A major snowstorm welcomed more than 12,000 transportation professionals from around the world to the 104th TRB Annual Meeting, held January 5–9 in Washington, DC. Despite the wintry blast, attendees trekked to the Walter E. Washington Convention Center and the Marriott Marquis Hotel for committee meetings, poster and lectern sessions, award presentations, the Careers in Motion Networking Fair, and other activities.
One such go-to was Empathy at the Intersection, an interactive collaboration between the Massachusetts Department of Transportation and TRB, which generated high interest among Exhibit Hall visitors. Attendees were invited to participate in several experiences, including strapping on special goggles and body weights to mimic the mobility and vision limitations that come with decades of aging.
Like last year, the Chair’s Plenary Session drew a standing-room-only audience. TRB Executive Director Victoria Sheehan introduced Vincent Tang, Deputy Director of the Advanced Research Projects Agency–Infrastructure, a new U.S. Department of Transportation agency, and Sarah Sharples, Chief Scientific Adviser of the UK Department of Transport. Both spoke about the importance of innovation in transforming transportation. Continuing the discussion, an international panel of four transportation leaders took the stage to share their views.
Sandra Rosenbloom delivered the 2025 Thomas B. Deen Distinguished Lecture. She is a research professor in The University of Texas at Austin School of Architecture’s Community and Regional Planning Program and a fellow of Hampton K. and Margaret Frye Snell Endowed Chair in Transportation. She is also director of the university’s Lab for Safe and Healthy Aging.
Sessions and workshops addressed topics of interest to policy makers, administrators, practitioners, researchers, and students. Discussions focused on designing roadways to target speed, advances in artificial intelligence, and innovative mobility strategies for rural communities.
Take a look at highlights from an exciting and informative week of all things transportation!
Annual Meeting photographs by Risdon Photography, except where indicated. Click on gallery images to enlarge.
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Intersections
- Technical Activities Council member Fred Wagner (right) spends time with attendees interested in legal resources in transportation at the New Attendee Engagement Session.
- FHWA representatives share opportunities with attendees at the Careers in Motion Networking Fair.
- University of Washington Professor Yinhai Wang addresses a crowded room during a discussion of hot topics in artificial intelligence.
- Future transportation professional Derrick Cook, Morgan State University, introduces himself at a reception.
- TRB staff members (left to right) Waseem Dekelbab, Claudette Louard-Clarke, and Christian Petitfrere talk to attendees about TRB’s mission and current career opportunities.
- Exhibitor Roy Czinku (center) of Quarterhill in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada, joins others for a snack-and-chat.
- Attendees navigate the two Washington, DC, venues.
- Opportunities—and fun freebies—are plentiful at the Careers in Motion Networking Fair. (Mary Lord, TRB)
- Hao Yu, Bingshen Chen, and Shangzhi Zhuo (left to right) check the heavy event schedule while navigating through the Exhibit Hall.
Sessions & Workshops
- Michelle Miller, Michigan Department of Transportation, grabs attendees’ attention during the Do Not Let Asphalt Recycling Scare the RAP Out of You workshop.
- High school student and lead author Sophia Shen presents MIT’s research, The Effect of Remote Work on Urban Transportation Emissions: Evidence from 141 Cities, during the Wednesday afternoon poster session. (Hyun-A Park)
- U.S. Department of Transportation Deputy Secretary Polly Trottenberg leads a discussion among senior transportation leaders during the session titled U.S. Department of Transportation: Advances in Safety: Beyond the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law—Lasting Legacy in a Time of Transition.
- Fan Yin shares lessons learned from the National Center for Asphalt Technology test track.
- Surya Congress (left), Michigan State University, and Chud Lundgreen, Washington State Department of Transportation, converse during a workshop titled Exploring Sustainability and Resilience from TRB’s Transportation Infrastructure Group Perspective.
- David Brill, FAA, raises a question during a discussion about airfield asphalt pavements.
- Greg Woltman, Alan M. Voorhees Transportation Center, shares his views during the lectern session, 15-Minute Cities and Micromobility: Current Practices and Future Directions.
- Simon Lewis, Bob Peskin, and Bridget Malinowski (left to right), AECOM, share a laptop during the lectern session, Transportation Asset Risk and Resilience Strategies and Tools.
Committees
- Mahdi Monemi Nodehi, University of South Florida, discusses an agenda item in the New Users of Shared Airspace Committee workshop.
- Jeff Borowiec, Woolpert, Inc., moderates a discussion during the Airport Terminals and Ground Access Committee meeting.
- Ted Rosenbaum, DB Engineering USA, weighs in on the business of the Light Rail Transit Committee.
- Bruce Haldors, Transportation Group, Inc., shares his insights with fellow members of the Artificial Intelligence and Advanced Computing Applications Committee.
Blue Ribbon for Best Practices
Technical Activities Council Chair Avery Grimes presents Blue Ribbon Awards for best practices of outstanding technical activities committees in the following categories:
1. Research: Identifying and Advancing Ideas for Research: Standing Committee on Highway Traffic Monitoring, chaired by Ioannis Tsapakis;
2. Research: Identifying and Advancing Ideas for Research: Standing Committee on Aviation Economics and Forecasting, chaired by Liying Gu (accepted by Fecri Karanki); and
3. Diversity: Increasing the Diversity of Committee Membership and Friends, Especially from Groups that are Under-Represented in Transportation Research and Practice: Standing Committee on Construction of Bridges and Structures, chaired by Chiara Rosignoli.
Paper Awards
The Fred Burggraf Award is presented to researchers under age 35. TRB Executive Director Victoria Sheehan presented the Paper Awards to recipients, who are shown from left to right.
- Cassie Castorena, Gabriel Macedo Duarte, and Shivpal Yadav received the Burggraf Award on Transportation Infrastructure for Using Color Measurements to Quantify Aggregate and Asphalt Emulsion Compatibility. Other Burggraf Award winners are Aurore Sallard and François Hublet (not pictured) for Where the Borders Lie: Mapping Cross-Border Communities in Ten Western European Countries.
- Jose Capa Salinas and Tyler Lewandowski (not pictured) received the Burggraf Award for Blue Unmanned Aerial Systems Explained: The Current Drone Market, Flight Regulations, and Debunking Common Misconceptions.
- Sándor Vass and Biagio Ciuffo received the Pyke Johnson Award for Thermal Cameras and Their Safety Implications for Pedestrian Protection: A Mixed Empirical and Simulation-Based Characterization. Riccardo Donà, Konstantinos Mattas, Guillaume Delubac, Jessy Matias, and Sébastien Tinnes (not pictured) also received the award.
- Xinzhi Zhong, Wissam Kontar, and Soyoung “Sue” Ahn received the D. Grant Mickle Award for Learning Driver Models for Automated Vehicles via Knowledge-Sharing and Personalization.
- Bonnie Powell, Rick Grahn, Alejandro Henao, Stanley Young, and Sailesh Acharya received the William W. Millar Award for Mobility Energy Productivity Evaluation of On-Demand Transit: A Case Study in Arlington, Texas. Ruqayya Zakaria (not pictured) also received the award.
- Christina Freeman received the K. B. Woods Award for Splice Length of Large Diameter Reinforcing Bars in Ultra-High-Performance Concrete. William Potter and Steven Nolan (not pictured) also received the award.
- Ruth Steiner, Mehri Mohebbi, Virginia Sisiopiku, Steven Click, Mohammed Hadi, Jeremy Griffith, and Muhammad Sherif received the Charley V. Wootan Award for Framework for the Development of a Diverse Transportation Workforce in the Southeast Region. Dimitra Michalaka and James Martin (not pictured) also received the award.
Major Awards
Research professor at The University of Texas at Austin School of Architecture’s Community and Regional Planning Program and fellow of Hampton K. and Margaret Frye Snell Endowed Chair in Transportation, Sandra Rosenbloom is the recipient of the 2025 Thomas B. Deen Distinguished Lectureship. Also the director of the university’s Lab for Safe and Healthy Aging, Rosenbloom is recognized for her pioneering research that has advanced the understanding of urban mobility. The hallmark of her work is its interdisciplinary approach—combining insights from sociology, urban planning, and public policy to address the multifaceted nature of transportation issues.
Rosenbloom is a leading authority on the mobility needs of older adults. Her studies and resulting publications have highlighted the transportation challenges faced by aging populations, such as the inadequacy of public transportation options, the design of pedestrian infrastructure, and the implications of driving cessation.
The Deen Lectureship is named for TRB’s eighth executive director, who served from 1980 to 1994. It recognizes the career contributions and achievements of an individual in one of the areas covered by TRB’s Technical Activities Division.
Halil Ceylan, Pitt–Des Moines, Inc., Endowed Professor in the Department of Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering at Iowa State University, is the recipient of the 2024 Roy W. Crum Distinguished Service Award. Crum served as TRB’s executive director from 1928 until his death in 1951. The award recognizes outstanding achievement in the field of transportation research.
Ceylan is recognized for his distinguished career in civil, transportation, and pavement engineering—marked by exemplary leadership, numerous outstanding achievements, and significant contributions to the performance and production of fundamental and developmental transportation-related research. His research encompasses innovative geomaterial stabilization solutions, such as nontraditional stabilizers and 3D-printed geosynthetics using recycled plastics. He has pioneered continuous real-time health monitoring of infrastructure using smart sensors and technologies, including uncrewed aircraft systems. His work includes developing next-generation electrically conductive concrete and asphalt for self-heating and applying artificial intelligence to transportation infrastructure system performance modeling and design optimization. He has also conducted life-cycle cost and environmental analyses of transportation infrastructure systems and developed guidelines and specifications to support transportation infrastructure system innovations.
Deputy Director of the Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) at the U.S. Department of Transportation, Rolf R. Schmitt is the recipient of the 2024 Robert E. Skinner, Jr., Distinguished Service Award. Skinner, who served TRB for more than 30 years, was the executive director from 1994 to 2015. The award recognizes outstanding achievement in management, administration, promotion, fostering, and implementation of transportation research. Schmitt is acknowledged for a career of nearly 50 years devoted to conceiving, designing, establishing, sustaining, and managing transportation statistical programs and a national library critical to fostering the nation’s transportation research community and the advancement of transportation knowledge, practice, and processes.
Schmitt helped launch BTS more than 30 years ago, focusing on building quality data covering all forms of freight and passenger transportation and making information available for research, planning, and policy making. Throughout his career, he has championed the mission of creating and making available robust, reliable, up-to-date data that can be used to inform planning, investment, and policy decisions and support positive outcomes to meet public purposes.
Chandra R. Bhat is the recipient of the 2024 W. N. Carey, Jr., Distinguished Service Award. Bhat is the Joe J. King Endowed Chair Professor in Engineering and University Distinguished Teaching Professor in the Department of Civil, Architectural, and Environmental Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin. He is recognized for more than 30 years of service to TRB and his significant engagement in the transportation research management field.
Bhat is acknowledged worldwide as a leading expert in travel-demand modeling and travel-behavior analysis. His research interests include the social and environmental aspects of transportation and the planning implications of emerging technology and mobility options. His methodological research interests and expertise are in econometric systems and mixed data models. His scholarly contributions are widely referenced in the economics, marketing, geography, statistics, and transportation fields and have been included in econometric textbooks and software packages. His work has had an important impact on practice, shaping the design of transportation systems today and into the future.
The Carey Award is named for TRB’s executive director, who served from 1967 to 1980. It recognizes individuals who have provided leadership and distinguished service to TRB.
Nuria Fernandez, Principal Consultant and Chief Executive Officer of AMDC Consulting in Alexandria, Virginia, is the recipient of the 2025 Frank Turner Medal for Lifetime Achievement in Transportation. She is recognized for her significant contributions to the U.S. public transportation landscape during a career that spans more than 35 years.
Fernandez retired in February 2024 as the 15th administrator of FTA. During her three years at the helm, she led the agency in making transformative investments and creating policies that made public transportation stronger and safer nationwide. She also took over leadership of the federal transit response to the impacts of the COVID-19 public health emergency. This included maintaining safe travel for the transit workforce that moved frontline workers to and from their jobs, implementing transit practices that reduced COVID-19–related illness and fatalities, and coordinating more than $70 billion in federal COVID-19 emergency recovery funds.
The Turner Medal is a biennial award established in 1998 to commemorate former FHWA Administrator Frances (Frank) C. Turner for his extraordinary accomplishments in the development and construction of the U.S. transportation system. The award recognizes lifetime achievement in transportation—demonstrated by a distinguished career in the field; professional prominence; and a distinctive, widely recognized contribution to transportation policy, administration, or research.
Executive Committee Names New Leaders
Leslie S. Richards, Professor of Practice in the Department of City and Regional Planning at the University of Pennsylvania Stuart Weitzman School of Design in Philadelphia, as well as the 2024 vice chair of TRB’s Executive Committee, was elected as the committee’s 2025 chair during the Annual Meeting. From 2020 until late last year, she was CEO and General Manager of the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA), the fifth largest U.S. transit system. Prior to heading SEPTA, she served as Pennsylvania’s secretary of transportation.
A change maker and advocate for sustainability, efficiency, and accountability, Richards has been recognized for her pragmatic approach and commitment to engaging local communities before implementing transportation projects. Accomplishments include steering SEPTA through the COVID-19 pandemic, where she advanced initiatives to revolutionize buses, modernize trolleys, and reimagine regional rail. At the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, she launched a metrics-driven strategic investment plan aimed at fixing greater numbers of deteriorating bridges and roads.
Richards is a graduate of Brown University, where she concentrated in economics and urban studies. She earned a master’s degree in regional planning from the University of Pennsylvania.
Serving with Richards as TRB Executive Committee vice chair is Joel M. Jundt, Secretary of the South Dakota Department of Transportation. Jundt joined the agency in 1985 as a road design engineer and has held a variety of positions during his career there, including Rapid City region and operations engineer, director of planning and engineering, and deputy secretary. He is also active in TRB. In addition to his leadership role on the Executive Committee, he chairs the AASHTO Special Committee on Research and Innovation—the oversight committee of the National Cooperative Highway Research Program—and is a member of the TRB Division Committee, the National Research Council oversight body.
Jundt received a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology.
Serving as new members of the TRB Executive Committee are Andrew Fremier and Martha Grabowski. Reappointed members include James F. Albaugh, Douglas C. Ceva, Carol Abel Lewis, Russell McMurry, and Steward T. A. Pickett. The new Marine Board chair is Craig E. Philip, and new ex officio members are Firas Ibrahim, Sandra Knight, Chris Rocheleau, and Gloria Shepherd.
Policy Session
Each year, the TRB Executive Committee selects a topic worthy of deeper analysis to address in a policy session. The 2025 policy session explored various aspects of innovation, from incentivizing and managing innovation to initiatives involving bike and pedestrian trails, the use of telematics in freight rail, connected vehicle technology deployment, and construction of federal ships used for training mariners and supporting disaster relief. The panel of experts are (left to right) John Carter, TCGen; Carlos Braceras, Utah Department of Transportation; Russell McMurry, Georgia Department of Transportation; and Rear Admiral Ann Phillips (USN-Ret.), U.S. Maritime Administration. Panel members Mara Campbell, Jacobs, and Michael McClellan, Norfolk Southern Corporation, presented remotely.
Executive Committee
- Executive Committee Chair Carol Abel Lewis (left) chats with Sandra Knight (middle), University of Maryland, while TRB Executive Director Victoria Sheehan prepares for the day’s discussions.
- TRB Executive Director Victoria Sheehan presents Executive Committee member Chris Hendrickson with a plaque for distinguished service as chair of the Division Committee.
- Randell Iwasaki (left), Iwasaki Consulting Services, and Andrew Fremier, Metropolitan Transportation Commission/Association of Bay Area Governments, take a few minutes to chat.
- Ex officio member Vinn White, Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, makes a point during a discussion.
- Nancy Daubenberger, Minnesota Department of Transportation, joins the conversation about an agenda item.
- Ex officio member Major General Jason Kelly, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, weighs in on TRB’s initiatives.
Random Moments
- Attendees grab seats where they can, including on the Convention Center stairs. (Mary Lord, TRB)
- Friends meet at the giant “TRB” sign to coordinate their activities. (Mary Lord, TRB)
- Caleb Osmond, a student at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, takes a few minutes to relax and explore the Annual Meeting program.
- An attendee settles into a quiet spot with his laptop. (Mary Lord, TRB)
- Headphones and a hat doubling as an eye mask help an attendee escape the busy Annual Meeting pace.
- The heavy schedule of Annual Meeting sessions got the better of two sleeping attendees. (Mary Lord, TRB)
- As the Annual Meeting wrapped up, an impromptu call from TRB’s Cooperative Research Programs Director Monique Evans (center, in red scarf) drew staff to everyone’s favorite photo spot.
