MIT PhD student Yang Wen presents the DynaMIT simulation tool.

Real-time traffic congestion information feeds to travellers, flexible car-sharing services and other new transportation services are all currently under development by researchers from the MIT Portugal Program.

These new innovations and others were presented at a recent MIT Portugal Program Transportation Systems workshop held July 11-15 in Lisbon. The event was attended by MIT Portugal Program faculty, students and government and industrial representatives in Transportation Systems.

Several MIT Portugal Program Transportation Systems projects hold promise for the future of urban transportation.

These solutions are being developed through research projects such as Strategic Options for Integrating Transportation Innovations and Land Development (SOTUR), the SCUSSE program, which looks to create smart transport modes linked to lifestyle frameworks, and CityMotion, which is creating advanced transport data fusion and visualization tools.

The recent workshop gave researchers the opportunity to share progress they have made in these areas, which will impact not only urban-regional transportation networks in Portugal, but worldwide.

This research is being led by Instituto Superior Tecnico Professor José M. Viegas and Massachusetts Institute of Technology Professor Chris Zegras, the co-coordinators of the Transportation Systems focus area.

To support this important research, the Transportation Systems area has created significant partnerships with local authorities, such as the transportation companies of Porto and Lisbon (STCP and Carristur), and with global companies, such as Brisa and SAG.

SAG representative Eng. Diana Nunes described an innovative new project called EcoCity, being developed for target cities worldwide, which will deliver flexible car-sharing services adapted for the needs of dense urban areas. The Geotaxi fleet management service for taxis was also presented by Eng. Frutuoso.

With over 60 faculty, students, and industry representatives from MIT and Portuguese institutions participating, the workshop also set the stage for the research and industrial partnership agenda for the 2008-09 academic year.