Mark Burris, Ph.D.

Professor

Education

• Ph.D., Civil Engineering, University of South Florida, 2001
• M.S., Civil Engineering, University of New Brunswick, 1995
• B.S., Civil Engineering, Technical University of Nova Scotia, 1993

Short Biography

Dr. Mark Burris is a Professor in the Zachry Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Texas A&M University, and a Research Engineer at the Texas A&M Transportation Institute. He received his Bachelor of Engineering, Co-op Program, degree in 1993 from the Technical University of Nova Scotia, his Master of Science in Engineering in 1995 from the University of New Brunswick, and his Ph.D., Civil Engineering degree in 2001 from the University of South Florida.

Dr. Burris’s main area of interest is traveler behavior in response to pricing, particularly congestion (or value) pricing.  He has been, and continues to be, involved in many projects in this area and has published extensively in this area of research.  He has served in an evaluation and monitoring role for projects around the country, including the Houston Value Pricing Project, HOT lanes in Atlanta, Minnesota and LA, and the Lee County Variable Pricing Pilot Project.  He has also led many studies and surveys on how travelers will react to innovative tolling strategies and the costs and benefits associated with those projects.

His research has provided a better understanding of traveler behavior in response to tolls and helped to improve our ability to predict their reaction.  He is the immediate past chair of TRB’s Transportation Economics committee, a friend of TRB’s Congestion Pricing committee and a member of the Institute of Transportation Engineers.  Prior to joining Texas A&M in August 2001, he was a senior research associate at the Center for Urban Transportation Research (CUTR) in Tampa, Florida.

Dr. Burris won the Council of University Transportation Centers (CUTC) New Faculty Member Award in 2007, the Dick and Joyce Birdwell Endowed Teaching Award in Civil Engineering in 2007 and was named the Charles H. Barclay, Jr. ‘45 Faculty Fellow, Dwight Look College of Engineering for 2008–2009.