Bart Treece is the director of the interdisciplinary Mobility Innovation Center at the University of Washington, where he leads applied research projects that tackle near-term and emerging transportation challenges.

What you’ll learn:

• Why data needs to be personal. If you want someone to care about something, we need to explain and visualise the value in a way that is personally meaningful to their life.

• How Washington State is preparing for nearly two million new residents. Bart explains the pressures this growth brings to housing transport mobility and quality of life and how the 2050 scenarios help guide decision making.

• What it takes to bring siloed datasets together. Learn why the Transport 2050 project exists, how combining scattered public datasets can reveal a previously hidden bigger picture, and what cross-sector collaboration looks like behind the scenes.

• How to plan for a future that is uncertain. How agencies can avoid picking a single path and instead prepare for multiple possible futures while protecting quality of life and shared goals.

Kristin White is a visionary leader serving as Transportation Industry Executive and Field Strategist for Google Public Sector, where she bridges the gap between Silicon Valley innovation and the public good. With a distinguished career that includes serving as the youngest-ever acting Federal Highway Administrator, COO of nonprofit ITS America, Minnesota DOT Innovation Director, and other roles, she’s managed $300B+ investment portfolios and led major state and nonprofit initiatives.

A lawyer and former Fulbright Fellow, Kristin pairs deep policy expertise with a human-centered philosophy to tackle global mobility challenges like road safety and expanding mobility access. Beyond her professional achievements, she’s a dedicated mentor, “human sunshine”, women’s nonprofit founder, and a fierce advocate for advancing women in transportation.

What you'll learn:

• Why transport innovation isn’t always a technology problem. The biggest barriers to progress aren’t always related to tools (like AI or data) but the systems around them: procurement processes, institutional inertia, and misaligned incentives. Learn why solving “people and process” challenges is often the real unlock for innovation.

• Why outcomes matter more than outputs. The difference between measuring activity (e.g. kilometres of road built, number of signals installed) and measuring impact (e.g. reduced fatalities, improved safety).

• Why collaboration between public and private sectors is harder, and more important, than it looks. The structural differences in incentives, education, timelines, and risk between government and tech companies, and what it takes to build partnerships that genuinely deliver value.

• Why human-centred design is critical to innovation. Understand how designing around real needs leads to better outcomes for both private and public entities and the communities they aim to serve.

This episode is produced in partnership with the University of Sydney Institute of Transport and Logistics Studies (ITLS) Board of Advice.

Prof. Michael Kennedy OAM is one of Victoria's most experienced and innovative private and public sector chief executive officers. He’s worked in a wide range of leadership roles in the transport sector for decades before joining Monash University as a Professor of Practice ten years ago. Michael is the Director of the Monash Institute of Transport Studies, who are partners with ITLS at University of Sydney as ARC Centre of Excellence in Transport Management.

• City planning is an interconnected system, not a single project. Transport, housing, taxation, political cycles, and human behaviour all shape outcomes and simplifying that complexity leads to impaired decisions.

• Long-term planning collides with short-term politics. Governments plan 30–50 years, but elections happen every 3–4 years, creating structural tension in reform.

• Does faster CBD access reinforce inequality? How improving connections that perpetuate the primacy of central business districts can undermine ‘multi-city’ infrastructure planning.