3/26/2008
Have you studied the environmental impact, cost/benefits of train vs bus for a busy highway, such as Highway 101 in Sonoma county?
Associate Engineer Paul Ryus
on Kittelson's past and future
In 1985, Kittelson & Associates consisted of Wayne Kittelson, a small office in downtown Portland, and great visions for the future. More than twenty years later, we have a staff of 125 people across eight offices. Along the way, we've developed a national reputation for excellence in a number of specialty areas, a direct result of the contributions of our staff.
We've always sought out talented individuals, even when the need for growth might not be obvious from a pure business perspective. As a case in point, all of our East Coast offices opened because opportunities existed to bring into the firm like-minded individuals who we'd worked with in the past, even though the new offices would be as remote as could be from Portland. Similarly, we occasionally hire more staff than are necessarily justified by immediate workload needs, confident that over time they will help lead us into new geographical markets and new areas of transportation practice.
One of our company's hallmarks is our ability to perform cutting-edge transportation research that is grounded in real-world experience. Many of our staff are considered national experts in their fields, and provide project support across the country in such specialized areas as access management, context-sensitive solutions, highway safety, roundabouts, transit fare policy and market research, transit performance measurement, and transit signal priority.
None of the areas I listed were part of the company's résumé in 1985, but were developed over time. Small individual steps, such as supporting an individual employee's professional growth or hiring a skilled person who shared our philosophy, have collectively resulted in the company taking great strides in the types of services we offer to clients, and in the variety of projects that staff work on. Our partnerships with universities around the United States, staff exchange opportunities with transportation firms in Australia and South Africa, and the international background of our staff, also help contribute to our staff's knowledge of global transportation best practices.
Where will the next twenty years take us? That’s a question not easily answered. On the one hand, we know it will depend on the interests and passions of our staff, because we’ve found that building on their enthusiasm and commitment always results in excellence in our work and in opportunities for them to assume leadership roles within the profession. At the same time, we know the world around us will also play a big part in dictating what we do, when we do it and how we do it 20 years from now. Environmental impacts, technological advances, an aging population and infrastructure, a chronic shortage of engineering graduates, international collaboration and competition – I expect that all of these things, and probably more, will affect the ways we travel and the ways we practice our profession in the coming decades. I’m especially interested hearing your own thoughts on what are likely to be the most significant changes affecting our profession and the way we travel over the next 20 years. Please take a moment to share your own thoughts by providing a comment and/or posing a question.
