In late October, Prof. Dick and TRAIN grad student Qianqian Tong travelled to the 2025 INFORMS Annual Meeting in Atlanta, GA, along with several other members of the UT Transportation Group. Qianqian presented on her work to develop a modeling framework for routing containers through intermodal networks, including rail link and terminal performance functions that vary transit time according to assigned demand, and a solution approach to achieve equilibrium transit times. Qianqian is developing this modeling framework as part of new and ongoing freight network modeling projects for DoE ARPA-E and the Texas Department of Transportation.
In early November, Prof. Dick attended the 27th Railroad Environmental Conference held in Urbana, IL. He presented on three different research projects, including ongoing work with TRAIN PhD student Steven Shi on identifying optimal Battery Electric Locomotive deployment strategies, our recently completed FRA-sponsored project with Michigan Technological University on Life-Cycle Analysis of Track Maintenance, and our recently completed work with the National Renewable Energy Lab for DoE ARPA-E to compare the performance of Parallel Systems vehicles to conventional intermodal trains on two different study corridors.