From her home in Beijing, China, Jianping Sun travels the 8.5 kilometers to her office everyday to the Beijing Transportation Research Center (BTRC) where she’s worked as a mobility expert for four years. She’s one of about 50 employees at the center, which was established in 2001. Her 5-mile commute takes nearly an hour each way. “The mobility in College Station is much better,” she laughs.
In her first trip to the United States, Jianping arrived at TTI September 6, as a visiting scholar working in the Mobility Analysis Program alongside Shawn Turner and Teresa Qu. According to Turner, Jianping is one of the first visiting scholars at TTI, “but because of our international efforts, I think we need do this more often. These one-on-one personal interactions do a lot to foster our relationships with experts in other countries.”
Agreeing, Jianping says, “At BTRC, we all know of TTI. Actually being here is impressive, because you have so many employees and so many fields of study.”
TTI first worked with BTRC in 2006 on a congestion evaluation project, but the collaboration on several topics has continued since then. Jianping hopes to work with the Institute again. “In the future, I think BTRC will be better known because of our work with TTI.” Jianping finishes her work in College Station and travels home to Beijing at the end of November.