being addressed by the wider research community, and
Engage with both traditional and non-traditional equity partners on our projects.

POST-EVENT RESOURCES

Equity in Transportation Research
Speaker presentation: Luis Artieda Presentation
Speaker presentation: Alice Grossman Presentation
Speaker presentation: David Bragdon Presentation
Speaker presentation: Amy Fong Presentation

SPEAKERS
Amy Fong is a mathematical statistician at the Department of Labor Office of Disability Employment Policy. Amy does research on the employment outcomes and labor force participation of people with disabilities. She is interested in how access to services, utilities and the built environment (such as public transportation and broadband internet) affect the well-being and socioeconomic status of people with disabilities. She is set to discuss how the US Census Bureau measures disability and why disability is a function of the built environment; illustrate how disability prevalence (rates of disability) by age, race and gender varies across New York City; and explain where researchers can access the data themselves.
Alice Grossman is a Research Scientist with the Center for Advancing Research in Transportation Emissions, Energy, and Health at Texas Transportation Institute. Her research and project management experience covers various areas of multimodal transportation with a focus accessibility, technology in transportation, vulnerable road user safety, and performance measurement. She was previously a Senior Policy Analyst at the Eno Center for Transportation and is currently a Science, Technology, and Policy Fellow with the Inter-American Institute for Global Change and was a 2020-2021 Science Technology and Policy Fellow with the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS STPF) at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
Luis Artieda is an Inclusion and Sustainability expert with 10 years of experience in development at an international and local level. He focuses on the intersection of community economic development, inclusion, and sustainability. He was responsible for the strategic launch of the global campaign Cities For All, as well as organizing diverse stakeholder events and high-level roundtables to global international forums (UNHabitat World Urban Forum, Forum of Latin American Ministries of Housing, UN High-Level Political Forum, etc). He has facilitated high-level capacity-building workshops about inclusion and sustainability to city officials such as Amsterdam, Barcelona, and Abu Dhabi, as well as the Inter-American Development, World Bank, and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.
David Bragdon has been at the helm of TransitCenter since 2013, leading a NYC-based civic foundation dedicated to improving public transportation to make cities more just, sustainable, and prosperous. TransitCenter conducts applied research and supports community-based advocacy. David spent the early part of his career in the maritime and aviation freight industries. During 2002-10, he was elected to two terms as President of the Metro Council, the regional government for the Portland, Oregon area. He served as Director of New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s Office of Long-term Planning and Sustainability 2010-12. Transportation is a passion and a vocation for David. He drove a taxi cab for a year, has jump-seated a 747 freighter into a remote airport in the far eastern steppes of the then-USSR, rode a Dutch container ship up the Strait of Malacca, and twice (once for five minutes in Minnesota and once for ten minutes in Iowa) has been allowed to run the engineer’s throttle on freight trains. He likes to move big things.

Using AI to Improve CAV Operations in Mixed Traffic
2021-11-09 12:00 - 13:00 (America/New_York)
Rapid advances in artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML) offer unprecedented opportunities for improving the operations of connected and autonomous vehicles (CAVs) in a traffic stream that also includes human driven vehicles. Dr. Sikai (Sky) Chen will discuss recent developments in vehicle automation with mixed traffic stream, including the challenges and opportunities associated with AI/ML algorithm development and application for CAV operations. These include leveraging real-time data using AI/ML to improve safety, mobility, and efficiency, and rapidness of response to changing traffic environments. Dr. Chen will also discuss AI/ML cooperative control algorithms for multi-agent systems that consider dynamic interactions between heterogeneous system users (e.g., human drivers, connected and/or automated vehicles). Results from extensive simulation experiments will be presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of such cooperative control innovations. Insights from this research can provide guidance to CAV manufacturers and transport agencies regarding infrastructure investments specifically for CAV operations.

State of the Field: Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) towards Infrastructure Resiliency
2021-10-26 12:00 - 13:00 (America/New_York) | Virtual, 6 MetroTech Center, Brooklyn, NY, 11201, United States
In this event series, C2SMART leverages its consortium of researchers and experts to share a vision of the future of mobility and transportation systems. They’ll share advances, opportunities, predictions, research bottlenecks, and what perspectives and skills are needed from researchers and the workforce of tomorrow towards tackling one area of today’s most pressing problems.
State of the Field: Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) towards Infrastructure Resiliency
What does the best of transportation engineering research have to say about maintenance, rehabilitation, and replacement of critical infrastructure? How are the latest advances in technology being applied to extend lifespans of structures, and how can this technology be scaled to infrastructure projects around the United States? Structural Health Monitoring provides critical insight into answering these questions using new technologies that are changing the ways we tackle maintenance and rehabilitation of structures.
The first event in this series will be a webinar delivered by Erik Zuker, PE, of HNTB, on the state of SHM applications and case studies from the Mario M. Cuomo Bridge, Verrazzano Narrows Bridge, and the Marine Parkway Bridge, in the New York City area.

NYC 2025: Road to Recovery Series
2021-10-22 09:00 - 10:30 (America/New_York) | Virtual, 6 MetroTech Center, Brooklyn, NY, 11201, United States
The inaugural event of the NYC 2025: Road to Recovery Series, a partnership between NYU Wagner and the Stern Center for Sustainable Business, presents an interactive panel featuring contributors to NYC 2025. Panelists will discuss their vision for a stronger, fairer and more equitable New York City.
Announced this summer, NYC 2025 convenes non-partisan experts to hold an ongoing conversation on issues that must be addressed for New York City to become a stronger and more equitable city than it was before COVID-19. This event is part of a series of public discussions following the release of the NYC 2025 policy proposals.

Flooding and Public Transportation
2021-10-20 09:00 - 22:30 (America/New_York)
Hurricane Ida presented the latest example of climate change impacts to the subway system, with extensive damage and a systemwide shutdown. As storms intensify and sea levels rise, New York City’s public transportation systems will endure repetitive flooding and destructive events.
The NYU Rudin Center for Transportation presents a virtual panel discussion about mitigating climate change impacts, keeping transit riders safe and reassured, and activating alternative modes.
Panelists:

Chante Harris, Director, Climate Investment & Partnerships, SecondMuse
Greg Lindsay, Director of Applied Research, NewCities
Jose Martinez, Transportation Reporter, THE CITY
Jamie Torres-Springer, Commissioner, NYC Department of Design and Construction
Moderated by Sarah M. Kaufman, NYU Rudin Center for Transportation

Proactive Safety Management Empowered by Big Data
2021-10-19 15:00 - 16:00 (America/New_York) | Virtual, 6 MetroTech Center, Brooklyn, NY, 11201, United States
In the last few decades, data-driven methods have been used to assist with key tasks of road safety management like hotspot identification, countermeasure development, and before-after evaluation. These methods have traditionally relied heavily on historical crash data for safety assessment, which can take a long time to collect. Professor Kun Xie will share a more proactive and time-efficient approach based on surrogate safety measures (SSMs), which can assess safety by capturing the more frequent “near-crash” situations. Massive amounts of data from emerging sources like GPS devices, smartphone apps, traffic cameras, naturalistic driving, and connected vehicles (CV) can be leveraged to extract SSMs on a large scale, presenting new opportunities for proactive traffic safety management. Results will show that risk status is a reliable criterion for safety assessment, and promisingly point towards the use CV data for proactive traffic safety management.

Transportation Camp NYC 2021
2021-10-16 10:30 - 15:00 (America/New_York) | Virtual, 6 MetroTech Center, Brooklyn, NY, 11201, United States
TransportationCamp is an unconference – every session is planned, proposed, and led by attendees like you. It’s the perfect opportunity to share your transportation passion with a diverse gathering of fellow enthusiasts. TransportationCamp welcomes all attendees, whether you’re a planner, software developer, engineer, student, transportation professional, community member, policy maker, or just excited about mobility! TransportationCamp is an opportunity for professionals, students, and enthusiasts of urban transportation and technology get together to discuss the most diverse ideas. The unconference format of the event makes it easy for like-minded people to shape the best experience,
Once you get your ticket, keep an eye out for our emails with further information and links for the exclusive TransportationCamp NYC 2021 Slack workspace and Zoom information for the sessions. You can find the main event schedule below.
2021 Main Event Tentative Schedule
Eastern Daylight Time (EDT) in US
10:30AM EDT Welcome and Kick Off
11:00AM EDT Session 1
12:00PM EDT Session 2
1:00PM EDT Lunch & Keynote Talk by Chris Pangilinan – Head of Global Policy, Public Transportation, Uber
2:00PM EDT Session 3
3:00PM EDT Session 4
First Time at a TransportationCamp?

How To TransportationCamp: The folks at MobilityLab have taken the time to put together a TransportationCamp 101 guide that explains all aspects of the event.
Participation Encouraged: Sessions are formed as the day goes on, so be sure to come with topics for discussion. If you have an idea, feel free to share and add your thoughts.
Rule of Two Clicks: Never hesitate to leave a session if you suddenly find it’s not for you, or if there’s another session that you want to check out, too!
New! Scholarship Essay Opportunity! Check here for more details.

Employer-Backed Bikes Concept Showcase
2021-09-29 12:00 - 13:00 UTC | Virtual, 6 MetroTech Center, Brooklyn, NY, 11201, United States
Join the New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC), in partnership with NYU C2SMART Center, Fraunhofer, and Nelson
ygaard, as they convene public and private stakeholders toward implementing this bike access model in NYC. The goal of this effort is to define the opportunity and connect stakeholders interested in growing cycling for employees in New York City. The Concept Showcase will evaluate potential approaches to catalyze employer leasing programs for bikes, e-bikes, and scooters in New York City. It will take place on Sept 29, 12 to 1 PM ET. You can register for that event here.

Incentive Design for Promoting Ridesharing
2021-09-08 15:00 - 16:00 UTC | Virtual, 6 MetroTech Center, Brooklyn, NY, 11201, United States
Traffic congestion has become a serious issue around the globe, partly owing to single-occupancy commuter trips. Ridesharing can present a suitable alternative for serving commuter trips. However, there are several important obstacles that impede ridesharing systems from becoming a viable mode of transportation, including the lack of a guarantee for a ride back home as well as the difficulty of obtaining a critical mass of participants. At this event, Neda Masoud will discuss a study which addresses these obstacles by introducing a Traveler Incentive Program (TIP) to promote community-based ridesharing with a ride-back home guarantee among commuters. The TIP program allocates incentives to (1) directly subsidize a select set of ridesharing rides, and (2) encourage a few, carefully selected set of travelers to change their travel behavior. We formulate the underlying ride-matching problem as a budget-constrained min-cost flow problem and present a Lagrangian Relaxation-based algorithm with worst-case optimality bound to solve large-scale instances of this problem in polynomial time. We further propose a polynomial-time budget-balanced version of the problem. Numerical experiments suggest that allocating subsidies to change travel behavior is significantly more beneficial than directly subsidizing rides. Furthermore, using a flat tax rate as low as 1% can double the system’s social welfare in the budget-balanced variant of the incentive program.
Bio: Neda Masoud is an Assistant Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Michigan. She holds a Bachelor’s of Science Degree in Industrial Engineering and a Master’s of Science degree in Physics. She received her Ph.D. in Civil and Environmental Engineering from the University of California Irvine. Her research focuses on devising operational and planning tools to facilitate the transition into the next generation of mobility systems, which are envisioned to be connected, automated, electrified, and shared.
