Dr. Farnaz Sadeghpour

What my job is:

I work as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Civil Engineering at University of Calgary. My area of expertise is Construction Engineering and Management. In my role as an academic, I contribute to the teaching, research and service to the Civil Engineering profession, community at large, and at the University of Calgary.

Why I work in civil engineering:

Working in this fi eld has given me a tremendous opportunity in a number of different ways. In teaching, I feel I am contributing to the training of the future generation of Civil Engineers in Canada; in research, I get to push the envelope in research and innovation in construction in a day to day work that we do in our lab. I also get a chance to work closely with professional societies such as CSCE and be part of professional activities such as organizing industry- academia collaboration workshops and organizing construction specialty conferences where researchers and practitioners share and exchange their latest fi ndings in research and practice. All in all, it is an exciting line of work that I cannot imagine doing without.

The project I worked on that I think best represents sustainable infrastructure:

One of the exciting research projects that I work on is related to “Cycling Infrastructure for Cities in Cold Climate”. Cycling is currently receiving a large attention in North America as means of improving sustainability and reducing GHG emissions in urban areas. The underlying question for this project is that the investment in cycling infrastructure in cold climate is still a matter of debate.

We are currently working to develop a model that can predict the return on investment in cycling facilities based on the usage of the facility in such environment. The model can also be used to conduct cost benefit analysis for the construction of cycling infrastructure in different communities and help in making budget and investment decisions.