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Research explores impacts of electric vehicle charging
With the emergence of electric vehicles (EVs) as an environmentally friendly alternative to the internal combustion engine, OTREC researcher Robert Bass decided to investigate some of the uncharted effects of their growing prevalence.
Bass is interested in measuring and understanding the impacts that electric vehicle charging stations have on their cities’ power distribution systems.
Electric Avenue, located on the Portland State University campus where Bass is an associate professor, is the perfect research opportunity: a row of EV charging stations along Southwest Montgomery Street, between Broadway and Sixth Avenue in downtown Portland, Ore.
Tags: drive oregon, electric vehicles, livability, otrec, portland state university, psu, research
New modeling tools better represent the pedestrian environment
OTREC research from Portland State University has developed a new method of travel demand modeling for pedestrian trips.
Transportation professionals use travel demand modeling to forecast how many people will be using a given portion of the transportation infrastructure. This is typically done using a four-step process, the first step of which relies upon a basic unit known as a transportation analysis zone, or TAZ.
A TAZ is a relatively coarse unit of space that can vary in size depending on planners’ needs; typically it encompasses somewhere around 3,000 residents.
Planners started using TAZs in the 1950s, on mainframe computers with limited capabilities, for guidance in making highway investment decisions. As transportation modeling practice has evolved, computers are capable of processing more data and models are being increasingly relied upon to answer more complex questions.
Tags: active transportation, kelly clifton, livability, metro, otrec, portland state university, transportation modeling, walking
OTREC gives “green light” to new hybrid electric vehicle
OTREC researchers and students from the Oregon Institute of Technology have teamed up with Green Lite Motors to test a next-generation hybrid car.
Green Lite Motors, a clean-tech start-up company based in Portland, Ore., has developed a small, three-wheeled, gas-electric hybrid vehicle based on the platform of a Suzuki Burgman scooter.
The vehicle is classed as a motorcycle, and has all the advantages of the smaller vehicle — it doesn’t take up a whole parking space, and it gives off fewer emissions — but it also has an advanced roll-cage design, giving it the safety and comfort of a standard passenger car. It has two wheels in the front, one in the back, and mileage possibilities greater than 100 miles per gallon.
The target market areas for this two-passenger vehicle are urban commute zones, where large numbers of people travel daily from suburban homes to city-based professions.
The tiny hybrid car could change the commuting experience, minimizing gas expenditure and cutting down the time people spend looking for parking.
Tags: electric vehicles, emissions, livability, oregon institute of technology, otrec
PSU students and transportation professionals celebrate with post-TRB happy hour
The Transportation Research Board’s Annual Meeting took place in Washington, D.C. from January 12-16, 2014. Nearly 12,000 transportation professionals were in attendance, including 75 OTREC/NITC faculty and student researchers.
To recap this exciting event and share their experiences, Portland State University students and local transportation professionals gathered Tuesday, February 11th at the Rock Bottom Brewery, a combination brewery, restaurant and pub located in downtown Portland.
Attending the TRB meeting as students gave participants an opportunity to accelerate their development as transportation professionals. Conference sessions and workshops offered a multitude of learning and networking events. Civil & Environmental Engineering graduate student Katie Bell said, “There were so many things going on [at the conference], you could be somewhere from dawn to dusk... it was a really great experience.”
Graduate student Pam Johnson organized the happy hour event, arriving early to make introductions, distribute name tags and help people mingle. Approximately 25 people attended the event, most of them PSU students. There were also representatives there from Kittelson & Associates, Lancaster Engineering, the Portland Bureau of Transportation and Washington County.
The gathering allowed students and conference participants to share ideas and research, along with their TRB stories. Graduate student Nick Foster and PSU Transportation Certificate alum Max Scheideman of Lancaster Engineering enjoyed the opportunity to chat and catch up on research developments in the local transportation community.
Not all of the PSU students who came to the happy hour were participants in this year’s TRB conference. Some of them, like MURP student Mandia Gonzales, just came to soak up the knowledge and network with fellow transportation students. Those who did attend TRB, like graduate students Adam Moore and Kristina Currans, came to the happy hour to see each other’s research, enjoy some microbrews, and share stories about their adventures in D.C.
The "TRB Aftershock" happy hour event was hosted by Portland State University Students in Transportation Engineering and Planning (STEP) and the National Institute for Transportation and Communities (NITC).
Tags: otrec, portland state university, transportation research board
OTREC research looks into contextual influences on trip generation
OTREC research has taken steps toward developing trip generation rates for sites in a multimodal context.
Trip generation refers to the number of vehicle trips that are predicted to originate in a particular zone. The Institute of Transportation Engineers (ITE) provides standard trip generation rates, but these rates are primarily measured in low-density suburban areas.
In areas that have a more compact urban form, better access to transit and a greater mix of land uses, fewer (and shorter) vehicle trips might actually be generated there than the current ITE rates indicate.
A project headed by Kelly Clifton, of Portland State University, examines the ways in which urban context affects vehicle trip-generation rates across a variety of land uses.
Tags: institute of transportation engineers, kelly clifton, metro, otrec, system development charges, trip generation
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