PacTrans | Student Activities

In 2010, Alaska ranked 50 out of 51 for highway traffic fatalities, with 56 fatal traffic deaths.

Source: U.S. Dept. of Transportation, Research and Innovative Technology Administration, Bureau of Transportation Statistics

MEET THE TEAM

Yinhai Wang Dr. Wang is a professor in Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Washington. He serves as director for the Pacific Northwest Transportation Consortium (PacTrans), USDOT University Transportation Center for Federal Region 10.

+ Meet all of the team

Student Activities

October 01, 2015
PacTrans Region 10 Student Transportation Conference 2015 Registration

Student Register online for the 2015 PacTrans Regional 10 Student Transportation Conference on Saturday, October 17, 2015 at Room 250 Husky Union Building (HUB), University of Washington. Click on the flyer for a clearer image.

For more information and to register, free of cost, click here. Read More
July 13, 2015
Meet Our 2015-16 PacTrans Fellows

As part of PacTrans’ mission to bring talented professionals into the transportation field, PacTrans provides funding to students seeking transportation-related graduate degrees each year. Read More
July 01, 2014
2014 Graduation

Congratulations to our 2014 Graduates
May 12, 2014
Jeff Busby from TransLink Talks to Transportation Graduate Seminar

On May 2, Jeff Busby, Senior Manager, Project Development at TransLink in Vancouver, BC, came and talked to the University of Washington transportation graduate students at the graduate transportation seminar. He gave a very interesting talk about how areas in Metro Vancouver are using transit stations to stimulate better development and the relationship between development and transportation infrastructure. This is important because Metro Vancouver is projected to grow over the next 30 years, meaning that there will be an increase in the number of trips taken. TransLink hopes that the increase in person trips won’t result in an increase in vehicle trips. Achieving this goal involves everything from designing transit station access to choosing which benches to put at stations. The talk was an excellent opportunity for students to learn about issues in the transportation industry, and how those issues are being solved. One interesting thing about TransLink is that it is organized differently than many of its North American counterparts, as they fulfill the roles of both an MPO and a transit system operator, and also fund a lot of road infrastructure. This enables a degree of coordination that would be impractical in many jurisdictions. We would like to thank Jeff for speaking to our students, as it was a great experience for them.
April 28, 2014
STAR Lab Participates in UW Engineering Discovery Days

PacTrans joined in the celebration of UW Engineering Discovery Days. Engineers and scientists from across campus displayed their most engaging research and projects during the 2 day event held from April 25-26, 2014. This event was free and open to the public with almost 600 students, parents and faculty in attendance. Some of the highlights included a PacTrans research project with a display of an earthquake table used by structural engineers to test how structures will withstand earthquakes. This sort of testing is crucial to figuring out how well a structure, such as a bridge, would be able to withstand a major natural disaster. STAR Lab as well as other labs conducting research demonstrated their research to people of all ages as well. The STAR Lab demonstrated video-based pedestrian detection systems, controllers used for traffic signals, and let kids play “Traffic Hero,” a game similar to Guitar Hero^, in which players try to detect cars along with the detection system and score points if they can correctly do so.

Students learn about traffic signal controllers

Students play Traffic Hero