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Message from New WCTRS President –Professor Tae Hoon OumSauder School of Business, University of British Columbia, Canada |
The WCTR Society began in Rotterdam in 1977 as a forum for transport researchers and policy makers. In 1986, it was registered as an international academic society under Swiss Law. Nowadays WCTRS includes many eminent scholars, policy and management decision makers, and practitioners/thinkers from all modes of transport and related fields and all regions of the world including developing, emerging and developed countries. This integration of researchers, decision makers and practitioners makes WCTRS a unique organisation in its ability to contribute to the world of transport and related fields from a perspective which is multi-modal, multi-disciplinary and multi-regional.
In the past, it was expected that developing countries follow similar pathways that the advanced countries had gone through to achieve progress in their society.
However, during the last several decades, we have witnessed some developing countries leap-frogging advanced countries in various aspects of transport and infrastructure services in order to improve their productivity growth and social welfare. Therefore, from now on it is essential that the developed and developing countries should work together by learning from each other. In this 21st century, all countries are facing common problems such as economic and energy crises, pressure of urbanisation, mobility needs for aging population, aging/inefficient infrastructure, transport security threats, increasing natural disasters, etc. Solutions to these problems need to be found by setting common objectives, identifying new and innovative policy and infrastructure investment approaches, researching for efficient design of transport systems and improving operational efficiency of those system.
Given the above discussion, our Society’s 35+ Special Interest Groups (SIGs) are becoming increasingly important both for promoting our research and as on-going international fora for exchange of ideas and helping to devise policy approaches and solutions. I hope these SIG events should involve not only researchers but also policy makers, government officers, NPOs, and corporate decision makers.
To this end, WCTRS would very much like to invite public and private sector organisations, including research institutes, government organisations and private corporations, to participate in these WCTRS’ efforts by joining as one of the WCTRS Supporting Organisational Members. For further info on Organisational Memberships, please visit https://www.wctrs-society.com/membership/organisational-membership
I also would like to encourage all WCTRS members to register in one or more SIGs in their field of interest by inspecting our growing list of 35+ SIGs posted on our website (www.wctrs-society.com), and actively participate in their activities by contacting the SIG leadership. These SIGs’ future activities will be announced in WCTRS Newsletters, on our website, as well as other digital media including Facebook.
Young researchers and graduate students determine the future of the WCTRS and thus, our society need to give special attention to take care of their needs which are different from the needs of our mature members. To this end we in the leadership of WCTRS will be working diligently on the following issues:
Thank you very much with my welcoming hands,
(please click HERE to see the Profile for Prof. Tae Oum)
