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Transportation Engineering

The scope of Transportation Engineering

Transportation is essential for both individuals and society. Transportation is a consequence of people's needs to travel and to transport goods. Transportation can be defined as moving people and goods from one place to another. We can also consider traffic from another perspective: as a flow seen by some outside observer. From this viewpoint traffic involves movements of pedestrians and vehicles on routes and areas assigned for them. For instance in traffic flow theory traffic is mainly concerned as a phenomenon and thus ignoring the purpose of transport.

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Transportation can be divided into different modes for example according to transport route or transportation means. The transportation system consists of a stationary physical infrastructure (routes and terminals) and a transport management system (vehicle fleet, traffic control systems, and operator organizations). The physical infrastructure also includes some parts of the control systems like traffic signals and signs.

The scope of teaching and research in transportation engineering is the examination of the goal setting, the activities and the consequences of passenger and freight transport systems of different modes, general planning and analysis of transportation systems, and traffic control and management.  

The work tasks of transportation engineers are very versatile and comprehensive. They range from concrete traffic and freight transport planning assignments to theoretically demanding research projects and expert tasks. The research methods reach from traditional field measurements to interview studies and from statistical analysis and modelling to fuzzy logic and neural networks. In solving transportation engineering problems methods of for instance applied mathematics, economics, urban planning and psychology are used.

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Short history of the professorship of Transportation Engineering

The professorship of Transportation Engineering at Helsinki University of Technology (TKK) was established in spring 1966. Before that transportation engineering matters were taught within the professorship of Highway and Railway Engineering.

The first professor in Transportation Engineering was Dr. Otto Wahlgren (1967-). Professor Wahlgren had worked as associate professor of Highway and Railway Engineering 1964-1966. In 1974 prof. Wahlgren became the head of the Road and Traffic Laboratory at VTT (Technical Research Centre of Finland) and Dr. Sulevi Lyly was appointed to professor of Transportation Engineering. From 1972 the Transportation Engineering also had an associate professorship. In 1974 Lic.Sc. (Tech.) Pekka Rytilä was appointed to associate professor. When Rytilä left TKK in 1988 Lic.Sc. (Tech.) Matti Pursula was appointed to associate professor in 1990. After prof. Lyly had retired in 1996, associate prof. Pursula was appointed to professor in Transportation Engineering from 1999. In 1998 all associate professors became professors. Since 1999 the other professor in Transportation Engineering has been Lic.Sc. (Tech.) Timo Ernvall, who moved to TKK from the University of Oulu, where the department of Civil Engineering was closed. In 2003 prof. Pursula was elected as rector of TKK (vice rector 1997-2003). Since 2003 Dr. Tapio Luttinen has been the other professor in Transportation Engineering. Prof. Luttinen acts now also as the head of Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering.

On 1 January 2010, Helsinki University of Technology became a part of Aalto University and was renamed the Aalto University School of Science and Technology.  

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