Faculty View -- Mohammad Qureshi
We’ve all sat through long traffic lines, maneuvered our way through road construction zones, and tried to decipher highway signs and exits with the growing suspicion that we may never reach our destination. But while we may have endured our share of driving dilemmas, we may not realize there are people out there committed to eliminating them. Mohammad Qureshi, assistant professor of civil engineering at UMR, makes a career out of studying the daily grind on our nation’s roads and highways, and is finding ways to make them smoother, both physically and conceptually.
Qureshi has been involved in transportation research for more than 10 years and conducts various projects in conjunction with the Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT). He also serves as director of the Missouri Local Transportation Resource Center (MLTRC), located on the UMR campus. The MLTRC was established in 2002 under contract with MoDOT and provides workshops for transportation officials throughout Missouri on work zone safety, snow and ice removal, gravel road maintenance and other subjects.
“The benefit of MLTRC is really to the citizens of the state. What we are doing is providing resources for their local entities to tap into," he says. The center’s greatest impact will likely be in rural areas with limited resources, he says.
Changing lanes
Qureshi’s other MoDOT projects include a study concerning the placement and functioning of left turn lanes and signals. He conducted a nationwide survey to develop guidelines based on things like lane capacity, light phasing and safety considerations.
Also on Qureshi’s list of projects is an analysis of railroad highway grade crossings to determine which sites should be reviewed and what corrective actions should be taken. In addition, Qureshi helps MoDOT standardize traffic systems and develop design guidelines for single-point urban interchanges. These interchanges bring all traffic coming on and off highway ramps into one signal, rather than multiple signals, with the goal of reducing congestion.
Qureshi’s decision to pursue a career in transportation research was partly a proverbial “sitting at a stoplight" inspiration, and partly a desire to be involved in an area that incorporates so many different disciplines. “One day I might be dealing with how signals work, and the next day I’m talking to students about how to design a road. Transportation is very interdisciplinary because we get a lot of different backgrounds coming in. We have people with planning backgrounds, geology backgrounds, even statistics."
So how does someone who makes a career out of traffic dynamics look at his own dealings with challenging interchanges and intersections? With tongue in cheek, “What were they thinking? This is not the way you do this!" Ultimately, Qureshi is motivated by making a system more efficient for everyone by offering new technologies, designs and resources. “The reality is that we all use the transportation system," he says. It was this fact that gave him the “intuitive connection" that sparked his interest and understanding of transportation systems.