Catherine Ross
Nationally recognized transportation expert Catherine Ross was excited to return to Georgia Tech in 2003 as the director of Tech's Center for Quality Growth and Regional Development and the Harry West Chair for Quality Growth and Regional Development. "It gave me the opportunity to direct a center and integrate a number of research interests: transportation, quality of life, sustainability," says Ross, who has spent her career researching sustainable solutions.
The College of Architecture's first endowed faculty member, Ross has strong ties to Georgia Tech. She joined Tech in 1976 as an assistant professor in the Graduate City Planning Program, becoming a full professor in 1990 and later holding a variety of important leadership positions, including vice provost for academic affairs, associate vice president for academic affairs, co-director of the Transportation Research and Education Center, and director of the College of Architecture's Ph.D. program.
Being a part of the Center for Quality Growth and Regional Development allows Ross to work with affiliated centers such as Tech's Institute for Sustainable Technology and Development (ISTD), which she sees as the "point of reference" for sustainability at Tech. "There's a whole contingent of people who come together around ISTD. We're in that network," she explains.
As the director of the Center for Quality Growth and Regional Development, Ross coordinates numerous research efforts, hosting seminars and an annual conference while addressing a variety of subjects, from air quality to water resource and transportation management. Under her leadership, the Center recently received a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation grant to partner with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other health officials and agencies on a Health Impact Assessment of the proposed Atlanta Beltline, which would convert an abandoned railroad encircling downtown Atlanta into a transit corridor and multi-use trail connected to an expanded city park system and targeted areas for redevelopment.
"We hope to be able to influence sustainable activities at Tech," says Ross, "and become a leader in the field identifying and using technologies that are useful."
Links
Catherine Ross' Web page at the Center for Quality Growth and Regional Development