Transit Tech: Realities and Possibilities for Serving Our Cities
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Busy street in London, United Kingdom. Jeremy Bishop / Unplash
Abstract:
How are transit technologies shaping cities? During this panel, we will hear from Via, Transit app, and Open Transport Partnership on how their practices have changed the urban mobility landscape. We will discuss the role of transit technology in relation to governing organizations, how city agencies and planners shape these projects, and how technologies shape transport decisions. Panelists will also address how transit technology companies can be viable while balancing public interests, what new developments panelists anticipate, and how data and analytics from these companies have created new planning insights.
Bios:
Kitty Chiu
Kitty Chiu is a transportation planner currently working in the transit tech space as part of the Partnerships team at Via. She works with cities, transit agencies, planning authorities, and private organizations to uncover ways to leverage transit technology and demand responsive transit to improve the efficiency of mobility services and provide access to underserved communities. Prior to joining Via, she worked as a consultant at WSP as part of the Emerging Mobility Strategies and Future Ready teams, where her work focused on developing strategies for agencies to better prepare for the future of transportation and cities more generally. She holds a bachelor's degree in urban planning and a master's degree in transportation engineering from the University of Waterloo in Canada.
Stephen Miller (B.S. URS '08)
Stephen Miller is responsible for external communications to public transit riders, partner transit agencies, the press, and policymakers at Transit, the app to get around without a car in more than 300 cities worldwide. Prior to joining Transit's Montreal-based team, Miller was a journalist covering New York City transportation and politics in the Village Voice, Gothamist, CityLab, and Streetsblog. Previously, he served as legislative director for a member of the New York City Council and worked as a bicycle and pedestrian advocate with Rails-to-Trails Conservancy. Originally from Rhode Island, Miller has a bachelor's degree in urban and regional studies from Cornell University and a Master of Urban Planning from Pratt Institute.
Shin-pei Tsay
Shin-pei Tsay's work centers people in the design, policy, and governance of the built environment and its transformations. She is currently Director of Global Policy for Cities and Transportation at Uber, where she leads a team focused on creating a sustainable, inclusive, and multi-modal future. Prior to Uber, she founded Make Public, a social impact analysis firm that specialized in social metrics for the public realm, and she was executive director of Gehl Institute, a non-profit that advocated for public life and public spaces. She served on the NYC Public Design Commission from 2015–2019 and taught urban design at Columbia University Graduate School for Architecture, Planning, and Preservation as well as Parsons School of Design at the New School. Shin-pei has served as deputy executive director of TransitCenter, a national foundation focused on improving urban transportation, and director of the Cities and Transportation Program under the Energy and Climate Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Her work was included in the 2012 Venice Biennale for Architecture and was most recently published by the Urban Design Forum, Common Edge, and SFMOMA's Open Space. She holds a bachelor's degree from Cornell University and an MSc from the London School of Economics.
Kevin Webb
Webb directs the Open Transport Partnership, a nonprofit helping communities build just and sustainable transportation systems. He previously worked at OpenPlans, Sunlight Foundation, the transport technology consultancy Conveyal, and as an entrepreneur-in-residence at Sidewalk Labs.
Moderators:
CRP Assistant Professors Nicholas Klein and Wenfei Xu
