Natural hazards, from hurricanes to earthquakes, too often become disasters that wreak havoc on transportation systems. TRB hosted a webinar on Tuesday, October 19, 2021 from 1:00 to 2:30 PM Eastern that discussed transportation systems resilience, which is the ability to prepare for and adapt to changing conditions and to withstand and recover rapidly from disruption. Resilience is vitally important, but increasingly challenging when resilience enhancement investments compete against projects that may produce more certain and immediate returns. Presenters discussed measuring resilience and using resilience measures within a strong decision support framework to help make the case for investments in resilience.

This webinar will present the findings, conclusions, and recommendations from the recently published Consensus Study report Investing in Transportation Resilience: A Framework for Informed Choices. This webinar was organized by TRB’s Consensus Studies Division.

The slides and recorded webinar are available.

Webinar agenda and presenters

1. Overview of study: Joseph Schofer, Northwestern University
2. Current practices of measuring and assessing resilience: Susanne DesRoches, New York City Mayor’s Office
3. Review of academic research on resilience and resilience metrics: Paolo Bocchini, Lehigh University
4. Recommendations for integrating resilience in transportation investment decisions: Joseph Schofer, Northwestern University
5. Question and answer session: Moderated by Joseph Schofer, Northwestern University

The first 60 minutes of the webinar will be for presentations and the final 30 minutes will be reserved for audience questions.

Learning objectives

1. Discuss how transportation agencies are approaching resilience evaluations and investment decisions
2. Describe the multi-step, multi-hazard analytic framework recommended for measuring resilience and informing investment decisions 

There were no credits associated with this webinar.