Events

June 30, 2020 2:00 pm to 2:45 pm ET:

The COVID-19 pandemic has pushed transit professionals to establish new standards for resiliency. At the same time, leaders in transit are seeking new ways to promote social mobility through career pathway opportunities. Drawing from industry experience and research, this webinar will delve into resiliency challenges and education and training solutions to cultivate a more resilient and empowered transit workforce. The webinar will identify critical labor market benchmarks impacting the transit workforce and address ways to prepare the public transportation workforce for the post COVID-19 world.

Registration link: https://www.enotrans.org/event/webinar-empowering-a-resilient-transit-workforce/

Moderators:
Tyler Reeb, Director of Research and Workforce Development at the Center for International Trade and Transportation at the California State University of Long Beach & Editor of Empowering the New Mobility Workforce: Educating, Training, and Inspiring Future Transportation Professionals
Robert Puentes, President and CEO, Eno Center for Transportation

Panelists:
Xinge Wang, Deputy Director of the Transportation Learning Center
Joanne Peterson, Chief of Human Capital & Development at Los Angeles Metro
Jess Guerra, Executive Director of the Transportation Workforce Institute at Los Angeles Trade-Technical College

The impacts of density on the COVID-19 pandemic are currently the center of attention in public opinion, policy decisions, and planning practice. The concerns and assumptions surrounding density challenge the foundation of modern cities and have immediate implications for transportation expenditures, urban redevelopment, tax policy, congestion pricing, smart growth, and affordable housing. However, a recent study titled “Does Density Aggravate the COVID-19 Pandemic” suggests quite the opposite. The authors found that density is not linked to rates of COVID-19 infections and that COVID-19 death rates are lower in denser countries and higher in less dense ones. In this webinar, we will discuss the study’s findings on density and COVID-19 and their implications for transportation, urban planning, and more.

Speakers:
Shima Hamidi, Bloomberg Assistant Professor of American Health, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
Reid Ewing, Professor of City and Metropolitan Planning, University of Utah
Sadegh Sabouri, Ph.D. Research Assistant, University of Utah
Robert Puentes, President and CEO, Eno Center for Transportation 

Click here to register for this event 

Transportation Training Professionals: 2020 NTTD / NLTAPA Annual Conference registration is now open for the 2020 Virtual To You (V2Y) NLTAPA/NTTD Annual Conference. A gathering of professionals responsible for training the current and future transportation workforce, the National Transportation Training Directors (NTTD) & the National Local Area Technical Assistance Program Association (NLTAPA).

To register and see the draft agenda please go to https://nltapa.org/workgroups/conference/. We’re virtual and free this year! We’ll meet from 10:00 AM to 1:30 PM (Central Time) from July 28-30, 2020.

We will have general sessions, technical sessions, state sharing, and hot topics. There are three opportunities to directly participate:

• If you are interested in doing one of the three 5 minute state sharings, reach out to Keith Knapp (kknapp@iastate.edu) or Colleen Montague (Colleen.Montague@vermont.gov) in the next couple of weeks so we can put you on the agenda ASAP.
• If you have an interesting poster on training or learning, please reach out to Marilee Lafond (Marilee.LaFond@unh.edu) for more information.
• Hot Hot Hot Topics. If you have any ideas about hot topics please contact me (kknapp@iastate.edu) or Matt Enders (matthew.enders@wsdot.wa.gov).

by Marley Randazzo, USC, Masters of Urban Planning 2021

Tuesday, June 2nd, the Transportation Research Board (TRB) and the Pacific Southwest Region University Transportation Center (PSR) held the Traffic Trends and Safety in a COVID-19 World webinar. The event was the first partnership of its kind for both TRB and PSR. “We are delighted to be able to partner with TRB and share some of our PSR research on this timely topic,” said PSR director Dr. Genevieve Giuliano.

Amplifying the event on both organizations’ platforms and speaking to the high level of interest in planning in a post-COVID world, the webinar was extremely well-attended, drawing an audience of over 1,100 attendees. Event moderator Dr. Fraser Schilling, representing UC Davis’ Road Ecology Center, noted the current importance of academic research to the planning practice: “I think the size of the event spoke to how much these new traffic conditions are on peoples’ minds. It is a learning experience for everyone, from planners to traffic safety and operations.”

Read the full article at METRANS.org.

About the Author: Marley Randazzo is a second-year graduate student in the Master of Urban Planning program at USC Price. He works as a writer, product manager, and designer for METRANS.