Catching Up on your Connection
Updated: Feb 9, 2021

Agenda:
Faster Headlines
Japan Central Internship
Mayor Pete, Transportation Secretary
Cascadia Rail Project
CoE Training
Faster Headlines
Buttigieg confirmation boosts hope for massive infrastructure investment
Smart Cities Dive
Pete Buttigieg Wants The U.S. To Lead The World In High-Speed Rail
Huff Post
Will President Biden restore high-speed rail funds that Trump took away from California?
Fresno Bee
We still don’t know what the Hyperloop will feel like, but here’s how it will sound
Fast Company
What will travelling on a Virgin Hyperloop feel like?
Virgin Hyperloop Company Release
SpaceX Crew Dragon: Super Bowl ad reveals how to enter space competition
Inverse
Virgin vs. Hyperloop TT: The Race to Make Musk’s Moonshot a Reality
Wall Street Journal
Japan Central Internship

Application Closes February 21st
This is a once in a lifetime opportunity to get an in-depth experience in not only cutting edge high speed rail technology and to experience Japanese culture, but to become a select group of alumni.
Cascadia Rail Team/Project:

One of the emerging high speed rail corridors is from Portland to Seattle to Vancouver. While the proposal does not get as much publicity as the California, Texas, or Florida projects it is likely to be a rising priority in infrastructure talks. This corridor already suffers from some of the worst congestion in the United States, but more importantly the airports in the region are going to be maxed out and unable to expand by 2025. This would have tremendous impact on economic activity as this region is the home of some of America's most successful corporations including Microsoft, Boeing, Amazon, Starbucks, Nordstrom, and Alaska Airlines.
This is a group project where over the course of the semester a team will review the current Cascadia Rail studies and add their own insights, as well as review the performance of the current Amtrak Cascadia service. Additionally the team will put together a strategy for identifying an airline partner, since the major goal of high speed rail system will be to relieve airport congestion by moving regional flights to rail.
Click here to sign up for the group.
Details about the group:
This project will be treated like a semester project. Every week the group will report out to the main group what was accomplished, and or planned. The final product will be a white paper and video presentation that will go to Cascadia Rail and perhaps political stakeholders.
For more details on the project:
Ultra-High-Speed Ground Transportation study - 2019 business case analysis
Ultra High‐Speed Ground TransportationStudy
Congrats to Stephen Kocmoud:

Why, well you will just have to come tonight to find out
Student Org Training:
As a College of Engineering Student Organization, the Leadership Team needs to attend a professional development training session. Here are the dates:
Soft-Skills:
Authentic Leadership Thursday, April 15th @ 10-11am
Communication and Conflict Management Tuesday, February 9th @ 1-2pm
Educational
Identity/Multicultural Wednesday, February 24th @ 6pm
Positional Leadership Thursday, March 4th @ 11-12pm
Responsible Community Partnerships Tuesday, March 16th (time TBD)
Administrative
Financial Planning Tuesday, April 30th @ 9-10am
Team Building
CliftonStrengths Test and group facilitation (by request only)