Wong selected as an Eno Fellow for 2018

March 12, 2018

Congratulations to doctoral student Stephen Wong, who was selected by the Board of Regents of the Eno Center for Transportation to participate in the 26th annual Eno Future Leaders Development Conference in Washington, DC, May 20–25, 2018. 

The Future Leaders Development Conference provides a first-hand look at how transportation policy is developed and implemented. Wong will meet with top government officials, leaders of associations, and members of Congress and their staff; and see how the nation's transportation policies are debated, shaped, formed, and ultimately adopted and applied.

Upon completion of this intensive program, Wong will be better equipped to understand the policy-making process that will become increasingly more important as he pursues a career in transportation.

Wong's primary research topic involves the evacuation behavior of individuals before, during, and after large-scale natural disasters. Moving beyond traditional choice models, the research employs data from Hurricane Irma and the California Wildfires of 2017 to gain a deeper understanding of individual decision making in stressful situations.

He also researches the role that sharing economy companies and crowdsourcing could play in evacuations and disasters to more effectively leverage additional, much-needed resources for transportation and sheltering.

Through this cross-disciplinary work, the research aims to improve emergency management and transportation response, planning, and policies to develop a more flexible and adaptive network of resources.