World Road Association appoints Christoph Walther

Karlsruhe, Germany, 19 April 2016. In February 2016, Professor Dr. Christoph Walther, Head of Global Research at PTV Group, was appointed by the World Road Association (WRA) to a 4-year term on the Road Transport System Economics and Social Development Committee upon recommendation of the German Ministry of Transport and Digital infrastructure (BMVI). Together with experts from around the world, he will deal with issues concerning transport reliability and ex-post evaluation of transport infrastructure projects.

WRA is an organization that is supported by the governments of its member countries. The general objective of the World Road Association is to promote international cooperation in the field of roads and road transport. Expert teams draw up recommendations on different road-transport related issues during their 4-year term as WRA committee members.

From 2010 – 2016, Professor Dr. Christoph Walther oversaw all aspects of the Federal Transport Infrastructure Plan 2030 as technical coordinator on behalf of the BMVI. The Federal Transport Infrastructure Plan is a multimodal framework for investment in national transport networks and thus a key planning tool for the federal government’s transport policy.

The Committee ‘Road Transport System Economics and Social Development’ focuses on transport in terms of reliability and on ex-post evaluation. Ex-post project evaluation is carried out in order to assess the impacts of a project and whether it achieved its original objectives. This type of evaluation is performed for projects around the world. In the field of transport reliability, experts will establish common principles to define reliability in different climatic, economic and cultural environments. Their research activities will be based on case studies provided by the member countries.