Liang Zhai, PhD.

Liang is a multidisciplinary researcher who has a PhD in urban and regional planning, a master’s degree in geography, and a bachelor’s degree in environmental science. Liang enjoys using big data to solve transportation problems and improve transportation services and is familiar with traffic crash data. His PhD dissertation focused on predicting autonomous vehicle crash reduction in Florida by using natural language processing and machine learning models. Liang also has a deep understanding of transit data, operations, and challenges. He has worked on several transit accessibility research projects at the University of Florida and worked as an NTD contact at Lee County transit in Florida. Liang’s technical specialization includes spatial analysis, data science, data visualization, and Python tool development. Outside of work, Liang enjoys spending time with family, cooking, music, archery, and biking in Tallahassee when the weather is cool.