Transportation Science

R. Jayakrishnan, Director
949-824-2172
rjayakri@uci.edu
http://www.transci.uci.edu/

The interdisciplinary graduate program in Transportation Science at the Institute of Transportation Studies (ITS) includes faculty from five academic units: the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering in the Henry Samueli School of Engineering, the Department of Urban Policy and Public Planning in the School of Social Ecology, the Department of Economics in the School of Social Sciences, the Department of Environmental and Occupational Health in the Joe C. Wen School of Population and Public Health, and the School of Law. Faculty from the Department of Computer Science in the Bren School of Information and Computer Sciences and the Paul Merage School of Business also support the program through courses and collaborative research at ITS.

The program is designed to educate students in a broad set of competencies and perspectives that mirror the actual state of policy, practice and research in a variety of areas involving mobility, transportation, and logistics. The students develop cross-cutting background by selecting study topics along policy, planning, technology, modeling, data science, economics, environment, housing, sustainability, legal, regulatory, business and social dimensions of Transportation.

M.S. and Ph.D. degrees are offered in Transportation Science.

Admission

Admission is limited to a small number of exceptionally talented, independent, and self-disciplined students. The deadline for application for admission is March 1 for the fall quarter. All applicants must take the Graduate Record Exam (GRE) prior to the application deadline. Applicants whose first language is not English must also submit Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) or International English Language Testing System (IELTS) scores.

Requirements

The M.S. program is a 44-unit program with two options: (1) thesis; and (2) comprehensive examination. Students will choose one of these two options. For both options, no more than 12 credit hours of non-transportation courses can count toward the required number of course-work units. Exceptions must be approved by the student’s advisor and the Director of the Transportation Science program. Opportunities are available for part-time study toward the M.S. degree. The normative time for completion of the M.S. is four quarters, with some students finishing in a single academic year, and others staying into a second year. Many students will choose to stay for five or six quarters, and the maximum time permitted is four years.

Requirements

Core courses must be chosen from lists in each of the four program areas: Area 1 (Transportation Systems Engineering), Area 2 (Urban and Transportation Economics) and Area 3 (Transportation Planning), and Area 4 (Computer Science).

Substitutions and exceptions must be requested ahead of time and must be approved by the Director of the Transportation Science program.

Each student must choose at least two graduate courses from Area 1, at least one graduate course from Areas 2 and 3, and at least four additional graduate courses from any of the four areas. At least five of the eight core courses must be transportation courses, which are indicated by an asterisk.

Specific courses in each of these areas are shown below:

1. NOTE: ECON 281A-ECON 281B and ECON 282B require ECON 210A or consent of the instructor.

After approval from their advisor, students may petition the Director of the Transportation Science Program with requests for substitution of the required courses.

Plan I: Thesis Option

Students who select the thesis option must complete at least 44 units of study, up to eight of which can be taken in conjunction with the thesis research topic (thesis units should be taken in the home department of the faculty advisor); they must also complete at least 36 units of course work with no more than four units of pre-approved upper-division undergraduate courses, independent study units, or seminars. The thesis should reflect an original research investigation and it must be approved by a thesis committee of at least three full-time faculty members, a majority of which must be Transportation Science faculty.

Plan II: Comprehensive Examination Option

Students who select the comprehensive examination option must successfully complete 44 units of course work and pass a comprehensive examination. These units may include no more than 12 units of pre-approved upper-division undergraduate courses, independent study units, or seminars. The comprehensive examination requirements may be met with a publication-quality paper dealing with a transportation topic; this paper must be approved by the student’s advisor and the Director of the Transportation Science program.

Research Facilities

Research is coordinated at the UCI Institute of Transportation Studies (ITS) the home of the Transportation Science Program. ITS facilites include classrooms, remote teaching, and seminar facilities and offices for faculty and researchers. ITS also offers extensive computer lab and software support. Approximately 30 to 40 graduate students have their desks at ITS and are employed as research assistants each year. Funded research projects at ITS in recent years have focused on topics such as: intelligent transportation systems; artificial intelligence (AI) applications in transportation; planning and analysis of transportation systems; transportation systems engineering, operation and control; travel behavior and demand forecasting; transportation safety and security; road and congestion pricing mechanisms; advanced sensor systems; electric vehicle systems; environmental and energy issues; agent-based modeling and simulation of traffic and activity systems; public transit operations; shared mobility systems and subscription services; land use and housing interactions with transportation; environmental justice and equity; community and social impacts of transportation; transportation economics, funding and finance; infrastructural, environmental, economic and regulatory policy in transportation.

ITS is part of U.S. Department of Transportation's University Transportation Center program regional consortium, one of 10 federally designated centers of excellence for transportation research. The Institute maintains a regular publications series documenting research conducted within its programs. UCI has an excellent library collection, as well as special inter-library loan arrangements with other University of California libraries including the Transportation Library at UC Berkeley.