UTM-MN presents Student Research Showcase
The University of Toronto Mississauga Mobility Network (UTM-MN) is proud to present its inaugural Student Research Showcase. Each presenter was selected through a competitive application process to receive research funding from UTM-MN. The showcase will celebrate student research achievements and aims to inspire UTM graduate students to engage with the UTM-MN.
Join us online to learn about the latest mobility-related research of five award-winning UTM graduate students: Haifa AlArasi, Emily Power, Sophie Roussy, Shaba Taskin, and Hanlin Zhou. Hear directly from researchers about their work.
Following the presentations, all are invited to take part in a Q & A discussion of the research moderated by Dr. Lisa L. Losada Rojas.
Program
Introductory remarks
Professor Eric Miller, Director, Mobility Network
Presentations by award recipients
- Grounded mappings of adolescents’ non-school mobility in Mississauga, Ontario - Haifa AlArasi
- Demanding Justice in Transit Planning: A case study of Light Rail Transit Gentrification in Hamilton - Emily Power
- Spatial associations between marginalization, ambient benzene pollution, and health outcomes: An investigation of environmental inequality across Etobicoke-York, Toronto, Canada - Sophie Roussy
- Development of Remote Work Assessment for Workplaces in Canada - Shaba Taskin
- Walkability Assessment Using Street View Imagery - Hanlin Zhou
Discussion
Dr. Lisa Lorena Losada Rojas, Postdoctoral Fellow, Mobility Network, will moderate an open discussion following the research presentations.
University of Toronto Transportation Alumni Network
Kevin Chan, Vice-Chair of the University of Toronto Transportation Alumni Network, will briefly introduce the community of U of T graduates working in transportation.
Concluding remarks and announcement of 2022/23 UTM Mobility Network student funding opportunities
Professor Shauna Brail, Associate Director, UTM Mobility Network
Speakers
Eric Miller is Director, University of Toronto Mobility Network; Professor, Department of Civil and Mineral Engineering; Research Director, Data Management Group; and Research Director, Travel Modelling Group. His research focuses on the areas of transportation modelling and sustainable urban design, and is a pioneer in the development and application of agent-based microsimulation model systems in large urban contexts.
Shauna Brail is Associate Director, UTM, Mobility Network; Associate Professor, Institute for Management & Innovation, University of Toronto Mississauga; and Senior Associate, Innovation Policy Lab, Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy.  As an economic geographer and urban planner, her research focuses on the transformation of cities as a result of economic, social, and cultural change. Brail’s research encompasses studies of broad urban economic challenges and transformations associated with 21st century cities – including the impacts of COVID-19 on cities; the relationship between cities and the digital platform economy, with a particular emphasis on ride-hailing; and shifts in urban governance, policy and planning in connection to innovation and technological change.
Kevin Chan is the Vice-Chair of the University of Toronto Transportation Alumni Network. He graduated from U of T in 2016 with a Master of Science in Planning.
Moderator
Lisa Lorena Losada Rojas joined Mobility Network in July 2022 as a postdoctoral fellow to research and report on potential impacts of zero-occupant vehicles operating within the City of Toronto, in support of the development of the City of Toronto’s Automated Vehicles Tactical Plan and upcoming Micromobility Strategy. Her research interests include transportation planning, accessibility, active travel, emerging mobility, public health, rural transportation, and sustainability.
Graduate Student Presenters
Haifa AlArasi is a Planning PhD candidate focusing on digital ethnographic explorations in reproductions of childhoods and cities. AlArasi’s research examines questions related to practices that are embedded in the environment, the social, and the material. Using grounded spatial visualizations, AlArasi attempts to broaden constructions of marginalized bodies and their associated experiences. Under the Mobility Network, AlArasi will focus on examining fleeting visual narratives of travel produced by newcomer immigrant adolescents that fall under acts of appropriations of claiming the (sub)urban as a legitimate site of childhood.
Emily Power is a student in the Master of Science in Planning Program in the Department of Geography and Planning. Power’s research interests include planning and social justice, gentrification, financialization of housing, and tenant struggles. Her project for the Mobility Network analyzes transit-induced gentrification and displacement resulting from light rail transit planning in Hamilton, with a focus on the working-class Afro-Caribbean neighbourhoods along the route. This research draws upon Power’s experience as a tenant in the Gibson neighbourhood, living one block south of the proposed LRT, and involvement in King Street Tenants United, a group of tenants fighting back against eviction and demolition of their homes by Metrolinx and the City of Hamilton.
Sophie Roussy is a student at the Master of Science in Physical Geography, Environment and Health Collaborative Specialization. Roussy’s research focuses on the intersection of transportation-related air pollution (TRAP), marginalization, human exposure, including its equitable distribution, and health outcomes. Specifically, Roussy’s research uses spatial interpolation techniques to model the spatial distribution of TRAP, with a specific focus on ambient benzene pollution, across Etobicoke-York, Toronto. The research employs spatial analysis techniques, statistical models, and established dose-response relationships of the air pollutants to health outcomes to examine associations between level of marginalization and disparities in human exposure to TRAP and subsequent health risks, thereby identifying environmentally-driven health disparities across Etobicoke-York.
Shaba Taskin (she/her) is a graduate student in the Master of Urban Innovation program. Taskin’s research interests include social justice, inclusive urban spaces, and sustainable cities. Taskin was awarded the first Mobility Network Summer Internship Award. During her internship, Taskin researched on hybrid work policies and how it links to sustainable urban environments. She designed an assessment to evaluate what percentage of work structure in can be made remote. Her internship project is closely linked to the host organisation - pointA’s research goals in providing transport demand management solutions to firms, organizations, and the community.
Hanlin Zhou is a second-year PhD student in Human Geography in the Department of Geography, Geomatics and Environment. Hanlin Zhou’s research interest is in linking GIS, RS, and CS techniques or data to human activities, such as health behavior, crime problems, and economic issues. Zhou’s research project for the Mobility Network focuses on quantifying the walkability of the micro-built environment (measured by the street view imagery) at a city-wide scale.
About UTM-MN funding support for graduate student research
The University of Toronto Mississauga Mobility Network (UTM-MN) announced recipients of their inaugural round of Graduate Student Research Awards in January 2022. In April 2022, an award for the inaugural Summer Internship Award (Professional Graduate Programs) was announced.
The awards are designed to support University of Toronto Mississauga graduate students in either research or professional internships that contribute to the Mobility Network mission to support interdisciplinary mobility research that addresses equity and promotes resilient, sustainable and just urban growth and prosperity.
The transportation system, and the mobility and accessibility it enables, touches almost every aspect of our urban lives. Applicants for UTM-MN Graduate Research Awards, as well as the UTM-MN Summer Internship Award (Professional Graduate Programs) had the choice to focus on any aspect of transportation through a discipline of data sciences, natural and social sciences, or humanities, using an equity, environmental, economic or other lens, alongside a Mobility Network faculty sponsor.
Winning proposals met the criteria of academic excellence, future research and professional promise, and support of Mobility Network’s mission. The total value of each award was $5,000. Projects were completed at either the University of Toronto Mississauga or in the field.
The Call for Applications was circulated to UTM students and faculty in fall 2021.
These competitive awards will be offered annually.
Register
Free. All are welcome to register to attend.