Advancing transportation technology and infrastructure: Transportation and Highway Engineering Conference

The 111th Transportation and Highway Engineering Conference, held on March 4-5, at the I Hotel and Conference Center in Champaign, Illinois, brought together professionals, researchers and students from across Illinois and beyond.

The event featured a diverse program, focusing on various aspects of transportation engineering, technology and networking opportunities. Presentations covered topics such as local roads and streets, aviation, bridges and structures, design, construction and environment, traffic, operations and safety, and transportation and material innovations.

This year’s event highlighted cutting-edge research and innovations in transportation engineering, with Illinois Center for Transportation faculty and students playing a prominent role.

Faculty members delivered key presentations on their latest ICT research:

• Imad Al-Qadi, ICT director and Grainger Distinguished Chair in Engineering, shared ways to improve freight efficiency and sustainability using electric truck platoons. The Illinois Department of Transportation-sponsored research addresses how to optimize electric vehicle technology while maintaining roadway performance.
• Jeffery Roesler, T.H.E. conference director and ICT’s rigid pavements lead, shared insights into vehicle-to-infrastructure technologies. The research, sponsored by the Center for Connected and Automated Transportation, focuses on enhancing road safety by preventing lane departures in construction work zones.
• Ryan Fries, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville professor, presented best practices for assessing the condition of traffic signals, sponsored by IDOT.

The poster session highlighted the work of ICT graduate students, ranging from sustainable pavement technologies to innovative safety systems and materials science applications in transportation engineering:

• Lama Abufares: Asphalt density monitoring during compaction
• Lara Diab: Role of asphalt pavements in achieving net-zero emission in the U.S. transportation sector
• Syed Husain: Long-term durability assessment of cement-stabilized aggregate quarry by-products: Potential role of hydrotalcite
• Pengyuan Liu: Evaluation of digital alert systems associated to emergency response vehicles and compliance with move over law
• Apidej Sakulneya: V2I work zone communication through pavement signage coded on road surfaces
• Yudi Wang: Chemo-mechanical characterization of rejuvenated asphalt binder using data-driven approach and micro-mechanical models

The 112th T.H.E. conference will take place March 3-4, 2026.