Interview - Prof. Dr. Regine Gerike

Could you provide us with a brief overview of the most pressing challenges facing sustainable urban mobility currently?

Reducing greenhouse gas emissions is a major challenge, the recently published new IPCC report shows again the urgent need for action and that we even need to accelerate our efforts.

Reduced greenhouse gas emissions can come with various synergies to other challenges such as reduced car ownership and car use, noise, resource and energy consumption.

You have taken a week out of your busy schedule to be a mentor at the workshop on “Integrated Engineering for Future Mobility”. As a leading expert in the field of Integrated Transport Planning and Traffic Engineering, could you elaborate on what motivated you to engage in an event tailored towards early career researchers?

It is always a privilege for me to work with young researchers with their deep knowledge in their specific fields, open minds and fresh ideas. It was also a privilege to work with a highly interdisciplinary group and with researchers from both countries, India and Germany. In addition, the workshop format of Design Thinking was new for me, it was a great way to work.

You have been working on research projects with India for a while, in your opinion why should India and Germany cooperate for sustainable transport and mobility?

Transportation systems and societal framework conditions differ substantially between the two countries, researchers in both countries are very well educated and easily find a common language and research interest. This comes with a great potential to learn from each other, to run comparative studies, to provide evidence on possible pathways towards greenhouse gas neutral, safe, healthy and sustainable transportation systems in both countries and beyond.