This year, CTS is marking its 40th anniversary, celebrating four decades of transportation research, education, and engagement — a milestone made possible by the meaningful contributions of the Center’s five councils. The recent all-councils meeting explored topics of innovation and progress, reflecting on the past 40 years and anticipating the future. The meeting also featured presentations highlighting the USDOT’s University Transportation Centers (UTCs) Program and detailing the success of a Mobility-as-a-Service pilot in Minnesota.
The future of University Transportation Centers
Featured speaker Henry Liu — who serves as director of the University of Michigan’s Transportation Research Institute (UMTRI) and the Center for Connected and Automated Transportation (CCAT), the Region 5 UTC — recounted his career in university transportation research and addressed the challenges and opportunities ahead for UTCs. Liu conducts research on transportation engineering, automotive engineering, and artificial intelligence (AI), with a focus on cyber-social transportation systems. His long list of credentials also includes professorships in civil engineering at the University of Minnesota from 2005 to 2014, during which time he led development of the SMART Signal (Systemic Monitoring of Arterial Road Traffic and Signals) system.
In 2014, Liu left the UMN for the University of Michigan, where he helped establish Mcity, the world’s first physical test track for autonomous vehicle (AV) testing, deployment, research, education, and engagement and a third-party performance evaluator for connected and AV technology. Under his directorship, Mcity 2.0 launched in 2022, incorporating a digital infrastructure that allows remote access to the test facility for researchers outside the University of Michigan, Liu explained. With Mcity 2.0 expected to sunset next year, Liu is envisioning the next chapter of the program as an urban test bed for physical AI, including drones and delivery and humanoid robots.
Looking ahead, Liu noted critical factors for the continued success of existing UTCs, emphasizing the importance of domain expertise, physical test tracks, and computational infrastructure. Among his specific recommendations were aiming to influence standards, regulation, and agency practice through research; building signature infrastructure or programs that others can’t replicate; investing in graduate training, mentorship, and industry co-op programs; partnering with community colleges and high schools to expand the talent pool; and remaining a neutral, pre-competitive hub for industry-government collaboration.
Research into practice: Mobility-as-a-Service
Following Liu, recipients of CTS’s 2026 Research Partnership Award shared the results of their Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) application project implementation in southern Minnesota. The work, sponsored by the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT), was driven by the need to reduce transportation emissions and improve post-pandemic public transit use. Using a smartphone app, the MaaS platform integrates multiple transportation options, booking, and payment. This form of multimodal trip planning includes fixed-route services, such as buses or trains with a set schedule, and demand-responsive transit options, where transit riders schedule their own pick ups and drop offs. Elliot McFadden, emerging mobility unit supervisor in MnDOT’s Office of Transit and Active Transportation, and Alireza Khani, UMN Department of Civil, Environmental, and Geo- Engineering professor and CTS scholar, presented on the lifecycle of the project.
McFadden explained the technical components of the MaaS platform, including the public-facing consumer app and the operational software, while Khani described the effectiveness of the MaaS platform for growing ridership, increasing equity, and improving operational efficiency. Notable research results include streamlined trip planning, improved travel behaviors, reduced stress and demand on call centers and dispatchers, and increased flexibility through same-day and longer-term reservation options. In addition, services that were part of the MaaS project experienced a 4.2 increase in ridership compared to a 0.2 percent increase for control groups.
—Krysta Rzeszutek, CTS digital editor
