Digital Twins Powered by Traffic Simulation, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, and Big Data for Real-World Deployment Testing and Validation
Sunday, January 5, 2025, 1:30 PM-4:30 PM, Convention Center, Washington, DC
Presiding by:
Kaan Ozbay, New York University, NY
Sanhita Lahiri, Virginia Department of Transportation
Sponsored by:
Standing Committee on Traffic Simulation (ACP80)
Standing Committee on Regional Transportation Systems Management and Operations (ACP10)
Standing Committee on Freeway Operations (ACP20)
Subcommittee on Simulation (SimSub), ACP80(1), Joint Subcommittee of ACP80, ACP20, ACP25, ACP35, ACP40, ACP50, ACP55, AEP40, AMS10 (ACP80(1))
For any questions, contact Zilin Bian (Coordinator), zb536@nyu.edu
Workshop Description
Digital Twins as a Highly Responsive Decision Support tool for Management and Planning of Transportation Systems Operating Under Stochastic Demand and Supply Conditions This workshop will focus on the development of digital twins as a decision support tool for varying applications with time scales ranging from the near real-time operations and management to long-term planning of complex transportation systems. Moreover, the role of Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning that will be required to be incorporated into the digital-twin applications to make them operationally feasible and effective will also be discussed.
The ultimate goal of this workshop is to bring together experts from transportation agencies, academia, as well as the industry to have a highly interactive discussion of the most important research and implementation opportunities and challenges to improve the safety and efficiency of complex transportation systems.
Detailed Agenda
Session 1: The role of big data and AI/ML in the development and deployment of Digital Twins for Transportation Systems
1:30 pm-2:45 pm
Moderator: Jeff Ban, University of Washington, WA
Eugene Vinitsky, New York University, NYU
“Enhancing Digital Twins with Reinforcement Learning”
Rahul Mangharam, University of Pennsylvania, PA
“StreetSavii: AI Assistant for Complete Streets that are safe and efficient“
Ziran Wang, Purdue University , IN
“Generative AI-Based Human-Autonomy Teaming on Connected and Automated Vehicles“
Zilin Bian, New York University, NYU
“AI/ML enhanced Digital-Twin Based Risk-Aware Intelligent Mobility Simulation and Analytics for Incident Management Operations in New York City“
Session 2: Real-World Deployment, Testing and Validation of Digital Twins in Urban Areas
2:45 pm – 4:00 pm
Moderator: Bekir Bartin, Özyeğin University, Turkey
Hwasoo Yeo, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, South Korea
“From Traffic Simulation to Mobility Digital Twin: Concept and Strategies”
Venktesh Pandey, North Carolina A&T State University, NC
“Digital Twin for Urban Resilience: Modeling Transportation and Water Infrastructure Interoperability”
Omer Verbas, Argonne National Laboratory, IL
“Simulating traveler decision making and traffic using POLARIS for Digital Twin Applications: Methodology and large-scale case studies”
Jeff Ban, University of Washington, WA
“Testing and Evaluation of Multiscale Infrastructure-Vehicle Cooperative Control in Simulation and Digital Twins”
Tho Le, Purdue University
“Revolutionizing Logistics and Supply Chains with Digital Twin Technology”
Open Discussion of the role of AI/ML and Big data in the future research, development, and deployment opportunities of DT’s
4:00 pm – 4:30 pm
Moderator: Kaan Ozbay, New York University, NY
Panelists:
Daniel Work, Vanderbilt University, TN
Rahul Mangharam, University of Pennsylvania, PA
Eugene Vinitsky, New York University, NYU
Speakers and Moderators
Dr. Kaan Ozbay is a tenured Full Professor and the founding Director of the C2SMART USDOT Tier I University Transportation Center led by NYU. Dr. Ozbay was a tenured full Professor at the Rutgers University Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering until July 2013. Dr. Ozbay is the recipient of the prestigious National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER award. He co-authored 4 books and published approximately 400 refereed papers in scholarly journals and conference proceedings. Most recently, Prof. Ozbay co-edited a book titled “Dynamic Traffic Control Ramp; Guidance” published by Springer Verlag’s “Complex Social, Economic and Engineered Networks” series. He is a member of the editorial board of the ITS journal and serves as the Associate Editor of Networks and Spatial Economic and Transportmetrica B: Transportation Dynamics journal.
Sanhita Lahiri, PTOE is with Virginia Department of Transportation at Central Office Traffic Engineering Division, and manages the Data and System Analysis program. Her programs include Performance Measures, Roadway Network Analysis, Modeling and Simulation, Travel trends, Policy and Guidance for Traffic Analysis, and Statewide Traffic Engineering Software Training and Management. Sanhita also Cochairs the TRB Standing committee on Traffic Simulation. Originally from India, and having lived in Florida for a while Sanhita enjoys warm weather and pursues photography during her free time.
Dr. Eugene Vinitsky is an Assistant Professor of Civil and Urban Engineering and an affiliated professor of Computer Science Engineering at NYU. He has a BS in physics from Caltech and received his PhD from UC Berkeley in Controls Engineering with a specialization in Reinforcement Learning after which he worked as a research scientist in the Apple Special Projects Group. He received his MS in physics from UC Santa Barbara. As a member of the CIRCLES consortium, he is responsible for the reinforcement learning algorithms and simulators used to train and deploy energy-smoothing cruise controllers onto Tennessee highways. His research goal is to see complex, human-like behavior emerge from unsupervised interaction between groups of learning agents with an applications focus on enabling autonomous vehicles to operate in rich scenarios.
Dr. Rahul Mangharam is an Associate Professor in the Department of Electrical and Systems Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania. He is a founding member of the PRECISE Center and directs the Safe Autonomous Systems Lab at Penn. His research is at the intersection of formal methods, machine learning and controls for medical devices, energy efficient buildings, & autonomous systems. He is the Penn Director for Safety21 US DoT National University Transportation Center ($20MM), Director of the Autoware Center of Excellence in Autonomous Driving, Board Member in The Autoware Foundation and Leader of the F1Tenth Autonomous Racing Community.
Dr. Ziran Wang leads the Digital Twin Lab, which aims to build digital replicas of real-world entities based on AI, big data, cloud/edge computing, and mixed reality. One particular application domain of his research is connected and automated vehicles, where he also gained related experience from his last role as a Principal Researcher at Toyota Motor North America. Besides actively publishing peer-reviewed papers, Dr. Wang has also filed more than 50 patent applications in the U.S., Japan, and China. Dr. Wang’s primary research interests include: Digital Twin, Autonomous Driving, Human-Autonomy Teaming, and Personalized Recommendation.
Dr. Zilin Bian is a Research Associate in Transportation Planning and Engineering in the Department of Civil and Urban Engineering at New York University. He received his Ph.D. degree at NYU and a master’s degree at the University of Florida. His research interests include applications of machine learning and artificial intelligence in traffic incident management, transportation data and mobility modeling, and transportation policy. He plays a leadership role both within and beyond his research group, serving as the research lead for multiple projects in collaboration with other research groups such as the University Transportation Research Center (UTRC) of the City University of New York (CUNY). He was honorably mentioned at the 2023 best dissertation award in Transportation Research Board (TRB) Artificial Intelligence and Advanced Computing Applications Committee.
Dr. Bekir O. Bartin is a full time associate professor at Özyeğin University. Prior, he was the founding chair at Civil Engineering Department at Altınbaş University (formerly Istanbul Kemerburgaz University). Dr. Bartin worked as a full-time research associate at Rutgers University. He has a Ph.D. (’06) and M.Sc. (’00) in Civil and Environmental Engineering from Rutgers University, and a B.Sc. (‘97) in Civil Engineering from Middle East Technical University. His research expertise lies in the development of simulation models of large scale complex transportation systems, application of reinforcement learning methods in traffic simulation, economic evaluation of transportation investment projects, traffic safety and security. He is an affiliate of the C2SMARTER center.
Dr. Hwasoo Yeo received his B.S. degree in civil engineering from Seoul National University, Seoul, South Korea, in 1996, and the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in civil and environmental engineering from University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA, in 2008. He is a Professor with the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Korea, Advance Institute of Science and Technology, Daejeon, South Korea. His research interests include traffic flow, traffic operations and intelligent transportation systems.
Dr. Venktesh Pandey is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Civil, Architectural, and Environmental Engineering at the North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. His research integrates intelligent transportation systems (ITS) and emerging mobility services in traffic operations, congestion pricing, and transportation planning models with a focus on sustainability. He is actively involved with various professional organizations such as the Transportation Research Board (TRB), Institute of Transportation Engineers (ITE), and the Institute for Operations Research and Management Sciences (INFORMS). Dr. Pandey has broad interests in improving Engineering Education systems of the future. He is the recipient of the 2022-23 Junior Faculty Teaching Excellence Award at NCA&T and holds certifications for Effective Teaching Practice and Fostering a Culture of Belonging through the Association of College and University Educators (ACUE).
Dr. Ömer Verbas is a Computational Transportation Engineer in the Systems Modeling and Control Group in the Center for Transportation Research at Argonne National Laboratory. His primary research areas are in transportation network modeling; multi-modal routing, assignment, and simulation; and transit network design and scheduling. He is actively working in the Transportation Network Modeling Committee (ADB30) on the Transportation Research Board of the National Research Council. He serves as a reviewer for several transportation-related academic journals. He completed his doctoral studies at Northwestern University in 2014 under the supervision of Prof. Hani S. Mahmassani with whom he also worked as a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow until the end of 2016. Prior joining the PhD program at Northwestern, he received his Master of Science degree in Transportation Engineering from Istanbul Technical University, and his Bachelor of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering from Boğaziçi University in Istanbul, Turkey.
Dr. Jeff Ban’s research interests are in transportation network system modeling and simulation, urban traffic system modeling and operations, and Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS). He develops modeling tools to study dynamic transportation networks with emerging technologies and systems such as connected/automated vehicles and shared mobility. He also works on urban traffic system state estimation/prediction using mobile sensing data. He is the recipient of the NSF CAREER Award, and the New Faculty Award by the Council of University Transportation Centers and American Road & Transportation Builders Association. His research has been funded by the NSF, US DOT, NCFRP, Volvo Foundation, among others. He joined UW as an Associate Professor in the Fall 2016. Prior to this appointment, he was an Associate Professor of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
Dr. Tho Le is a tenure-track Assistant Professor of Industrial Engineering Technology at the School of Engineering Technology at Purdue University where he leads the Smart Logistics (SmartLogs) Systems Research Lab. He is a member of the Institute for Control, Optimization and Network (ICON) and the Realizing the Digital Enterprise (RDE) initiative. Dr. Lo is also affiliated with the Integrative Data Science Initiative (IDSI) and Semiconductors @ Purdue. His research focuses on system-scale transportation modeling and analysis. This work uses a range of techniques from Optimization, AI/Machine Learning, and Econometrics to model and provide quantitative analysis in order to guide industry planning and government decision-making.
Dr. Dan Work is a Chancellor Faculty Fellow and professor in civil and environmental engineering, computer science, and the Institute for Software Integrated Systems at Vanderbilt University. He has held research appointments at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (2010-17), Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics (2015, 2020), Microsoft Research Redmond (2009), and Nokia Research Center Palo Alto (2007-09). Dr. Work received a 2018 Gilbreth Lectureship from the National Academy of Engineering and a 2014 CAREER Award from the National Science Foundation. He earned a BS from Ohio State in 2006, and an MS (2007) and Ph.D. (2010) from UC Berkeley, all in civil and environmental engineering.