(September 11) Solutions for Today, Decisions for Tomorrow: A Behavioral Agenda for Next-Generation Transportation

From connected corridors and automated speed enforcement to continuous friction monitoring and Advanced Air Mobility ecosystems, modern transportation research increasingly delivers high-resolution sensing and operational interventions. Yet every technological advancement ultimately interfaces with human decision-making — whether an automated pedestrian detection countermeasure at a signalized intersection, a V2X roadside unit broadcasting safety warnings, or an emerging urban air network. System efficacy hinges not just on physical reliability or algorithm design, but on behavioral adaptation: how drivers process automated alerts, how travelers value travel time across novel modes, how compliance shifts under camera enforcement, and how bounded rationality governs movement during urban disruptions.

Positioned early in the seminar series, this presentation establishes a behavioral and econometric foundation to bridge today’s deployment evaluations with tomorrow’s mobility paradigms. By framing transportation systems through the dual lenses of travel behavior modeling and human-machine interaction, this talk provides researchers and students with a conceptual scaffold to contextualize the sensing, infrastructure, and engineering innovations presented throughout the day.

Michael Maness, PhD
Assistant Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering
University of South Florida

Michael Maness, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of South Florida, affiliated with the Center for Urban Transportation Research (CUTR) and a former Associate Director of the TOMNET Tier 1 University Transportation Center. His research focuses on travel behavior modeling, discrete choice analysis, mechanism design, and data science applications in transportation, with particular emphasis on how human decision-making, social interactions, strategic behavior, and societal dynamics shape the adoption of emerging mobility systems. Prior to USF, he completed research appointments at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and FHWA’s Turner-Fairbank Highway Research Center, and is a past recipient of the Eric Pas Dissertation Prize.