TRANSPORTATION RESEARCH FORUM

Members and friends,

Summer brings good news to the TRF community. Many members feel a great sense of relief—and excitement—about being able to freely travel again as pandemic health restrictions ease. Our organization finds itself in a position of financial strength due to the success of our 62nd International Meeting, the momentum behind the Journal of the Transportation Research Forum, and the activity of our chapters.

By my count, TRF staged more than 20 events over the past year. Our membership has risen to 160 and we have an effective business manager in Jolie Estes. The latest issue of our journal, which is published as part of Elsevier’s Research in Transportation Economics series, has an impressive research lineup.

Much of the credit goes to Baruch Feigenbaum, our past president, who despite a demanding “day job” at the Reason Foundation, helped forge an effective strategy during the pandemic. We held a highly successful April conference, attracted new sponsors, and revamped our newsletter series.

Our international conference committee, including Cambridge Systematics’s Susan Binder, Northwestern University’s Ian Savage, University of Saskatchewan’s James Nolan, and Jolie, brought together in April 120 researchers from around the world via Zoom. Our intellectually rich sessions reinforced TRF’s reputation as a place for high-level discussions on timely research. Ian developed a conference program with distinguished discussants assigned to every paper. I challenge you to find another major transportation conference in which such extensive and thoughtful feedback is provided.

What’s next for TRF? Among my goals, as your President, are to:

• Help assure another successful international conference, working with the St. Louis Chapter team.
• Create at least one new chapter, adding to our seven.
• Expand our newsletters to include member profiles and other timely material, and grow our membership, including the number of students who are part of our organization.

Please help our leadership team build an even stronger TRF community. Stay involved, keep your membership active, and reach out to fellow members in support.

Joe Schwieterman
President, Transportation Research Forum
Professor, DePaul University