May-June 2016: The Bus Rennaissance - Intercity Travel, Bus Rapid Transit, Technology Advances, Rural Services (2016)

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Growing up in Paris, Brendon Hemily embraced inde-pendent travel on the city’s comprehensive subway andbus system and valued the broader purpose of transit: helping people fulfill their lives. “Public transportation was something worth doing,” Hemily recalls; from a young age, he knew it was a career path he wanted to pursue. In college and graduate school, Hemily studied and worked with leading researchers such as Nigel Wilson and transporta- tion economics expert William Vickrey. He received a bachelor of arts degree in economics from Columbia University in New York; he then pursued a master’s degree and a Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 1978, Hemily attended his first TRB Annual Meeting, discovering a forum that brought together academic researchers, innovative transit agency staff, government agency policymakers, and consul- tants. “This was an exciting place where knowledge was gained and ideas were discussed,” Hemily comments. He has attended every Annual Meeting since 1978. At one Annual Meeting, Hemily met George Smerk, who hired him to manage Indiana University’s slate of transit train- ing courses and to conduct research on the use of strategic planning in the transit industry. Hemily then found himself at a professional crossroads: to continue an academic career, fulfilling research objectives and mentoring young people, or to work with transit agencies to forge innovation and effect change. Hemily found an opportu- nity to fulfill both career tracks by joining the Canadian Urban Transit Association (CUTA) as research and development (R&D) coordinator. He surveyed innovation activities pertinent to transit systems, identified gaps and related R&D needs, and developed problem statements to encourage applied research. Dissemination also was a significant part of his responsibilities; starting in 1988, Hemily organized theme-specific confer- ences—an industry first for both North America and Europe. “The success of these conferences inspired other organizations to structure more focused events where colleagues could learn about innovations and share best practices,” Hemily notes. In 1989, Hemily’s success with R&D at CUTA led to the cre- ation of a national research program at the agency, funded by governments and transit agencies. He became the manager of research and technical services and was responsible for all tech- nical activities. “This was the best of jobs,” Hemily notes. “I worked closely with highly motivated transit system colleagues to identify practical research needs, to define and conduct stud- ies, and to ensure that those who needed the information received it firsthand from the researchers in the form of mile- stone reports or through workshops—rather than through large final reports that few have the time to read.” The program facilitated research on many diverse topics, including the implications of demographic and socioeconomic trends on transit, the ergonomic design of the bus driver’s work- station, the use of automatic vehicle location data for planning and management, low-floor buses, rear- facing positioning for wheelchairs on transit vehi- cles, and more. In 2000, Hemily left CUTA to pursue applied research as an independent consultant, working in the United States and Canada. He focused primarily on intelligent transportation systems—not from the perspective of a technology enthusiast, but to use technology to enhance effectiveness and efficiency for transit customers. “Technology is changing our world significantly and offering diverse opportunities,” he muses. “Most of the obstacles to innovation, however, are not technical in nature but are organizational, human, and institutional, com- pounded by a lack of awareness of best practices.” Hemily has stayed involved in the academic and research world as well; he taught a graduate course on public trans- portation at the University of Toronto for 10 years. “Public transportation is a worthwhile pursuit, but it is also challeng- ing, because transit agencies are asked to pursue multiple, and sometimes conflicting, objectives,” he comments. “True inno- vation requires individuals to have both a multidisciplinary perspective on benefits and challenges—and an eternal curios- ity to ask questions and seek better solutions—underlining the importance of research.” Hemily is chair of the TRB Public Transportation Planning and Development Committee, which he joined in 1986. He is a longtime member and friend of the Bus Transit Systems Com- mittee and also serves on the Transformative Trends in Transit Data Subcommittee and several Transit Cooperative Research Program project panels. In 1993, he served on the steering committee for the Workshop on Transit Fare Policy and Man- agement; in 2007 he worked with Edward Beimborn to orga- nize the Conference on Transit Planning and Land-Use Coordination in Denver, Colorado. TR N EW S 30 3 M AY –J UN E 20 16 46 “Most of the obstacles to innovation are not technical in nature but are organizational, human, and institutional, compounded by a lack of awareness of best practices.” Brendon Hemily Consultant P R O F I L E S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . TRN_303.e$S_TRN_303 7/1/16 11:46 AM Page 46

Cheryl Allen Richter was an agricultural engineeringmajor at Cornell University when she found a part-time job analyzing rural road data with the Cornell Local Roads Program. Director Lynne Irwin became Richter’s mentor and helped her develop her career focus in pavement engineering; Richter then returned to Cornell for a master’s degree in highway engineering. “To say that I am indebted to Lynne for much of the success that I have enjoyed in my career would be an understatement,” Richter observes. After receiving her master’s degree and working for several years as research associate and staff engineer with the first Strategic Highway Research Program, Richter joined the Fed- eral Highway Administration (FHWA) Office of Infrastructure Research and Development. Her work focused on the Long- Term Pavement Performance (LTPP) program, establishing many of the LTPP performance monitoring protocols as well as the falling weight deflectometer calibration. Later, her focus shifted to analysis of the LTPP data. She worked with the TRB Expert Task Group on LTPP Data Analysis to establish a strate- gic plan for long-term pavement performance data analysis. “Information derived from the LTPP program provides an understanding of pavement performance that can be applied to help agencies make well-founded pavement management deci- sions,” Richter comments. In 2002, she received a Ph.D. in pavement and geotechni- cal engineering from the University of Maryland, College Park. Richter also served as Technical Director for Pavement Research and Development and as Infrastructure Research Pro- gram Manager at FHWA. In 2010, she became assistant direc- tor for pavement R&D at FHWA’s Turner–Fairbank Highway Research Center in Virginia. Now, as senior adviser and program coordinator at the FHWA Office of Infrastructure, Richter provides advice and coordination encompassing all aspects of the agency’s infra- structure activities: administration of the Federal-Aid Highway Program, transportation performance management, bridges and structures, asset management, pavements, and construc- tion. A recent area of focus has included analysis and timely implementation of the Fixing America’s Surface Transporta- tion (FAST) Act of 2015. “The ongoing transition to transportation performance management, first provided for in the Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act and continued under the FAST Act, holds great promise as a way of improving the over- all effectiveness of transportation investments. Research is key to developing an understanding of transportation perfor- mance,” Richter comments, adding that research allows prac- titioners and policy makers to keep pace with the evolving challenge of delivering safe and reliable transportation. “As raw materials have become scarcer and costlier, and as concern for the environmental impacts of highways has grown, research enables the expanded use of reclaimed and recycled materials in the production of asphalt and concrete, without sacrificing durability,” she notes. Other innovations spurred by research include improved test methods and specifications, computer and automation technology applications to expedite and improve construction processes, and the use of ultrahigh- performance concrete to address a key challenge in prefabri- cated bridge construction. Richter served on the TRB Design and Rehabilitation of Asphalt Pavements Committee from 1991 to 2003. In 1994, she joined the Pavement Structural Modeling and Evaluation Com- mittee, then called the Strength and Deformation Characteris- tics of Pavement Sections Committee, which she served as chair from 2006 to 2011; Richter then was appointed chair of the Pavements Section. She spearheaded an organizational review of the section, which she cites as her most significant TRB accomplishment to date. “Our purpose in undertaking the review was to ensure that the section was organized in a way that would allow it to effec- tively lead advances in the profession,” she notes. Richter adds that important topics in pavement research did not have an “organizational home” within the TRB committee structure; the two pavement design committees were focused on rigid (con- crete) and flexible (asphalt) pavements, and a logical place was needed for cross-cutting pavement design issues such as life- cycle analysis, design approaches applicable to pavements of all types, composite or nontraditional pavements, and more. A consensus on addressing these needs was a challenge, but ulti- mately, Richter and her colleagues recommended the creation of a new committee and the sunsetting of another, adjusting committee scopes. Richter received the Federal Highway Administrator’s Award for Superior Achievement in 2003 and 2011; also in 2011, she received the Federal Highway Administrator’s Excellence in Teamwork Award. TR N EW S 303 M AY–JUN E 2016 47 “Research is key to developing an understanding of transportation performance.” Cheryl Allen Richter Federal Highway Administration P R O F I L E S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . TRN_303.e$S_TRN_303 7/1/16 11:46 AM Page 47