Inside - cee.illinois.edu · Rantoul. Taken together, these facilities represent an unsur-passed...

In s i d eF a l l / W i n t e r 2 0 0 5

ATREL’s open road: Big plans and a new transportation research center

for the Rantoul facility

Researchers respond to Hurricane Katrina

Illinois CEE Alumni Dinnerreturns to Springfield

This newsletter is published twice a year for members of the CEE Alumni Association and friends of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Robert H. Dodds, Jr., Professor and HeadMarilyn A. Boland, Director of Development and Alumni Relations

Carla J. Blue, Program CoordinatorCeleste Bragorgos, Editor/Designer

Your letters, comments and editorial contributions are always welcome. Please direct them to: CEE Newsletter, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign,

1117 Newmark Civil Engineering Laboratory, MC-250, 205 North Mathews Avenue, Urbana, Illinois 61801, (217) 333-6955, [email protected]

Contents

Department News

4 It’s all about excellence by Robert H. Dodds, Jr., Professor and Head5 Letters18 Katrina sends CE freshman home to Illinois24 Investiture honors three professorship recipients27 Former head’s gift contains centuries of CEE knowledge28 New faculty32 Department news33 Staff Spotlight: Sheree Waltz36 Student organizations37 Structural engineering conference

Research and Instruction

8 ATREL’s open road9 New research center strengthens ties with IDOT16 Researchers study the lessons of Hurricane Katrina22 Researchers think outside the box to model complex materials22 Getting inside the problem: Students develop virtual reality software23 CEAT celebrates work, honors Dempsey

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CEEAA Board of Directors

PresidentGregory D. Cargill

Clark Dietz Inc., Chicago

Vice PresidentJohn L. Carrato

Alfred Benesch & Company, Chicago

Second Vice PresidentKenneth M. Floody

Ingenii LLC, Oak Park, Illinois

Past PresidentKathryn A. Zimmerman

Applied Pavement Technology Inc., Urbana

SecretaryDaniel A. Kuchma

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, UIUC

Ralph E. AndersonIllinois Department of Transportation

Springfield, Illinois

William F. BakerSkidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP, Chicago

Louis BowmanBowman, Barrett & Associates Inc., Chicago

Pedro J. Cevallos-CandauPrimera Engineers Ltd., Chicago

Daniel P. DietzlerPatrick Engineering Inc., Chicago

Lawrence P. JaworskiGreeley and Hansen

Upper Marlboro, Maryland

Walter S. KosCook County Highway Department, Chicago

Tracy K. LundinHanson Professional Services

Springfield, Illinois

Kevin A. Michols Construction Technology Laboratories Inc.

Skokie, Illinois

Colleen E. QuinnRicondo and Associates Inc., Chicago

Allen J. StaronClark Dietz Inc., Chicago

David J. StoldtCommonwealth Pacific Ventures

Hopkinton, Massachusetts

Christopher M. Thomas Clark Construction Group Inc.

Bethesda, Maryland

Elias ZewdeKhafra Engineering Consultants, Inc.

Louisville, Kentucky

Alumni news and features

6 New Orleans: Some thoughts about responsible engineering by Gregory D. Cargill (BS 71)7 Springfield alumni dinner17 It finally happened by Jon Khachaturian (BS 78)19 Influential Illini: George Leventis (MS 85)26 University bestows honorary degree on Houbolt34 Alumni news35 Obituaries37 Where are they now? By Wendall Lee Rowe (BS 49)42 Old Masters: Ven Te Chow43 Join the UI Alumni Association

Development news

20 Career in rail prompts alumnus’ gift20 Krambles fund makes gift to UIC21 IL-ACPA supports concrete paving education21 Union Pacific Railroad supports rail grad research27 Dempseys establish fund to benefit ATREL38 Donors43 Gift and pledge form

Call for nominations:CEEAA Board of Directors

The CEE Alumni Association Board of Directors is seeking nomi-nations for new board members. For details, view the Board of Directors handbook under the alumni tab of the department web site: http://cee.uiuc.edu. Please submit a letter of interest and resume by January 15, 2006, to Carla Blue, Program Coor-dinator, 1117 Newmark Lab, 205 N. Mathews Ave., Urbana, IL 61801; fax 217-333-9464, [email protected].

Donors

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4 Visit CEE on the web at http://cee.uiuc.edu

It’s all about excellence

As I enter the second year as Head of the department, I continue to learn each day about the depth and breadth of excellence in our education and research programs. Real excellence is extraordinarily difficult to attain and even more difficult to sustain over many decades. Yet this is the hallmark of Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE) at Illinois. Excellence begins with outstanding, productive, creative faculty and the leadership they provide in all facets of the department, University and the profession. This ex-cellence is magnified by our generous and involved alumni, the talented students we continue to attract, and our state-of-the-art research facilities. The department continually evaluates its facilities to make sure they keep pace with our needs, and we are planning some exciting capital improvements.

The faculty today in CEE ben-efit enormously from the tradition of excellence created by the depart-ment leaders during the 20th century (Huntington, Shedd, Newmark, Peck, Hall, Chow, Sozen, Seiss, Ang and many others too numerous to mention). Those faculty leaders established an atmosphere to encourage excel-lence in undergraduate and graduate teaching, in basic and applied research, and in public service to Illinois and to the nation. Today’s generation of faculty is no different in their aspirations for excellence. This continued excellence leads to top rankings for the department (first in civil engineering for both undergraduate and graduate programs in U.S. News and World Report). Our faculty come to Illinois from the world’s best universities. The competition to gain a faculty position in CEE at Illinois and to secure tenure is stagger-ing. Only the very best succeed. We have renowned senior faculty members in all areas of the department, and younger faculty clearly on track to emerge as future leaders (see the articles introducing the new faculty who joined the depart-ment this year). Our faculty are more engaged in interdisci-plinary education and research than ever before — not only across subdisciplines within CEE but in biology, computer science, geology, business, chemistry, and materials, just to highlight a few areas. Our faculty are more entrepreneur-ial than ever before in competing for and obtaining external resources to support new, exciting and creative explorations into the future of civil and environmental engineering. They have formed innovative research centers and laboratories that engage undergraduate and graduate students in efforts, for

By Robert H. Dodds, Jr. (MS 75, PhD 78)Professor and Head

example, to make structures safe under extreme events, to improve the efficiency and durability of our nation’s trans-portation systems, to insure safe supplies of drinking water derived from contaminated sources, and to vastly improve our nation’s capability in responding to natural and man-made disasters that affect the civil infrastructure.

The coming generations of young civil and environmen-tal engineers to graduate from Illinois will be well-prepared by our faculty to face these many challenges. Our under-graduate enrollment increased by 70 students this fall se-

mester to 500, and with the highest qualifications ever in terms of ACT scores; among our students the aver-age score was more than 30 out of a possible 36. The enormous impact of civil and environmental engineering on our society has never been more in the public eye than with the hurri-cane and earthquake events over this past year. Perhaps this has sparked a greater interest in civil and environ-

mental engineering as a career that makes a visible, positive difference in the daily lives of our citizens.

The graduate enrollment this year remains at 400, the larg-est program in the nation, with extraordinarily high quality and diversity. The excellence of CEE at Illinois attracts the very best graduate students worldwide. The competition to gain one of our limited openings each year is also staggering, and only the world’s most outstanding new graduates succeed. These students know they will have unique opportunities to study with, and be mentored by, the best CEE faculty any-where and to work in modern, well-equipped laboratories. We expect they will become national and international leaders in professional practice, industrial and government research or-ganizations, and universities. With the increased complexity of modern professional practice, the enrollment of graduate students financing their own master’s degree work continues to increase. The faculty welcome this trend as a positive devel-opment and consider the professional education of post-gradu-ate students a core mission of the department.

Our excellent research facilities are located in Newmark Laboratory, the Hydrosystems Laboratory and the Ad-vanced Transportation Research and Engineering Laboratory (ATREL), located on the former Chanute Air Force base in Rantoul. Taken together, these facilities represent an unsur-passed resource for education and research in all areas of civil and environmental engineering. All three facilities have experi-

Real excellence is extraordinarily difficult to attain and even more difficult to sustain

over many decades. Yet this is the hallmark

of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Illinois.

Civil and Environmental Engineering Alumni Association—Fall/Winter 2005 5

Remembering SheddIn the [last] issue of CEE, I read with very great in-

terest the story of Professor Thomas Clark Shedd. I was in the Class of ’43 and was privileged to have him for classes in structures. You state at the very end of the article:

“His greatest legacy is probably the respect and admi-ration of the many students who were privileged to have had him as adviser and teacher. Those of us who knew him in these capacities still miss him.”

I’d like to say that these words really express perfectly the way I feel about him. I really do still miss him.Sidney Epstein (BS 43)

The story about Thomas Clark Shedd was the first in a series of articles about great engineers of the department’s history. This article is now online at http://cee.uiuc.edu/alumni/newsletter/p23_shedd.aspx. Another installment of this series appears in this issue on page 42.

It was a real surprise in leafing through Spring/Sum-mer 2005 CEE to read the letter addressed to Ralph Peck, who lectured while I was pursuing my studies in Urbana. I had already taken a course in soil mechan-ics at Columbia University and was aware of Dr. Peck’s contributions. I later bought a copy of Soil Mechanics in Engineering Practice, co-written by Peck with Terzaghi, which I still have.

It was an even bigger surprise to recognize the photo of Tommy Shedd on page 23. I took several of the courses he taught, and his students enjoyed talking of his teaching methods; the one I remember the best was his practice of drawing a line the full width of the chalk board as soon as he walked into the classroom. His teaching was based on the line, which might be a grade at a structure, the lower chord of a truss, or maybe the neutral axis of a beam. The line was there in any case. I also still have my copy of Theory of Simple Structures.John P. Beeson (BS 47)

enced major improvements in capability over the past two years driven primarily by funds from the growing, externally sponsored research programs with mod-est contributions from the University. We expect this trend to continue next year with a significant expansion in the environmental engineering laboratories for research on water quality and treat-ment processes.

Our classroom facilities, work spaces for student design teams, student or-ganization spaces, and CEE computer instructional labs, unfortunately, re-main far below the quality of our re-search laboratories. The Newmark and Hydrosystems Laboratories were not designed with such spaces. Over the years, we created makeshift classrooms out of necessity while always knowing that a first-class, longer-term solution would be required. Now is the time to move forward with building a Student Center addition to Newmark Labora-tory. The preliminary design calls for a 25,000-square-foot, four-story addition

to the northeast corner of the existing building. The Student Center addition will have classrooms, a large auditorium, and meeting rooms—areas to satisfy the department’s need for decades. The Student Center will become the central focus of daily life on campus for future generations of Illinois CEEs—the place where they learn about the excitement of our profession and make those lifelong friendships that so many of you enjoy. Once the Student Center becomes a re-ality, all of our facilities will be truly ex-cellent! Construction costs are estimated at $10 million. The lack of state financial support for capital programs requires that we raise the vast majority of these funds from our alumni and friends. That effort is already underway with very gen-erous and positive responses. The spring newsletter will have full details about the Student Center project.

Your ongoing financial support of the department contributes significant-ly to excellence and we sincerely thank you. State funding to the University

and department remained stagnant once again this year, now for the third consecutive year. Tuition increases paid by our undergraduate and graduate stu-dents allowed us to maintain momen-tum in faculty hiring to replace retire-ments. State and tuition funds make up only 25 percent of the department’s op-erating budget. The remainder comes from research, private gifts and endow-ment income. As you read through this newsletter, please reflect on your time at Illinois and the impact of the Illinois degree on your career. Annual contri-butions to the CE Trust Fund (page 43) make possible many student activities that make Illinois a special place. Just this past year, 120 of our alumni do-nated to the CE Trust Fund for the first time. Thanks to them and to all of our continuing donors for your support.

Your thoughts, suggestions and comments are always welcome. Please feel free to contact me any time at [email protected] or call (217) 333-3276. Go Illini!c

Letters


By Gregory D. Cargill (BS 71)President, CEEAA board

An engineering friend of mine said, following the enormous devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina, “When they rebuild New Orleans, they should consider building two rings of protec-tion around the city: re-establish the outer ring of levees plus create an in-ner protective ring around downtown.” Two thoughts came to mind upon hear-ing this statement: This civil/environ-mental engineer did not hesitate when stating that we have the technology to rebuild the protective rings, and that we could actually do it. Yet the overall situation made me think about the pro-cesses we go through as engineers when tackling such a challenging scenario of designing and building structures in a city like New Orleans.

The city of New Orleans has been built in a large bowl; much of New Or-leans is below sea level and lacks natu-ral drainage. It was founded in 1718 by Jean Baptiste le Moyne, sieur de Bienville, who was the governor of the French colony of Louisiana. The city of New Orleans always seemed proud that it had been constructed below sea level and that it depended on the world’s greatest system of drainage pumps; more than 100 pumps can move upward of 25 billion gallons of water each day. Of course, there is little other choice for a city of 364 square miles which contains 165 square miles of inward waters and the Gulf of Mexico just to the south. It seems that the city rarely thought of the potential devastation should any of their protections fail.

There is an outer ring of levees and dykes that allowed the city to basically reclaim land from the sea; these areas would eventually become very valuable

in the overall development of New Or-leans. But in the aftermath of Katrina, many nay-sayers (and probably a couple of the insurance companies) are asking a bunch of questions:

n Why would you want to build so much in areas below sea level?

n Did you know the true level of risk involved?

n What were the standards and codes applicable to these areas and to this construction?

n Were these standards and codes adhered to during construction?

n Who were the ultimate decision-makers that allowed such extensive construction?

The third and fourth bullet points interest me the most. The charge of engineers, especially professional engi-neers, is to follow a code of ethics when providing professional engineering ser-vices. This code needs to be in place no matter the social, economic and/or political pressures which may exist at the time. The Illinois Professional En-gineering Practice Act of 1989 states:

“The practice of professional engi-

neering in the State of Illinois is hereby declared to affect the public health, safety and welfare and to be subject to regulation and control in the pub-lic interest. It is further declared that the practice of professional engineering as defined in this Act merits the confi-dence of the public…”

This statute is the cornerstone of the ethics that the professional engineers in Illinois abide by. It is assumed that the vast majority of engineers involved in the planning, design and construc-tion within New Orleans were bound by similar guidelines.

It is not for me to judge the applica-tion of these principles of ethics in light of what has now occurred. Rather, let us look forward to the possibility of re-building the city of New Orleans. As we look forward, we need to look at the codes and standards in the con-text of what we now know. If the le-vees and other protective devices were once designed to withstand a Category III tropical storm/hurricane, we now need to consider the ramifications of designing and constructing to with-stand a Category V storm; i.e., we need to counter-balance the level of risk as it has been defined for us.

In closing, let me suggest that the role of the professional engineer tran-scends issues of economic justification, social acceptance and political motiva-tion. As providers of professional engi-neering services, it is our responsibility to do what is right in terms of public health and safety. In the rebuilding of New Orleans—and in the plan-ning, design and execution of all our projects—that responsibility should be foremost in our minds.c

Keep in touch.Track down your classmates

with the University of Illinois Alumni Association’s

Online Directory

https://www.uiaadirectory.org/

New Orleans: Some thoughts on responsible engineering


Alumni, students gather in Springfield for dinner, programMore than 50 alumni and

CEE students gathered in the state capital October 6 for the Springfield Alumni Dinner. Offered for the first time in four years, the event was held at the Public Affairs Center restaurant on the campus of the University of Illinois at Springfield.

After dinner, Robert H. Dodds., Jr., professor and head, gave the keynote ad-dress, a department update. He spoke about new faculty in the department, the space challenges in Newmark Lab, and the proposed new Student Center addition, for which the department is seeking funding.

Springfield-area alumni hope the dinner will become an annual tradition, much like the Chicago Regional Din-ner Meeting, which has been presented every year for more than 25 years.

The CEE Alumni Association would like to thank the following sponsors for their generous support of this event:

Selvaggio Steel Inc.Cochran & Wilken Inc.Coombe-Bloxdorf P.C.Green & Bradford Inc.Hanson Professional Services Inc.Martin Engineering CompanyShively Geotechnical Inc.

Who are you looking for?

Whether you’re looking for a job or trying to fill one, now it’s easier than ever. Engineer-ing Career Services has expanded and improved its services. What’s new?

n a new, improved job board at www.uiucengineeringjobs.com n free, direct access to job postings for full-time positions and internships for job-hunters n free, direct access to job seekers’ resumes for employers n 39 new interview rooms with Internet access, climate control and a professional setting n a new, college-wide Alumni Mentor and Networking Program

For more information, contact:Engineering Career ServicesSuite 3270 DCL1304 W. Springfield AvenueUrbana, Illinois 61801217-333-1960email: [email protected]: http://ecs.cen.uiuc.edu

Photos: Top left, Jacob O. Whitlock (BS 50) and Walter E. Hanson (MS 47). Top right, alumni Thomas F. Fitch (BS 90, MS 91), left, and Jay E. Jessen (BS 80), right, with student Shihui Shen, center. Bottom right: Raymond Ackerman (BS 43), left, with Professor and Head Robert H. Dodds, Jr., (MS 75, PhD 78).


ATREL’s open roadWith a rapidly expanding research program, new leadership and an eye toward the future, the department’s 13-year-old Rantoul facility is ready to roll

Illinois has long been called the crossroads of the nation. So when the department established the Advanced Transportation Research and En-gineering Laboratory (ATREL) 13 years ago as a research facility for its transportation program, the fields of central Illinois 15 miles north of campus were a fitting location.

Today, the placid prairie surrounding ATREL belies the excitement within. Under the leadership of a new director, ATREL has grown significantly in the past year. Along with a world-class faculty, the nation’s best transportation students, state-of-the-art laboratories and the second largest pave-ment loading accelerating machine in the world, ATREL now boasts a new research center and an ambitious new vision.

“The ambition we all have for ATREL is simple: provide our students with the best education; ad-vance the state of knowledge through innovative, basic and applied research; and serve the state, the nation and the world at large through continuing education and international conferences,” says Di-rector Imad L. Al-Qadi, Founder Professor of En-gineering. “With the new establishment of the Illi-nois Center for Transportation, housed at ATREL, the transportation program at Illinois is well on its way to reaching the next level of excellence.”

ATREL was established in 1992 to replace the department’s transportation laboratory building, which was destroyed by a fire in 1991. Professor Barry J. Dempsey, now emeritus, led the search for a new facility. In 1992 the site of the former Chanute Air Base in Rantoul, Ill., was chosen. The University obtained the land and facilities, then valued at $10 million, at no cost from the Air Force. Dempsey pioneered the idea of establishing ATREL as a facility for research related to “planes, trains and automobiles,” as he liked to say. In 2002 Dempsey retired, and Al-Qadi became ATREL’s second director in 2004.

Today, ATREL is a unique and comprehensive transportation research, educational and testing laboratory. The 47-acre complex includes three major buildings for testing pavement materials and transportation operations. The facility includes

60,000 square feet of laboratories, continuing edu-cation classrooms, office space, a technical library, and a computer facility for the use of researchers, faculty, and students alike. Since its inception, ATREL has received significant support from the Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT), the Federal Highway Administration, the Federal Aviation Administration, private industry, and other sources. This summer the collaboration with IDOT expanded with the creation of the new Il-linois Center for Transportation, headquartered at ATREL.

Physical features of ATREL include:Materials Testing and Processing Laboratories Designed to prepare and test pavement materials, the Materials Testing and Processing Laboratories include specialized equipment for soils, aggregates, asphalt binder, hot-mix asphalt, Portland cement concrete, and polymer modified construction ma-terials. The laboratory houses several servo-hydrau-lic systems and advanced equipment for testing tra-ditional and emerged pavement and construction materials. Specialty equipment includes linear roll-ing wheel compactor, triaxial shear apparatus, ag-gregate image analyzer, the UI-FastCell, reflective cracking simulation device, several custom-build devices, among others. In addition, large frames are available for full size cyclic loading testing of slabs and railroad beams.Accelerated Transportation Loading Assembly (ATLAS)

Through funding from IDOT and the State of Illinois, ATREL acquired the $2 million ATLAS accelerator in 2002 to evaluate multiple transpor-tation support systems, such as highway and air-port pavements and railroad tracks. It is the larg-est moveable, self-contained unit of its kind and is unique among accelerated pavement testing de-vices for its speed, loading length, the load levels it can accommodate and the range of materials it can test. Several hardware and software modifi-cations have been made over the past year to in-crease its efficiency and reliability. In addition, software was developed to collect real-time data from instrumented tested pavement sections.

8 Visit CEE on the web at


New research center strengthens ties with IDOTATREL’s newest feature is the Illinois

Center for Transportation (ICT, pro-nounced “ice tea”), established this sum-mer with an initial three-year cyclic fund-ing commitment of $6.6 million from the Illinois Department of Transportation

(IDOT) and $2.2 million from the University. The center will promote trans-portation innovation and progress, serving the needs of IDOT, the state and the nation through interdisci-

plinary research, education and outreach.“The purpose of this is not to be one

of the best transportation research fa-cilities—it is to be the best,” said Illinois Director of Highways Victor Modeer. “In five years, I predict this facility, this Illinois Center for Transportation, could be the top in the United States.”

At a grand opening celebration Sep-tember 9 attended by about 200 people, ATREL welcomed officials from gov-ernment, IDOT and the University for a luncheon and lab tours. Guests in-cluded Chancellor Richard Herman, Il-linois Director of Highways Victor Mo-deer, Illinois Deputy Director of High-

ways Eric Harm, University Trustee Robert F. Vickrey, U.S. Representa-tive Tim Johnson, state Senator Rick Winkel, state Rep-resentative Naomi Jakobsson, Uni-versity Vice Chan-cellor for Research Charles F. Zu-koski, and Dean of Engineering Ile-sanmi Adesida.

The new cen-ter’s leadership team consists of Imad Al-Qadi, ICT Director and Founder Professor of Engineering, and Professor Sam Carpenter, ICT Associate Direc-

Top: Illinois Director of Highways Victor Modeer at the ICT grand opening ceremony. Bottom: Professor Imad Al-Qadi right, describes some research to, from left, UIUC Vice Chancellor for Research Charles F. Zukoski, College of Engineering Interim Dean Ilesan-mi Adesida, and Chancellor Richard Herman.

tor. “We in Illinois

sit at the transpor-tation crossroads of the nation,” Al-Qadi said. “This role as a transpor-tation hub brings many benefits to the state, in our economy, employment, mobility and much more, but it also carries a lot of responsibilities. … We must be lead-ers in the discovery, deployment and implementation of solutions that will improve transportation safety, effi-ciency and sustainability.”

Other speakers at the grand open-ing event hailed the collaboration as a major step toward safer, more ef-ficient transportation.

“Today University of Illinois boasts the best department of civil and environmental engineering in our nation, leading the new, excit-ing collaboration with a major state agency, the Illinois Department of Transportation, to make advances to-gether that neither one alone would find possible,” said Trustee Robert Vickrey. “This center places the De-partment of Civil and Environmental Engineering, the College of Engi-neering, the University, and the Il-linois Department of Transportation squarely at the forefront of transpor-tation research and education.”

Research at ICT will be guid-ed by Technical Advisory Groups (TAGs) headed by volunteer profes-sionals, who will help determine the research needed to improve how the state builds and manages its trans-portation system. Initially, the cen-ter will establish TAGs in the areas of structures, pavements and materi-als, operations, safety, environment, public transportation, planning and construction.c

Traffic Operations Laboratory (TOL) Established in 1998 to train IDOT per-sonnel and contractors in the integration and working relationship of the railroad and highway signal systems, the TOL has been continuously updated since then. The lab has about 7,400 square feet of available building space which houses offices, classrooms, testing areas and a high bay area. Equipment is available to evaluate traffic signal components and fiber optic communications. An extensive collection of traffic signal control hardware, including con-trollers, detector units, and conflict monitors provide a valuable resource for hands-on instruction and re-search.Nondestructive Testing Equipment

ATREL’s equipment for nondestruc-tive testing include a van equipped with state-of-the-art ground penetration radar (GPR) with a range of antennae for accu-rate measurements of the layer thicknesses of various pavements and flaw detection, along with a video imaging camera. Test-ing conducted at ATREL includes the use of electromagnetic waves as well as ultra-

Continued on the next page


10 Visit CEE on the http://cee.uiuc.edu

Self-consolidating concrete sonic and stress waves devices such as im-pact echo and ultrasonic pulse.Computer Modeling Facilities

The computer modeling facilities at ATREL are among the best available. So-phisticated, state-of-the-art programs are used for finite element modeling of pave-ment structures and material behavior, discrete element particle models, traffic flow simulation models, network optimi-zation models, and digital image analysis programs. These modeling programs are supported by computer networks at U of I, which include the most current work-stations. Additionally, researchers have access to supercomputers housed at the National Center for Supercomputing Ap-plications.

Equipped with facilities that are among the best available today and led by top researchers in this field, the interdisci-plinary research and educational program at ATREL is developing cutting-edge transportation technologies that can be implemented by transportation agencies and engineers to make our transporta-tion system safer and more efficient in the years to come.c

Durable, economical runwayscrucial. Even a small reduction in pavement thick-ness could add up to big savings in a project that aims to build 35 miles of runways and taxiways using 2.2 million cubic yards of Portland cement concrete.

Tutumluer’s group is testing and characterizing soil samples from locations around O’Hare to de-termine the best method of stabilization, the pro-cess of treating the soil to improve it. O’Hare’s silty soils present a challenge; silt is highly susceptible to moisture and difficult to treat with admixtures. Another complication is the high degree of variabil-ity among soils at the site. Last year the researchers determined that lime as an admixture would work to stabilize the soils, and now they are studying the effectiveness of different types of lime such as lime kiln dust and hydrated lime, to determine the opti-mum treatment methodology. The goal: economi-cal, long-lasting pavement at the nation’s busiest airport.c

One of the most important considerations in build-ing airport runways that last is establishing the subgrade, the soil foundation on which the pavement will rest. The biggest threat to the life of airport pavement is rutting; if the underlying soil isn’t firm enough, the pavement will

deform. Good subgrade support allows pavement to be thinner, which saves money. Associate Professor Erol Tutumluer’s work for the O’Hare Modernization Program is helping ensure a firm foundation for the new pavement at O’Hare International Airport.

The O’Hare Modernization Program is a multibillion-dollar initiative to expand and redesign the runway system to reduce flight delays. The project’s enormity makes the subgrade even more

Continued from the previous page

Self-consolidating concrete is quickly emerging as a replace-ment for traditional concrete for applications that benefit from its ease of placement and potential for reduced labor costs. But the material—known for its quality of flowing freely like a liq-uid—is as tricky to mix as it is attractive, with the potential for higher shrinkage and segregation problems if done incor-rectly. As a result, the Illinois Department of Transportation is working with CEE researchers to ensure the greatest possible success of future projects that utilize this promising but sensitive material.

Professor David A. Lange, in con-sultation with Professor Leslie Struble, is working with the technical committee led by IDOT engineer Brian Pfeiffer to develop test procedures to evaluate differ-ent mixes of self-consolidating concrete. The researchers are pioneering methods for measuring segregation and formwork pressure, addressing concerns particularly important in the use of self-consolidating concrete. The goal is to provide IDOT with procedures for qualification, determining whether to use a particular mix, and acceptance, deciding whether to accept concrete delivered in the field.

“There is major interest in this new material,” Lange says, “and IDOT needs to have in place the test procedures and the specifications that allow it to be done successfully.”c



Experts in the design of asphalt pavement have long sought a “perpetual pavement” that didn’t succumb to fa-tigue failure or structural damage caused by bending of the pavement’s deepest layers under the weight of traffic. This perpetual pavement would never need costly reconstruction, only minor repair of surface distresses every 12 or 15 years. Professor Samuel H. Carpenter’s research for IDOT has brought the dream of perpetual pavement closer to reality.

Pavement experts had long observed that the thickest pavements didn’t fail, but overbuilding to prevent damage was expensive and wasteful. The question was, how thick was thick enough? To complicate the matter, different as-phalt mixes are used in different regions, and each mix has its

own unique characteristics that affect its endurance.

Carpenter’s group was the first to bring the prob-

lem into the lab to test asphalt mixes and quantify their “fa-tigue endurance limits,” or optimal thickness. The research combines computer modeling with laboratory and full-scale testing to give IDOT a better understanding of their mix-es and help them achieve the ideal thickness for each one. As the design methodology progresses, IDOT plans to begin implementing what they’ve learned in the construction and re-construction of Illinois’ roads.c

Perpetual flexible pavements

When construction crews use precast concrete beams, they hoist them using lift-ing loops, steel handles that are cast into the concrete by the manufacturer. These lift-ing loops usually are made of leftover sections of the steel bands used to prestress con-

crete. While guidelines exist for the proper fabrication of lifting loops cast into large concrete beams, manufacturers currently follow their own unique practices when casting lift-ing loops into beams with depths less than 16 inches. These

methods vary in effectiveness, and unreliable lifting loops create potentially dangerous conditions for workers.

In a study funded by IDOT, Assistant Professor Daniel A. Kuchma is studying lifting loops with the goal of devel-oping guidelines for their fabrication and use. Researchers will survey producers to get a clear picture of the methods in use and the rationale behind them, examine practices in use in other states, and review the basis for guidelines for larger concrete sections. They will then design and conduct experi-mental testing on a wide variety of lifting loops to compare effectiveness. The results will help IDOT standardize pro-duction of this small yet significant detail in its construction projects and increase safety for those who rely on them.c

Safer lifting

As pavement experts set their sights on roads that will last 40 years with minimal maintenance, Illinois researchers are taking a closer look at the factors that cause concrete pave-ments to fail. Assistant Professor Jeffery R. Roesler this sum-mer completed a study for the Illinois Department of Trans-portation (IDOT) that examined various design options for extended-life, continuously reinforced concrete pavements (CRCP). Using ATREL’s Accelerated Transportation Load-ing Assembly (ATLAS), Roesler’s team was able to replicate 40 years of traffic on full-scale test sections in less than two months, something engineers had never done before. Tra-ditionally, new pavement design and material concepts have been evaluated through a trial-and-error methodology that requires excessive amounts of time and money and “makes the traveling public the guinea pigs,” says Roesler.

Roesler’s test sections included two concrete thicknesses, several steel contents, and the use of single versus double lay-

ers of steel reinforcement. The fatigue performance of the concrete pavements exceeded expectations, validating IDOT’s structural designs, and the research fur-ther refined the mechanism of how rein-forced concrete pavements fail. In the pro-cess, the researchers also developed a new method for measuring crack width under dynamic loading, which is a key factor in predicting the failure of CRCP.

Using what they learned, Roesler’s team is now embarking on a three-year project to produce a guide for the design of CRCP. The guide will enable engineers to design extended-life CRCP for a variety of traffic, environment, and material inputs by applying the expertise of IDOT engineers and the knowledge attained by U of I researchers.c

Long-lasting concrete pavements

12 Visit CEE on the http://cee.uiuc.edu

Associate Professor James M. LaFave, standing, with Ph.D. candidate John Bignell, who is teaching the undergraduate course CEE 460 Steel Structures this semester. Bignell is the re-cipient of the Alumni Teaching Fellowship, an award offered every other year to provide the department’s best graduate stu-dents with teaching experience. The award also offers support for a semester of research.

Southern Illinois lies within the New Madrid Seismic Zone, an area identified by experts as vulnerable to a major earthquake. As part of its earthquake preparedness plan, the Il-linois Department of Transportation (IDOT) has designated several main arterial transportation routes as pri-ority emergency routes. In the event of a major earthquake, IDOT would like these routes to remain fully func-tional to allow emergency personnel and supplies to safely and effectively reach areas of need. A research proj-ect by Associate Professor James M. LaFave will provide IDOT with valuable information about the seis-mic vulnerability of hundreds of bridges along these routes.

Working with information from structural drawings of actual IDOT bridges, as well as the results of physi-cal tests done on relevant bridge components, LaFave and Ph.D. can-didate John Bignell have constructed three-dimensional computer models

Reliable earthquake emergency routes

of typical wall pier bridges, the second most commonly occurring type of bridge in this region. The most com-mon are multi-column pier bridges, a type examined several years ago using two-dimensional models by Profes-sor Emeritus Neil M. Hawkins. Like that project, LaFave’s has used com-puter modeling to expose the bridges to earthquakes of varying magnitude to see how they might fare.

LaFave’s project is unique in its examination of wall pier bridges, of-fering the first glimpse of their seismic vulnerability, and in its use of three-dimensional modeling to fully ad-dress issues such as bridge skew angle. The project has also provided IDOT with detailed inventory information about its bridges, which could be used to identify bridges for seismic retro-fitting. The results will give IDOT a better understanding of the earth-quake damage the bridges might sus-tain and the potential for interruption of its designated priority routes.c

Drivers who speed through construc-tion zones present a danger to construc-tion workers, fellow motorists, and them-selves. The sight of a police car curtails speeding, but it isn’t feasible to station law enforcement at every construction site. This year Illinois became the first state to try speed photo reinforcement in construction zones, a method that in-volves catching speeders on camera and mailing them tickets. Toward this end, the Illinois Department of Transporta-tion (IDOT) has acquired vans equipped with computers, radar devices and cam-eras. In order to study the plan and its effect on overall safety in construction zones, IDOT is funding a study by Pro-fessor Rahim F. Benekohal.

Benekohal’s research will evaluate the

Safer construction zones

effectiveness of speed photo reinforcement by studying various setups involving the vans, signs that warn drivers their speed is being moni-tored, and lighted displays that inform passing drivers of their actual speed. The researchers will examine the overall impact on safety in the work zone and will consider whether the presence of the equipment causes drivers slam on the brakes or tailgate. One of the most complex as-pects of the project will be following the issued tickets through the court system to see if they are upheld. Long used in Europe, speed photo reinforce-ment has been slow to catch on in the United States, partly because of legal issues surrounding its use.

During this inaugural period, all eyes will be on Illinois as other depart-ments of transportation watch and wait to see whether or not snapping pictures of speeders means safer construction zones for all concerned. c



Effective pavement maintenance

Safe, efficient rail transport

For nearly a century, the motto of the railroad industry has been, ‘Safety First.’ So it is no surprise that safety is a major research focus of Associ-ate Professor Chris Barkan, director of the railroad engineering program. Funded largely by the railroad indus-try, Barkan and his students are doing groundbreaking work in the areas of railroad train, tank car and hazardous materials safety and risk analysis.

Along with students and colleagues, Barkan is approaching the question us-ing statistical and operations research methods. Among their recent work has been an analysis of the factors affect-ing the causes and severity of railroad accidents. They have also developed a mathematical model to determine the optimal thickness of tank cars and a multi-attribute analysis to identify the

most efficient means of enhanc-ing tank car safety design. The third critical element of their risk analysis work is under-standing the characteristics of hazardous materials and their likely impact on humans or the environment if they are released in an accident.

Barkan is also collaborating with fac-ulty from the Beckman Institute on an-other project to develop machine vision technology to perform safety inspections of railcars more effectively and efficiently.

The longstanding focus on safety has paid off for the rail industry, which in the late 19th century was among the most dangerous occupations. Today railroads are the safest of all transportation modes and among the safest of all industries.

Another of Barkan’s research areas is

energy efficiency. In one project the loading patterns of intermodal equip-ment on railcars are being analyzed. An optimization model that accounts for the aerodynamics of different load-ing patterns has been developed and shown that substantial fuel savings are possible. In another project the feasibil-ity of using energy recovery technology somewhat akin to hybrid automobiles but applied to diesel electric locomo-tives is being studied.c

The most common and costly maintenance work performed on high-ways and airport pavements is the seal-ing of cracks that develop over time. The sealing of cracks prevents water from entering the pavement and caus-ing more serious, structural damage. Notwithstanding the benefits of crack sealing, the selection of effective seal-ants is difficult, as traditional methods of testing crack sealants are often poor

predictors of field performance. This is in part because current standard tests do not account for field conditions, includ-ing simultaneous traffic and environmen-tal loads, and sealant adhesion and rheol-ogy, which considers the coupled effect of loading time and temperature. Thanks to research by Professor Imad Al-Qadi, that is about to change.

In collaboration with chemist Dr. J-F. Masson and his group at the Canadian

National Research Council, Al-Qadi and his students are devel-oping performance-based guidelines for the selection of hot-poured crack sealants. With support from 13 state departments of transportation in the United States and 13 similar Canadian agencies and indus-try, the researchers

established the Crack Sealant Consor-tium and embarked on a $1.4 million dollar project. Their work involves the development of test apparatus and ap-proaches to assess the rheological prop-erties of the crack sealants in a wide range of temperatures, the modeling of sealant behavior and developed test procedures based on numerical and fi-nite element analysis, the comparison of laboratory test results and model predictions, the calibration of test pro-cedures against field data, and develop-ment of new testing standards.

The project is so unique that the researchers are scheduled to present six papers on their work at the next Trans-portation Research Board meeting. By 2007, they expect to have developed testing and specifications for deter-mining the best sealant for any region in North America, making unreliable crack sealants—and the unnecessary expense associated with them—a thing of the past. c


Stable, optimal networks

Most damage suffered by asphalt overlays is the result of reflective cracking, which occurs when underlying disconti-nuities in the pavement reflect through to the surface. But the exact cause of reflective cracking is still unknown, so ef-fective methods to prevent it and prolong pavement life have been elusive.

A multi-disciplinary team of CEE researchers, including Associate Professor William G. Buttlar, Professor Glaucio

Durable asphalt overlays

What does a supply chain have in com-mon with a stream of traffic? According to Assistant Professor Yanfeng Ouyang, a specialist in system control and optimiza-tion, both systems can benefit from math-ematical modeling to achieve stability and optimality. Ouyang’s unique focus is ap-plying principles of control theory and op-erations research techniques to traditional transportation engineering research. It’s a cutting-edge application, in which there is much opportunity, he says.

A decentralized supply chain is a sys-tem in which every party makes his or her

own, inde-pendent deci-sions. Such systems are vulnerable to some t h ing called the “ b u l l w h ip

effect,” a phenomenon in which small changes downstream can cause major dis-ruptions upstream. For example, a small change in customer demand can cause great order fluctuations for retailers, dis-tributors and manufacturers, leading to inventory problems and business disrup-tion. In a traffic application, a similar bull-whip effect can be observed in a stream of

Nondestructive testingWhen the Virginia Department of

Transportation (VDOT) wanted to implement performance-based specifica-tions for its concrete pavements, it need-ed a new testing approach. In order to thoroughly and fairly evaluate concrete for thickness and strength—and either reward or penalize contractors based on their adherence to specifications—they needed to test the concrete pavement at a number of locations. Traditional testing methods, which require taking samples, would result in too much damage.

That’s where Assistant Professor

John Popovics came in. An expert in nondestructive methods of testing, he soon became the first non-Virginian to win a research contract from VDOT. His task: develop two entirely new tests to be used by VDOT in the field. To evaluate concrete strength in place, Popovics developed a test method that employs ultrasonic surface waves, which VDOT personnel can per-form with a portable ultrasonic unit and a laptop. For the thickness test, he devised a method in which a VDOT official uses a spring-loaded BB gun to generate a small impact on the surface of the concrete. This

stop-and-go traffic, in which small vari-ances in speed are amplified further back, causing delays and unsafe driving condi-tions. Ouyang’s research has focused on such system instability. This also can be extended to airline traffic and mass transit systems, he says, because all such systems involve individuals making decisions inde-pendently.

The good news, Ouyang says, is that “understanding this mechanism has en-abled us to design rules to modify the behavior of the parties within the system slightly such that this phenomenon can be eliminated, and then to develop strategies such that the performance of every party can be improved.”c

creates harmless wave pulses that reflect with-in the concrete and are picked up by sensors on the surface and trans-mitted to a laptop.

In order to fine-tune the test methods in conditions similar to what they would find in the field, Popo-vics’ team cast full-scale concrete slabs at ATREL. This fall VDOT took delivery on the testing apparatus, an innovative, nondestructive way to ensure the quality of their concrete pavements.c

H. Paulino, graduate students SeongHyeok Song, Michael Wagoner and Eshan Dave, and engineers from SemMaterials L.P. are developing a sophisticated array of materials testing and numerical modeling tools in an effort to better understand premature pave-ment deterioration with an eye toward pre-venting it. Their work is being funded by the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) Grants Opportunities for Academic Liai-son with Industry (GOALI). The project integrates numerical simulations, laboratory tests and field observations to test asphalt overlays and interlayers, materials some-

times used to reinforce over-lays.

One such product developed by Sem-Materials L.P., the STRATA Reflective Crack Relief System, is being evaluated in the field. SemMaterials group engi-neers hope this research will provide the needed tools to optimize the cost/benefit ratio of the technology.

The collaboration among engineers with varying areas of expertise is offering a fresh approach to the familiar yet com-plex problem of pavement damage.c

14 Visit CEE on the web


By Imad Al-QadiFounder Professor of EngineeringDirector of ATREL

The Advanced Transportation Research and Engi-neering Laboratory (ATREL) has entered an exciting new era. The facility houses some of the most sophis-ticated testing and educational equipment in use today, and the synergy developed at ATREL among the depart-ment’s transportation faculty and students has resulted in an outbreak of innovative research. In addition, the recent establishment of the Illinois Center for Transportation promises to build an even more vital transporta-tion research program and greater multi-disciplinary collaboration.

ATREL’s ability to function as the central supporting force for an expanding research program is the fulfillment of the initial idea behind the establishment of this first-class facility. The Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT) recognized ATREL’s capability to support and expand a research field, and the facility’s renewed strength and promise played a role in IDOT’s desire to establish the Illinois Center for Trans-portation (ICT). It is in the mutual interest of both the University of Illinois and IDOT to expand their research beyond the national level at-tained by the pavements and materials faculty and achieve the same level of capability in areas not addressed here historically. The ICT will also extend to include premier researchers from other universities to ensure the center incorporates the best and most ingenious minds when address-ing the state’s needs.

ATREL will continue to grow and will become the premier transpor-tation research facility in the country, supported by the finest transporta-tion faculty and housing the premier transportation center in the nation. The next period in the development of ATREL will see an increase in the number of researchers and expansion in the scope of their research. ATREL’s capabilities combined with the research needs of ICT will sup-port both the focus of IDOT and the national transportation interest. ATREL will expand to include partners from other agencies and the pri-vate sector whose goals for the highway system are similar to those of ICT and IDOT. This multi-disciplinary setting will allow expanded work in a variety of areas, including:• Safety• Network management to alleviate congestion and unplanned expenditures• Highway infrastructure management• Pavement, bridge, and rail modeling and sensing • Innovative materials and designs for pavements and bridges• Environmental impact on transportation systems• Traffic systems evaluation, operations and management• Policy and transportation economics• Transportation security, evacuation, and hazardous material transportation

This expansion will provide increased educational opportunities for stu-dents at the University of Illinois and other state universities, as well as for practicing IDOT engineers, advancing the abilities of all ICT partners. It is our vision that ATREL will become the nation’s hub for innovative transportation research, development and implementation.c

ATREL: the road ahead

Photo: Professor Leslie J. Struble and Qiang Li, a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Geology, who is examining a thin section of concrete in an optical microscope.

For more than 15 years, Professor Leslie J. Struble has helped the Illinois Depart-ment of Transportation (IDOT) take a clos-er look at its concrete. Employing methods of petrography, a practice used in geology to describe and classify rocks, Struble examines concrete at its deepest levels and identifies chemical reactions that can destroy it from within.

An expert in concrete distress identifica-tion, Struble began her research for IDOT soon after joining the faculty in 1990. At that time, IDOT called her to examine some puzzling deterioration on a bridge in Peoria, Ill. Struble identified the problem as resulting from alkali-silica reaction (ASR), a chemical reaction involving aggregates in the concrete and sodium and potassium from the cement that results in expansion and cracking. It was the first time ASR had been identified in IDOT concrete; previously, much of its concrete deterioration had been attributed to D-cracking, a kind of damage associated with freezing and thawing.

Struble’s successful identification of re-active aggregates touched off a working re-lationship that continues to this day. She currently is using petrography and physi-cal testing to examine the effects of chert, a common rock in the sedimentary sand of Illinois, some of which is reactive. This multi-disciplinary approach will help IDOT set specifications on the sand it uses in its concrete and employ methods for testing its reactive potential.c

Strong concrete



Researchers study the lessons of Hurricane KatrinaHurricane Katrina has been called

the worst natural disaster in the history of the United States, and in its after-math are great challenges of civil and environmental engineering. There are immediate problems—accommodating one million displaced persons, restoring utilities, rebuilding structures—and there are long-term questions, such as how to improve our response capabili-ties to ease human suffering after future disasters. Department researchers are responding to the engineering chal-lenges presented by Katrina with both present and future needs in mind.

Three missions to the Gulf Coast, funded by the Mid-America Earth-quake (MAE) Center, promise to ex-pand our understanding of the issues related to hurricane damage in particu-lar and disaster response in general. In a four-day MAE Center mission to study damage sustained by bridges and trans-portation structures, structures Ph.D. students Curtis J. Holub and Oh-Sung Kwon from the University of Illinois traveled to New Orleans with three col-leagues from Georgia Institute of Tech-nology. On two additional trips, MAE Center professors Reginald DesRoches and Glenn J. Rix of Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta collected in-formation on harbor-related structures, and MAE Center professors Ricardo R. Lopez (PhD 88), also a department alumnus, and Arsenio Cáceres-Fernán-dez from the University of Puerto Rico studied the effects of the hurricane on

light industrial construction.

With an eye toward disasters of the future, the MAE Center is providing leadership for a multi-disciplinary Tem-porary Housing Initiative that will seek input from a range of professionals with relevant expertise, including structural engineers, seismologists, construction managers, sociologists and economists. The goal will be to define the issues that affect our national temporary housing policy and develop an optimal design for temporary housing, along with deployment and re-deployment pro-cedures and policies. The group is in

its earliest stages—ex-changing ideas and de-veloping a concept pa-per—and later will plan a workshop and develop a funding plan.

Associate Professor Feniosky Peña-Mora is studying the organi-zational relationships that formed during the response to Katrina.

The project is a collaborative effort with Professor Noshir Contractor from the National Center for Supercomput-ing Applications and a colleague at the University of California, Irvine, and is funded by a Small Grant for Explorato-ry Research from the National Science Foundation (NSF). The researchers are examining and analyzing how indi-viduals and organizations linked to one another and formed relationships for disaster response.

“Our goal is to determine which of the relationships of collaboration pro-vided more fruitful benefits or created a response that was actually effective

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Damaged bridge on US-90 highway at Bay St. Louis in Mississippi. Photo: Oh-Sung Kwon, November 7.


By Jon Khachaturian (BS 78) On August 29, 2005, it finally hap-

pened—the city of New Orleans, La., was hit with a category 4/5 hurricane, Hurri-cane Katrina. Although the city escaped the full impact of a direct hit, which was considered the worst case scenario, the New Orleans levee system suffered seri-ous breaches, and in the early morning of August 30, 2005, the city began to flood. This was considered the second worst case scenario. Despite years of theoretical dis-cussions about the ad-vent of just such a cri-sis, the residents were unprepared for the looming hardships. The plans required to handle a catastrophe of this magnitude simply did not exist at the local, state or federal levels of gov-ernments.

The principal cause was the inad-equate design of the levees which were to provide the necessary control of water. Clearly the levees were not designed for a hurricane greater than a category 2 or 3. Review of the design shows a single row of sheet piling driven into spongy, organic, porous soils to a depth that did not reach the depth of the adjacent canal, capped with a structurally marginal concrete flood wall. The conclusion of a Louisiana State University panel of experts, after studying the disaster, was simple, “This could never work.”

The negative impact on the city of New Orleans was enormous. The un-wanted water in the city stayed several weeks, which irretrievably damaged hun-dreds of thousands of cars and houses, and prevented people who had left the city in great numbers from returning to their homes. The water became contami-nated and unsanitary, power and drink-ing water were unavailable, and the whole economy of the city came to a standstill.

“It finally happened”Many of the people who lost their resi-dences left the city not knowing what the future would bring. Thousands of people whose houses survived lost their jobs. In addition, Hurricane Rita, which followed Katrina soon thereafter, added to the misery of the community. Many of those whose homes had survived and who had jobs outside the city had dif-ficulty staying in their houses since food and gasoline were not easily available.

The question arises as to what the fu-ture will bring to New Orleans. Will the

exodus be permanent? Is it possible to revive the community? The answer to the second question can be yes if the citizens are willing to undertake the chal-lenge.

New Orleans has many assets, primar-ily its location at the mouth of the Missis-sippi River. The Port of New Orleans is a ma-

jor import-export point for much of the central United States. The French Quar-ter is a great national heritage which has a unique history and has been a signifi-cant attraction for tourists, millions of whom have been visiting New Orleans every year.

The first order of business is to clean the city and remove all the waste, pro-viding a sanitary environment. It will be a time-consuming, major undertaking to re-establish a safe, clean community.

To begin with, the city should com-mit itself to resolve the problem of the levee system; protection from flooding is the first priority. If the water is not ad-equately controlled, any other improve-ments become an exercise in futility. We have to keep in mind that history repeats itself and additional hurricanes of this magnitude are possible.c

Jon Khachaturian (BS 78) is President of Versa-bar Inc. in Belle Chasse, La.

and which relationships did not,” Peña-Mora says.

Peña-Mora is working with the MAE Center and colleagues at the University of Arizona Housing Research Institute to explore the creation of Transitional Communities for people displaced by disasters. The idea of a transitional com-munity goes beyond emergency housing to provide people with additional tem-porary services like schools, post offices, banks, clinics, mental health centers, government assistance clearinghouses, fire and police stations, places of wor-ship, and recreational common areas. The group tentatively is planning a workshop in March on the topic.

“We are focusing not so much on just getting a roof over the head of peo-ple displaced by disasters, but on getting them from a place in which there is dev-astation and anguish to a place in which they feel that they are getting their lives back together,” Peña-Mora says.

Peña-Mora and MAE Center pro-fessors Amr S. Elnashai and Jerome F. Hajjar are participating in a cam-pus-wide Megacatastrophe Work Group, established after Katrina by Professor Susan Kieffer of UIUC’s Center for Advanced Studies. The group’s agenda includes networking with others in the University com-munity who are interested in the response to great catastrophes, iden-tifying ways in which they can work together, and providing a forum for discussing different aspects of mega-catastrophes. The group presented a panel discussion in September entitled Katrina and Other Mega-catastrophes: Science, Policy and Human Behavior and plans to pres-ent a similar event in the spring on the topic of major earthquakes. One concept that has surfaced from this effort is the concept of “the disas-ter within the disaster” that occurs when disaster response is inadequate

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der to place into a higher level language class at Tu-lane. She had been accepted to a residential college there where the pro-fessor in resi-dence was the chair for the department of Spanish and Portuguese.

“I had my whole major planned out,” she says. “I was going to double major in anthropol-ogy and civil eng ineer ing there. I had all my classes picked out, and I could have done it in four years with a little bit of summer school, but here—I don’t know.”

Goulioutina was happy to find a spot at Illinois and plans to stay for all four years. She is settling in on campus and soon after arriving had already joined two student organizations, Engineers Without Borders and the International Association for the Exchange of Stu-dents for Technical Experience. Both groups are good fits for her, because of her interest in international studies and her goal to one day practice civil engi-neering in a developing country. De-spite the tragedy that brought her to Illinois, Goulioutina is warming to her new identity as an Illinois civil engi-neering student.

“So far, the nicest people I’ve met on campus have been civil engineers,” she says.c

College freshman Sasha Gouliouti-na had just moved into her dormitory at Tulane University in New Orleans on Saturday, August 27, when she noticed a woman standing outside the build-ing with a posterboard sign. Dorms will be closing at 6 p.m., it read, due to evacuation for Hurricane Katrina.

For Goulioutina and her parents, who had flown in from Skokie, Ill., the night before, excitement over the family’s only child starting college had eclipsed any thought of the weather. Seeing the sign, Goulioutina recalled the dorm’s moving-in policy, explained to her just that morning, that residents must fill out a card detailing their per-sonal hurricane evacuation plans, just in case.

“We totally forgot to think about it,” Goulioutina says. “We thought we’d do it later. We didn’t know we’d be implementing our plan immedi-ately.”

The family tried to get a flight out of New Orleans but arrived at the air-port just five minutes too late to board. So they rented a car and headed back up north, leaving most of Gouliouti-na’s possessions in the dorm to which she believed she would soon return.

Two weeks later, though, after the hurricane and subsequent flooding had closed Tulane indefinitely, Gouliou-tina found herself starting classes as a freshman in CEE, one of the displaced students who found a new home at the University of Illinois. She started school in her oldest clothes, having left all her best things, along with all her new clothes for college and her favorite childhood books and photographs, in New Orleans.

“The only thing I got out was my laptop,” she says.

Born in Russia, Goulioutina came to Chicago when she was 7 years old. A graduate of Niles North High School, she speaks Russian, English and Span-ish. In addition, she began teaching herself Portuguese last summer in or-

Katrina sends CE freshman home to Illinois

Sasha Goulioutina joined the department’s freshman class after Hurricane Ka-trina forced her to evacuate on her first day at Tulane University.

Continued from page 17

or misguided and unintentionally exac-erbates human suffering.

Within the context of his ongoing research in information technology and the engineer’s role as a first responder, Peña-Mora is examining the informa-tion technology needs of engineers and others participating in disaster re-sponse. Through interviews with those who participated in the New Orleans recovery effort, Peña-Mora is identify-ing problems responders encountered, such as invalid software licenses, re-dundancy in the services provided and communication difficulties, with an eye toward streamlining the response after future disasters.

Professor Gary Parker, the newest member of the faculty in Environmen-tal Hydrology and Hydraulic Engineer-ing, organized a session of the Ameri-can Geophysical Union December 5-9 entitled A Delta in Jeopardy: Research Needs and Proposals for the Restora-tion of the Mississippi River Delta. Parker’s co-organizers were Chris Paola of the University of Minnesota and Rick Hooper of the Corporation for the Advancement of Hydrologic Science. The session included presentations that outlined tentative plans and research needs for the long-term restoration of the Delta and the protection of New Orleans.c

Collapsed buildings due to storm surge. Photo by Jamie Padgett.

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In April, the American Society of Civil Engineers named the Rion-Antirion Bridge, a cable-stayed bridge spanning the Gulf of Corinth in Greece, the Outstand-ing Civil Engineering Achievement for 2005. The longest cable-stayed bridge in the world, it was constructed at a cost of $1 billion in an area of extreme environmen-tal conditions, deep sea waters, marginal soils and high seismicity. For George Lev-entis (MS 85), whose firm played a signifi-cant role in the project, it represented not only an engineering achievement—one for which he himself was awarded the Na-tional Grand Award from the American Consulting Engineers Council—but also his first foray into the unique and chal-lenging area of project finance.

The Rion-Antirion Bridge was a con-cession project, in which the government allows a private consortium to finance and design an infrastructure project, then op-erate it and maintain it for a number of years to recoup their money through tolls. Leventis, a principal in Langan Engineer-ing and Environmental Services of New York City, served as technical adviser to the lenders, a role that at the time was new for him.

“When I first got involved, I was not 100 percent sure what it meant,” Leventis says. “It turns out it meant that you are re-sponsible for overseeing for the lenders ev-erything related to the project. You have to identify whether or not the consortium

has the ability to do it, whether the costs and schedule are reasonable, if the design is proper and if the project proceeds as planned.”

The complex, eight-year project, com-pleted in 2004, was one of many new challenges that have characterized Leven-tis’ 20-year career with Langan, where he was hired directly out of graduate school at U of I. Leventis wouldn’t have it any other way.

“I enjoy getting involved in very inter-esting projects and having the luxury and freedom to try new things,” he says. “I enjoy very much a challenge.”

Born in Greece, Leventis earned his B.S. in civil engineering from the National Technical University of Athens and his M.S. from Illinois with a concentration in geotechnical engineering. His adviser was Professor Ed Cording. After finishing his graduate coursework, Leventis remained at UIUC another semester to take some “legendary courses in CE,” including Case Histories in Geotechnical Engineering es-tablished by Ralph Peck.

“The University of Illinois geotechni-cal group was always known as a program that gave a lot of practical insight to stu-dents,” Leventis says.

During that time, Leventis was inter-viewing at multiple firms, hoping to find an entry-level engineering position in a competitive market. The 15-year-old, 35-person New York City metropolitan area

firm of Langan stood out, Leventis says, because of another UIUC alumnus, Den-nis Leary, one of the firm’s founders.

“He intrigued me quite a bit,” Leven-tis says. “I thought Langan would be a place where I would get more opportunity to work on everything from soup to nuts on a project, instead of getting into a big company where I could get stuck for sev-eral years doing the same thing.”

Leary turned out to be a tough mentor who taught Leventis a great deal, and the firm’s entrepreneurial atmosphere offered the freedom to try new things. Today he is one of nine senior principals in the firm, which has grown to 520 people. The firm specializes in geotechnical, land develop-ment and environmental engineering, as well as earth work and marine work—ev-erything “from the ground down and from the water out,” Leventis says.

Since the beginning of the Rion-Anti-rion Bridge project, Leventis has had more opportunities to work in the area of project finance, including participating in a study for the privatization of the Athens Metro extensions; serving as design checker for a concession bridge in Chile; acting as tech-nical adviser to the lenders for the privati-zation of a major motorway in Greece; and serving as Director General of Olympic Works for the 2004 Olympics in Athens.

Photo: the Rion-Antirion Bridge in Greece. Story continued on the next page

George Leventis (MS 85)Principal, Langan Engineering and Environmental ServicesPresident, Langan International

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Career in rail prompts gift for scholarships

Krambles gift to UIC will support urban planning

Alumnus Nor-man Carlson and his wife, Mary, have established the Nor-man Carlson Schol-arship Fund for stu-dents in railroad or transportation engi-neering.

Carlson gradu-ated from the Uni-versity of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign College of Com-merce and Business Administration in 1964 with a B.S. in Accountancy. After two years of mili-tary service, he joined Arthur Andersen and Company in 1966. He was appoint-ed Railroad Industry Head in 1985, and managing partner of the Worldwide Transportation Industry Practice in 1990. He retired in 2000 and formed Carlson Consulting International.

Carlson has written or published 18 books on the history and technology of electrified railways and is the editor of First and Fastest, a quarterly maga-zine on passenger railroads in Central Midwestern states. His many activities include serving as a guest lecturer on business formation at the University of

With a gift of $50,000, The George Krambles Transportation Scholarship Fund (GKTSF) has endowed a scholar-ship at the College of Urban Planning and Public Affairs at the University of Il-linois Chicago. Illinois alumnus George Krambles (BS 36) dedicated his career to the advancement of urban transpor-tation engineering. He is best known for his leadership of the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA), from which he retired as executive director in 1980. His estab-lishment of the Skokie Swift initiated a new era in commuter rail. The gift is in-tended to encourage students to pursue

Illinois at Chicago, a member of the Busi-ness Advisory Coun-cil to the Transporta-tion Center at North-western University, and the president of the George Kram-bles Transportation Scholarship Fund, a position he has held since 1985.

The Carlsons’ gift in support of rail ed-ucation is the result

of their gratitude for the opportunities they have enjoyed as a result of Carlson’s University of Illinois education and his long years of service to the rail industry, he says.

“Mary will tell you that I turned a hobby in railroads into a career and we’ve had a very nice life as a result of that career,” Carlson says. “I’m very ap-preciative of the education I got at the U of I.” In addition, Carlson wants to encourage students to pursue careers in the rail industry, where opportunities now abound due to growth in the indus-try and an aging work force.

“There is a tremendous need for peo-ple in the rail industry.”c

careers in urban planning and mass transit, said Norman Carl-son, president of the GKTSF Board of Direc-tors.

“Many stu-dents have ben-efited from the legacy of George Krambles, and I ap-plaud the efforts of the Board to con-tinue to help more students,” said the college’s Dean, Robin Hambleton. c

George Krambles on a CTA train, circa 1980

In that position, Leventis was responsible for all of the land development activities for the Olympic venues, their design and eventual construction, general planning, environmental considerations, and the master planning of the Olympic village. One of his first roles as Director General was to evaluate the privatization of certain Olympic venues, something that in the end was determined infeasible, primarily due to the unique nature of the projects and the tight and unyielding deadline of hosting the Olympic Games.

The demands of his job, which re-quires long hours and frequent travel, are balanced by the excitement of taking on new challenges and high profile projects, Leventis says. His civic involvements include membership in the New York Building Congress, the Board of Gov-ernors of the New York Building Foun-dation, and the Board of Trustees of the VanAllen Institute, an organization that promotes proper design in public spaces. His awards have included the National Honor Award from the American Con-sulting Engineers Council for his work on the $1 billion New York Hospital expansion over FDR Drive on the East River in New York City and the Grand Award of the State of New Jersey for his work on the Liberty Science Center on the Hudson River. Other notable proj-ects include the current study for the 111-story Empire World Towers in Mi-ami and the Chacao Channel Bridge in Chile.

“I’m running usually 120 miles an hour, and I am working many, many hours,” he says. “I guess we run on adrenaline, and if things are exciting, the adrenaline can get you going—now I don’t know what it does to your sys-tem—but I would be miserable if I didn’t have much to do.”

Leventis lives just outside New York City with his wife, Dr. Lili Deligianni, Ph.D., an alumna of U of I’s Depart-ment of Chemical Engineering, and their daughters, Christine, 10; and Evangelina and Natalie, 9.c

Continued from the previous page

Mary and Norman Carlson


Union Pacific Railroad gift to support rail grad research, diversity

IL-ACPA gift will support concrete pavement educationWith a gift of $200,000, the Illi-

nois Chapter of the American Concrete Pavement Association (IL-ACPA) has established an endowment fund for graduate fellowships in the area of con-crete pavements. Income from this en-dowment will be matched by the UIUC Endowed Fellowship Income Matching Program established by the Office of the Provost. In addition, IL-ACPA has pledged an additional $50,000 over five years to the department to assist prom-ising young faculty members whose area of research is concrete pavement and for general support of the concrete pavement program.

The organization hopes the gift will help the department attract the best graduate students with an interest in

concrete pavement design and help the department stay on the cutting edge of concrete pavement research, said Tom Beck (BS 79), vice president of Con-tinental Cement Company in Ches-terfield, Mo., and a member of the IL-ACPA board of directors. In addition, Beck says, IL-ACPA hopes the gift “will allow University of Illinois students at all levels to become familiar with the advantages and solutions that con-crete materials offer, so that they may avail themselves of those advantages throughout their careers.”

“The University of Illinois is recog-nized throughout the country for the excellence of its engineering school,” said Raymond C. McVeigh, said Ray-mond C. McVeigh, Executive Director

of the Great Lakes Cement Promo-tion Association Inc., a member of IL-ACPA. “IL-ACPA could find no better partner for the advancement of concrete paving research and for the dissemina-tion of excellence in concrete design. IL-ACPA recognizes the importance of introducing young engineers to the many advantages and design solutions that concrete offers. Because of its out-standing faculty and excellent reputa-tion, U of I was IL-ACPA’s choice as a conduit for concrete programs for tomorrow’s engineers.”

For information about the UIUC Endowed Fellowship Income Matching Program of the Office of the Provost, contact Marilyn Boland, (217) 333-5120, [email protected]

Union Pacific Rail-road (UP) has given $10,000 to the de-partment in support of graduate research in rail transportation. The Union Pacific Graduate Research Fellowship, to be of-fered annually, will provide support for the work of an outstanding graduate student. An additional gift from UP of $12,100 will be allocated within the University with an em-phasis on suitability to the rail industry and diversity.

This year’s fellow-ship recipient is Ph.D. student Pooja Anand (MS 04), whose work focuses on help-ing the rail industry increase the safety of transporting hazardous materials. Anand received her Bachelor of Tech-nology degree in 2000 at the Indian

Institute of Technology, Kanpur in In-dia and her Master of Science degree in 2004, from the department.

UP’s support of rail education is an important part of the company’s plan to

ensure a well-educated work force, says Valerie C. Ford, UP’s Senior Manager of Leadership Development and Re-cruitment.

More than 40 percent of UP’s op-erating management team is expected to retire within the next 10 years, and UP will need to hire and rap-idly develop new man-agers for the company’s 40,000-employee op-erating department, she says. University of Illinois’ rail curricu-lum is a “perfect fit” for UP’s Operations Management Training Program, which hires

more than 200 entry-level managers every year, Ford says.

UP is the largest railroad in North America, covering 23 states across two-thirds of the United States.c

Representatives from Union Pacific presented their gift in a visit to campus in October. From left, Jaime Hill, Union Pacific Railroad; Pooja Anand, the railroad program Ph.D. student whose research the gift will support; and Associate Professor Chris Barkan, director of the rail program.


Researchers think outside the box to model complex materialsAs engineering materials grow more

sophisticated, describing and predicting their behavior becomes more challeng-ing. Functionally graded composite materials are superior to traditional ma-terials for a growing range of uses. But because their properties vary through-out the materials, representing them with traditional numerical models is complicated and time-consuming.

Alok Sutradhar (PhD 2005) and Professor Glaucio Paulino, researchers in CEE’s Functionally Graded Mate-rial and Structural Mechanics Group, have demonstrated that such materials can be modeled quickly and accurately using the boundary element method (BEM). Their work has attracted at-tention in the field, and they plan to publish a book next year.

The boundary element method, a process for numerical modeling in computational mechanics, has emerged in the past decade as a powerful tool for solving engineering problems, but it is still not as commonly used as the popular finite element method (FEM), Sutradhar says. Both methods involve discretization, or the establishment of a mesh, a set of equations necessary to

mathemati-cally model a problem. Setting up

a mesh can be the most time-consuming part of numerical modeling. BEM reduces the di-mension of the problem by one, which dramati-cally reduces the time and ef-fort researchers spend creating a mesh. This makes it much faster to solve certain kinds of engineering problems and enables accurate numerical mod-eling of problems that would be impractical with FEM.

“There is a pre-conceived idea that the finite element method is the meth-od to use for any numerical modeling in computational mechanics, but that is not the case. The computational sci-ence researchers need to think outside the box,” Sutradhar says.

Paulino and Sutradhar developed a new BEM technique they dubbed “simple BEM” and successfully applied it to a particularly difficult engineering

Alok Sutradhar (PhD 2005) and CEE Ph.D. student Zhengyu Zhang (MS 03) have developed a virtual reality software called MechVR (Mechanics Virtual Re-ality), that allows users to visualize com-puter modeling data in a virtual reality environment.

Visualization is an integral part of computational mechanics research, Sutradhar says, and virtual reality en-ables multi-sensory, three-dimensional

problem, modeling functionally graded materials with multiple, interacting cracks (see figure at left).

“Solving this kind of problem with FEM is a mess,” Paulino says.

Their work has been acclaimed by others in the field. The International Association for Boundary Element Methods awarded Sutradhar a Best Stu-dent Paper Award at the organization’s 2004 conference, held at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. In addi-

Getting inside the problem

Attendees of the National Science Foundation’s U.S.-Africa Workshop on Mechan-ics and Materials in Cape Town, South Africa (left to right): Wole Soboyejo, Princ-eton University; Benjamin Imasogie, Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU), Nige-ria; Williams Siyanbola, OAU; Glaucio H. Paulino, UIUC; Gabriel Osinkolu, OAU; Alok Sutradhar, UIUC; Babaniyi Babatope, OAU.

CEAT Director David A. Lange and Barry J. Dempsey. Photos below: Interior shots of the CEAT office facility.

CEAT celebrates work, honors DempseyThe Center of Excel-

lence for Airport Technol-ogy (CEAT), celebrated its ac-complishments and honored Founding Director Barry Dempsey, Professor Emeritus, at a reception August 31 in the crane bay of Newmark Civil Engineering Laboratory.

Headquartered in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE), CEAT was established in fall 2004. It encompasses both a research initiative spon-sored by the O’Hare Modern-ization Program (OMP) and the department’s pre-existing Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Center of Excellence for Airport Pavement Tech-nology, funded by the Federal Aviation Administration.

CEE Professor and Head, Robert H. Dodds, Jr., started the program with a welcome message that highlighted the importance of research centers to the work of the department. Professor David A. Lange, CEAT Director, then spoke, acknowledging the FAA and the OMP for their support of the center. After a tribute to Dempsey by Professor Emeri-tus Marshall Thompson, a friend and

colleague since 1950, Lange presented Dempsey with a Distinguished Service Award and a Boeing Dreamliner model airplane.

Afterwards, visitors toured the center’s new office facility, situated in Newmark Lab off the southwest corner of the crane bay. It includes a conference room and office space.

For information about CEAT, visit http://cee.uiuc.edu/research/CEAT.c

tion, he was an invited speaker at the National Science Foundation’s U.S.-Africa Workshop on Mechanics and Materials in Cape Town, South Africa, last winter.

Paulino and Sutradhar are finishing a book about their work, the Symmetric Galerkin Boundary Element Method, which will be available by 2006.

For more information on the work of the functionally graded material group, visit http://cee.uiuc.edu/paulino/.c

modeling of scientific data. MechVR virtually places the user inside a numeri-cal simulation providing the depth of understanding necessary to accurately assess the system being modeled.

Sutradhar is shown at left in the CAVE (Cave Automated Virtual En-vironment), an immersive virtual real-ity facility at the University of Illinois’ Beckman Institute for Advanced Sci-ence and Technology. c


The example above shows boundary discreti-zation and visualization using the boundary element method.


Investiture ceremony honors three professorship recipientsThe department observed three in-

vestitures November 17. Professor Imad Al-Qadi was invested as a Founder Pro-fessor of Engineering, and professors Mark J. Rood and Benito J. Mariñas were named Ivan Racheff professors in Environmental Engineering.

Founder Professor of EngineeringThe College of Engineering created

four Founder Professorships in Engi-neering to recognize distinguished se-nior members of the faculty for their achievements in teaching, research and service. The name commemorates Still-man Williams Robinson, the first fac-ulty member to teach engineering at the University of Illinois and the first dean when the College of Engineering was organized in 1878.

An internationally renowned pave-ment scholar and expert, Professor Imad L. Al-Qadi joined the department in 2004 after 14 years on the faculty of Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University at Blacksburg. He is Direc-tor of CEE’s Advanced Transportation Research and Engineering Laboratory and the new Illinois Center for Trans-portation.

Al-Qadi has taught courses covering materials, pavements, asphalt technolo-gy, infrastructure condition assessment, and nondestructive evaluation (NDE). His research interests include pavement material characterization, instrumenta-tion, loading response, and interlayer modeling and fracture; NDE; and full-scale accelerated testing. He established the pavements and NDE programs at Virginia Tech and, with his students, designed and instrumented the state-of-the-art Smart Road pavement testing facility there.

Al-Qadi holds three degrees in civil engineering: a B.S. from Yarmouk Uni-versity in Jordan, awarded in 1984, and M.Eng. and Ph.D. degrees from Penn-sylvania State University, awarded in 1986 and 1990.

A registered professional engineer and a fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), Al-Qadi serves on more than 20 technical com-mittees and advisory boards. He has chaired several international confer-ences, and currently chairs the ASCE Committee on Pavements and the Transportation Research Board Section on Maintenance. He is Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Pavement Engineering and the North America Editor of the Construction and Build-ing Materials Journal. He has authored or co-authored more than 275 publica-tions, and his honors include the 2004 Limoges Medal of Merit from France, the 2002 International Geosynthetic Society Award, the 2001 Dean’s Award for Research Excellence, and the 1994 National Science Foundation Young In-vestigator Award.

Ivan Racheff Professorships in Envi-ronmental Engineering

The Ivan Racheff Professorship in Environmental Engineering is made possible through an endowment from the estate of Ivan Racheff, innovative industrialist and dedicated conserva-tionist.

An immigrant from Bulgaria, Racheff came to the University of Illi-nois in 1914. He studied first engineer-ing then chemistry, ultimately graduat-ing in 1917 with a bachelor’s degree in liberal arts. After graduation, Racheff worked as apprentice metallurgist with the Illinois Steel Company of Chicago until he was drafted for military service in World War I. After the war, he trav-eled around the country working at a variety of jobs in the tradition of Edgar Allen Poe, whose writings first inspired him to come to the United States.

In 1923, Racheff returned to Chi-cago and established the Racheff Met-allurgical Laboratory and a consulting practice. A pioneer in the field of met-allurgy, he designed his own laboratory

equipment and developed many new techniques. He wrote and compiled more than 70 volumes of the Racheff Metallurgical Studies.

In the late 1940s, Racheff purchased the Knoxville Iron Works in Tennes-see, for which he had done consulting work during World War II, and began a 25-year program to establish a park-like garden on the grounds. The gardens, featuring flowering trees and plants, fish ponds, and walking paths, reflected his belief that industry must exist in con-cert with the environment.

Racheff died in 1982, leaving a significant portion of his estate to the University to be used for educational, scientific and charitable purposes. His ashes were buried in the gardens he es-

Professor Imad J. Al-Qadi with his wife, Muna, and their children Dana, standing, Kareem and Nora, kneeling.


tablished.A specialist in physical and chemi-

cal treatment processes for water quality control, Professor Benito J. Mariñas has been a faculty member in the de-partment since 1995.

Mariñas has taught graduate and undergraduate courses covering fun-damental, laboratory experimentation, and design aspects of environmental engineering and science. His research explores mechanistic aspects of chemi-cal and ultraviolet light disinfection processes and membrane technologies for controlling water-borne pathogens and chemical contaminants. He is co-leader of the Interdisciplinary Disinfec-tion Research team of the National Sci-ence Foundation’s Center of Advanced Materials for the Purification of Water with Systems.

Mariñas holds a B.S. in civil engi-neering from the Universidad Politecni-ca de Madrid, Spain, awarded in 1982; and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in sanitary and environmental engineering from the University of California at Berkeley, awarded in 1985 and 1989.

Since 1998, Mariñas has been an Arthur and Virginia Nauman Faculty Scholar. His other honors include the Harold Munson Outstanding Teacher Award (1992) and the Ross Judson Buck ’07 Outstanding Counselor Award (1992) from the School of Civil Engi-neering at Purdue. He was included on the University of Illinois’ Incomplete List of Teachers Ranked as Excellent by their Students five times. He was co-adviser to Qilin Li (MS 99, PhD 02), recipient of the 2003 Parsons Engi-neering Science Doctoral Thesis Award from the Association of Environmental Engineering and Science Professors.

An expert in air quality engineer-ing, Professor Mark J. Rood has been a faculty member in the department since 1986. He was the Coordinator of the Environmental Engineering and Sci-ence Program from 1999 to 2005.

Rood has taught “Environmental Quality Engineering,” “Air Quality Engineering,” and “Control of Air Pol-

lution from Stationary Sources.” His research interests include aerosol chemistry and physics, air quality control technol-ogy, and sustainability.

Rood holds three de-grees in environmental engineering: a B.S.E.S. from the Illinois Institute of Technology, awarded in 1978, and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from the Universi-ty of Washington, award-ed in 1982 and 1985.

He and his research group have been honored with the Anderson Con-sulting Advisor Award (1991, 1993, 1994, 1999); James M. Montgomery/AEEP Thesis Award (1992); Richard A. Glenn Best Paper Award by the American Chemical Society (1997); the Smolokowski Award during the 23rd Bi-ennial Conference on Carbon (1997); and the Montgomery-Watson-Harza/AEESP Thesis Award (2002). Rood is an Affiliate of UIUC’s Department of General Engineering (2004-present) and a member of the Environmental Engineering Committee of USEPA’s

Science Advisory Board (2003-present). He was Editor-in-Chief (2002-2004) and Associate Editor (1998-2002) of the American Society of Civil Engineers’ Journal of Environmental Engineering, an Associate Editor of Journal of Air & Waste Management Association (1994-2004), and Treasurer and Executive Board Member of the Association of Environmental Engineering Professors (1993-1995).c

Professor Benito J. Mariñas, third from left, with (from left) his wife, Yolanda Mariñas-Keliiaa, Professor Emeritus Judith Liebman and Professor Emeritus Jon Liebman.

Professor Mark J. Rood, fourth from left, with investiture guests (from left) niece Katie A. Dau, par-ents Shirley H. Rood and Ray J. Rood, wife Terri I. Medwed, and their son, Mike R. Rood.


John Cornelius Houbolt (BS 40, MS 42) received the honorary degree of Doctor of Engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) May 15 for his achievements in the fields of Aeronautical Science and Engineering.

Born April 10, 1919, in Altoona, Iowa, Houbolt spent his childhood in Joliet, Ill. After graduating from Joliet Junior College in 1938, he transferred to UIUC, receiving his B.S. in civil en-gineering in 1940. Under the direction of Professor Nathan M. Newmark,

Houbolt worked on his thesis, “The Ef-fectiveness of Vari-ous Arrangements of Reinforcement in Concrete Slabs” and received his M.S. degree in June 1942.

Soon after re-ceiving his gradu-ate degree he found a position at the National Advisory Com-mittee for Aero-nautics (NACA) at Langley Aeronau-tical Laboratory in Hampton, Va., the predecessor of NASA Langley Research Cen-ter. Houbolt was exempted from military service in World War II be-cause the govern-

ment considered his work in improving airplane performance a significant con-tribution to the war effort. From 1942 to 1960, Houbolt’s research at Langley

UIUC bestows honorary degree on CEE alum Houbolt

focused on problem areas of airplane performance, including flutter, gust loads, landing loads and acoustics. His contributions led to improved efficiency and safety of air travel. In 1956 Houbolt received a Rockefeller Study Award and spent 18 months at the Swiss Federal In-stitute of Technology at Zurich research-ing problems of high-speed flight. He re-ceived his doctoral degree in 1957.

By 1959 Houbolt had begun working with the Manned Space Laboratory Group to establish a space station in orbit. The objective was to design the station to enable contact with other satellites. He was able to successfully link two crafts in rendezvous simulation for the Rand Corporation.

On May 25, 1961, President Kennedy, in a speech to Congress, proposed landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth

by 1969. Many scientists and engineers doubted the feasibility of the President’s request, assuming the flight would involve a single large rocket flying to the moon and back, what NASA called “direct flight.” Houbolt, however, had other thoughts. Believing direct flight was impractical, Houbolt suggested two separate elements, the Lunar Orbit Rendezvous (LOR) and the Lunar Excursion Module (LEM). The two components would fly together to the vicinity of the moon, then LEM would separate and land on the moon with two astronauts while LOR would orbit the moon with one astronaut. On the return trip the two astronauts would leave the moon in LEM, rendevous with LOR, then return to earth. Houbolt demonstrated that considerable savings of fuel would result. Initially there was much opposition to Houbolt’s method, but after a two-year battle and heated discussions, it was announced on July 11, 1962, that Houbolt’s plan would be used for the mission to the moon.

In May 1963 Houbolt left NASA and took a position with the Aeronautical Research Association of Princeton, N.J., a distinguished consulting firm, where he continued his research on aircraft dynamics.

On July 20, 1969, he shared the excitement with others in Mission Control as they heard those famous words from the moon, “The Eagle has landed!” Two months later, Houbolt’s hometown of Joliet declared September 18 to be John Houbolt Day. In accepting the honor that day, he emphasized the collaborative nature of the moon landing.

In 1976, after 13 years in private practice, Houbolt returned to NASA as Chief Aeronautical Scientist, a position he held until his retirement in 1985.c

Some of Houbolt’s other honors:

College of Engineering Alumni Award for

Distinguished Service, UIUC, 1997

NASA Space Act Award for LOR Concept, 1983

Honorary Doctors Degree, Federal Institute of Technology at Zurich,

Switzerland, 1975

Distinguished Civil Engineering Alumnus Award, UIUC, 1969

NASA Exceptional

Scientific Achievement Award for Conception

and Development of LOR for Manned

Lunar Landing Mission, 1963

A street in the City of Joliet named Houbolt Road

John C. Houbolt, center, with (at left) Chancellor Richard H. Herman and University President B. Joseph White.


Former head’s gift contains centuries of CEE knowledge Professor Emeritus and former head

Jon C. Liebman this year donated his ex-tensive collection of historical civil and environmental textbooks to the depart-ment. The collection of approximately 400 books will be housed in a newly constructed display room on the third floor of Newmark Civil Engineering Laboratory and rotated in and out of a display case in the administrative area of the building. Liebman, who served on the department faculty from 1972 un-til his retirement in 1996, collected the books over a period of nearly 30 years.

“What got me intrigued initially was the history of my own field,” he says. “It was really fun to read some of the very early stuff in what was then called sani-tary engineering.”

An environmental engineer, Lieb-man joined the faculty in 1972 as a pro-fessor. He was named associate head in 1976, and served as department head from 1978 to 1984. He remained on the faculty until his retirement in 1996. His wife, Judith S. Liebman, had a joint

appointment on the faculties of Civil Engi-neering and Mechani-cal and Industrial En-gineering from 1972 to 1978, after which she joined the Department of Mechanical and In-dustrial Engineering full-time.

Over the years, Li-ebman acquired books from many sources. A number of CEE fac-ulty, as they retired, allowed him to select books from their personal libraries. Other books were added from public and university libraries that were cull-ing their collections, and many were purchased from dealers of used and rare books. Many were written by University of Illinois faculty members, and some of those are signed by the authors.

One notable selection is The Design of Steel Mill Buildings by Milo S. Ket-

chum, a professor of civil engineering who later became dean of engineering. It is in-scribed by the author to Ira O. Baker, who was his department head at the time the book was published in 1903. The oldest book in the group is Surveying Improv’d by Henry Wilson, published in 1731. The collection also includes the first civil

engineering text in the western world, An Elementary Course in Civil Engi-neering by M.I. Sganzin.

Liebman hopes the textbook collec-tion will be made available to anyone with an interest in the history of the field.

“I hope that occasionally there will be people who really want to refer to the stuff,” he says. “If you’re trying to do any-thing in history, there’s a lot there.”c

Dempseys establish endowment fund to benefit ATRELProfessor Emeritus Barry J. Dempsey

and his wife, Pauline, have made a last-ing contribution to the future of the Ad-vanced Transportation Research and En-gineering Laboratory (ATREL) with the establishment of the Barry J. and Pauline G. Dempsey ATREL Endowment Fund. The fund will generate income for unre-stricted support of research and opera-tions at ATREL.

Dempsey was the founding director of ATREL after its establishment in 1992. During his tenure, he helped to expand the facility and the scope of the research pursued there. He stepped down as direc-tor in August 2004. Pauline G. Dempsey was an undergraduate academic adviser in General Curriculum for four years and in the Department of Psychology for 23 years. The couple wanted to support the future of ATREL and the research con-

ducted there by the department’s trans-portation faculty, Dempsey said.

“ATREL is an extraordinary educa-tion and research facility for our students and the state of Illinois,” said Robert H. Dodds, Jr., professor and head. “The on-going research conducted there holds the promise to reduce the cost of upgrading and replacing our transportation infra-structure and to improve the daily lives of Illinois citizens by making transpor-tation safer and more convenient. Prof. Dempsey was instrumental in the found-ing of ATREL, and we are very grateful for his commitment to its continuing suc-cess with this gift.”

“Professor Dempsey’s long-term vi-sion to establish ATREL 13 years ago has tremendously helped the transportation program specifically and the department in general,” said ATREL Director Profes-

sor Imad Al-Qadi. “His support did not stop with his retirement two years ago; he is continuing his support and setting a new precedent by supporting ATREL through this generous endowment gift. I believe many of our alumni will follow in his footsteps.”

Dempsey remains active in the de-partment, doing research and working with graduate students.

Those who might wish to contribute to the Barry J. and Pauline G. Dempsey ATREL Endowment Fund may do so by contacting Marilyn Boland in the Department of Civil and Environ-mental Engineering, (217) 333-5120, [email protected]. A bronze plaque will be placed in a prominent location at ATREL, and those making a major contribution to this endowment will be recognized for their support.c



International Association of Hydraulic Research, and the Einstein Award, Hilgard Prize and Stevens Award from the American Society of Civil Engi-neers. In 1991 he also received the University of Minnesota In-stitute of Technology Outstand-ing Teacher Award.

Parker’s research interests are centered in three areas; river mechanics and morphology, river engineering, and the dynamics and deposits of turbidity currents and submarine debris flows in the ocean. In addi-tion to numerous journal articles, he has written an e-book, “1D Sediment Transport Morphodynamics with Applica-tions to Rivers and Turbidity Currents,” which is download-able at: http://www.cee.uiuc.edu/people/parkerg/morphody-namics_e-book-htm.

Parker will teach undergraduate and graduate courses in flu-id mechanics, river engineering, sediment transport and stream restoration. He lives in Mahomet with his wife, Nid.c

New Faculty

Murugesu Sivapalan

Gary Parker

Professor Murugesu Sivapalan joined the faculty of the En-vironmental Hydrology and Hydraulic Engineering group this summer. Hired as part of the University’s new multi-disciplinary research initiative, the Center for Water as a Complex Environ-mental System, he holds a 25 percent appointment in the Depart-ment of Civil and Environmental Engineering and a 75 percent appointment in the Department of Geography.

Sivapalan holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Ceylon, Peradeniya (1975), a master’s degree in Water Resources Engineering from the Asian Institute of Technology, Bangkok (1977), and a master’s degree (1983) and Ph.D. (1986) in civil engineering from Princeton University. He comes to UIUC from the University of Western Australia, where he was a professor in the Centre for Water Research. During the course of his career, he also has been an instructor in civil engineering at the Univer-sity of Sri Lanka, a research associate at both the Asian Institute of Technology and Princeton University, and a geotechnical engi-neer with a consulting company in Nigeria, West Africa.

An expert in surface hydrology, Sivapalan’s special focus is making predictions in ungaged catchments, geographical areas which collect rain water and channel them to rivers and streams. Most of the world’s catchments are ungaged, meaning that

measurements of the stream flow are not available, and there-fore predictions of floods and droughts are extremely difficult. Sivapalan’s work eluci-dates natural fluctua-tions in stream flow in gaged locations, and then tries to extrapo-late to ungaged sites. Such understanding is important to properly design water supply plans and flood control structures.

Sivapalan will teach graduate and undergraduate courses in hydrological variability, integrated watershed modeling, and wa-tersheds as complex systems.

He lives in Champaign with his wife, Banumathy, and their son Kavin, 18, a freshman at UIUC. Another son, Mayuran, 23, is completing his college degree in Australia this year.c

Professor Gary Parker joined the Environmental Hydrol-ogy and Hydraulic Engineering group this summer. Hired as part of the University’s new multi-disciplinary research initiative, the Center for Water as a Complex Environmental System, he holds a 75 percent appointment in the Depart-ment of Civil and Environmental Engineering and a 25 per-cent appointment in the Department of Geology, where he is the W.H. Johnson Professor of Geology.

Parker received a B.S. from the Department of Mechanics and Materials Science of Johns Hopkins University (1971) and a Ph.D. from the Department of Civil Engineering of the Uni-versity of Minnesota (1974). Before coming to UIUC, Parker was an Institute of Technology Distinguished Professor in the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Minne-sota. During the period 1995-1999 he also served as Director of the St. Anthony Falls Laboratory, a water resources/fluid mechanics laboratory in the same department.

Parker was elected a Fellow of the American Geophysi-cal Union in 2003, and received the G.K. Warren Award in Fluviatile Geomorphology in 2002. He has received the Schoemaker Award twice and the Ippen Award from the


New Faculty

Assistant Professor Junho Song joined the department this summer as a member of the structures faculty. He holds B.S. (1996) and M.S. (1999) degrees in civil engineering from Seoul National University in Korea and a Ph.D. (2004) in civil and environmental engineering from the University of California, Berkeley.

Before coming to Illinois, Song worked in private prac-tice as a senior vulnerability engineer for Risk Management Solutions Inc. developing hurricane damage models. He has research interests in structural reliability, performance and reliability of complex systems, and random vibrations with applications to earthquake engineering and infrastructure systems subjected to natural and man-made hazards. His awards include the Outstanding Graduate Student Instruc-tor Award (2003-2004) of the GSI Teaching & Resource Center, UC Berkeley, which he received in recognition of development and installment of a new course on analysis of civil engineering data.

Two of Song’s former advisers are department alumni: Professor Hyun-Moo Koh (PhD 86) at Seoul National Uni-

The new Deputy Director of the Mid-America Earth-quake Center (MAE Center) is Professor Jerome F. Haj-jar, who joined the structures faculty in August as a Nar-bey Khachaturian Faculty Scholar. Hajjar holds a B.S. in Engineering Mechanics from Yale University (1982), and an M.S. (1985) and Ph.D. (1988) in structural engineer-ing from Cornell University.

Previously a structural engineer and associate at Skid-more Owings & Merrill from 1988 to 1992, Hajjar was a professor of civil engineering at the University of Minne-sota from 1992 to 2005. There he participated in build-ing and commissioning that university’s equipment facil-ity for the National Science Foundation’s Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation (NEES).

Hajjar’s research interests are in computational analy-sis, experimental testing, and design of steel and compos-ite steel/reinforced concrete structures. He serves on the American Institute of Steel Construction (AISC) Speci-fication Task Committees on Composite Construction; Stability; and Loads, Analysis, and Systems, for which he is vice-chair. His awards include the 2000 Ameri-can Society of Civil Engineers’ (ASCE) Norman Medal and the 2005 AISC T. R. Higgins Lectureship Award

Junho Song

Jerome F. Hajjar

for his research on steel and composite construction.

Hajjar will teach u n d e r g r a d u a t e courses in the de-sign of steel struc-tures and struc-tural analysis, and graduate courses in structural dynam-ics, advanced steel design and non-linear analysis of frame structures. In his position on the MAE Center leadership team, he will assume a major role in the inte-grated plan for consequence-based risk management of the Center. He also will coordinate the Center’s Engi-neering Engines thrust and serve as an investigator on the Advanced Simulation Tools project.

He lives in Champaign with his wife, Lauren K. Taaffe, Director of Foundation Relations in the University’s Office of Campus Development, and their daughter, Sophia.c

versity, and Profes-sor Armen Der Ki-ureghian (PhD 76) at UC Berkeley. This connection played a part in attracting Song to the depart-ment.

“I heard of this excellent department and its faculty and students,” he says.

Song will teach graduate and under-graduate courses in the areas of engineering risk and uncertainty, decision and risk analysis, structural reliability, system reliability, random vibra-tions, and probabilistic loads on structures.

He lives in Champaign with his wife, Heewon, and their daughter, Youngseo, 1.c


the collection pro-cess, reason about the collected infor-mation, and identify deviations and con-struction defects.

Boukamp is currently teaching Construction Cost Analysis and Esti-mates, a course for undergraduates and graduate students, and plans to develop a course on some aspect of information technology and sym-bolic modeling in construction.

He lives in Champaign with his wife, Sabine, and their son, Bjorn, 2. Sabine is a civil engineer with a Pittsburgh-based engineering and energy services company.c

New Faculty

Yanfeng Ouyang

Frank Boukamp

The newest member of the construction management team is visiting lecturer Frank Boukamp, who joined the department in August. He holds bachelor’s and master’s de-grees in civil engineering from Bauhaus-Universität Weimar in Germany and in October earned his Ph.D. in Computer Aided Civil Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh.

Boukamp’s professional interests lie in the use of informa-tion technology to help improve efficiency, safety and quality on construction sites. His thesis, “Modeling of and Reason-ing about Construction Specification for Automated Defect Detection” focused on the development of an automated sys-tem to detect defects in a construction project. Using com-puter models that incorporate data collected on a con-struction site with various reality capturing technolo-gies, for example laser scanners and embedded sensors, as well as the thousands of product and process speci-fications that must be considered for any given project, the system helps people collect information, manage

a student earns true distinction through research or teach-ing. Ouyang re-ceived the honor for exemplary research in the areas of lo-gistics, and traffic and infrastructure management. Ouy-ang’s other awards include an Out-standing Graduate Student Instructor Award from UC Berkeley in 2004 and several national-level governmental awards in China.

He is currently teaching the undergraduate course Trans-portation Engineering and plans to teach graduate courses on logistics systems, networks, and infrastructure system management.c

Assistant Professor Yanfeng Ouyang joined the trans-portation engineering group in August. Ouyang holds a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering with honors from Tsin-ghua University (2000), a master’s degree in transportation engineering from the University of Washington (2001), and another master’s degree in industrial engineering and opera-tions research from the University of California at Berkeley (2005). He earned his Ph.D. in civil engineering from UC Berkeley in 2005.

Ouyang’s research interests focus on the stability and ef-ficiency of transportation systems and include such topics as transportation and supply network operations, logistics sys-tem design, infrastructure system management, transporta-tion safety and traffic operations. His thesis was entitled Sys-tem-Level Stability and Optimality of Decentralized Supply Networks.

Earlier this year, Ouyang received the 2005 Gordon Newell Award from the Institute of Transportation Studies at the University of California at Berkeley. The Newell award is not given annually but is reserved for instances in which


Distinguished Alumnus Award This award recognizes professional accomplishments or unique

contributions to society of civil engineering graduates. Recipient will have distinguished themselves by outstanding leadership in the planning and direction of engineering work, by administration of major engineering work, by contributing to knowledge in the field of civil engineering, by fostering the development of young engineers, or by uniquely contributing to society. They should be dedicated to the ideals of the profession as evidenced by their contributions to the recognition and promotion of civil engineering activities and professional organizations. CEEAA board members are ineligible until lat least two years after their terms have ended. UIUC faculty members are ineligible for at least two years after ending their faculty status.

Young Alumnus Achievement Award This award recognizes a graduate who has received their most

recent degree from the University within the past 10 years, with special consideration for those 35 or younger. Recipients shall have distinguished themselves in their fields of endeavor and achieved a level of accomplishment significantly greater than that of other recent graduates. Recipients shall have demonstrated one or more of the following: outstanding technical advancement or achievement; design innovation and excellence; enhancement of civil and environmental engineering education; outstanding leadership resulting in significant accomplishments; exemplary service to the profession. Consideration is given to volunteer activities in civic, religious or charitable groups and organizations.

Call for award nominationsIf you know of a deserving colleague who graduated from CEE, please request a nomination form for the Distinguished

Alumnus Award or the Young Civil Engineering Achievement Award from Carla Blue, Program Coordinator, 1117 Newmark Lab, 205 N. Mathews Ave., Urbana, IL 61801; fax 217-333-9464, [email protected]. You must fill out the nomination form, but we will assist you as needed. Please make sure you make a clear case for the professional achievements and contributions of your nominee. A nominee will be considered for the award when the nomination form is completed and returned by the nominator. Criteria for the awards are as follows:

New Faculty

Nancy Gavlin

Department alumna Nancy L. Gav-lin joined the department in August as a visiting lecturer in the structures area. Gavlin holds a B.S. with Highest Hon-ors in civil engineering from UIUC, awarded in 1976, and an M.S. in struc-tural engineering from the University of California at Berkeley, awarded in 1977.

She comes to UIUC from Skid-more, Owings & Merrill, a consulting engineering firm in Chicago, where she worked as a structural engineer on a variety of projects related to building analysis and design. During her career, Gavlin also has worked as a private con-sultant and was co-founder and partner of Gavlin & Reckers Structural Engi-neers in Chicago. From 1993 to 1994, she was a visiting lecturer in the depart-ment and during that same academic year taught as an adjunct assistant pro-

the Illinois Department of Professional Regulation Structural Engineers Li-censing Board. She has served on the Civil and Environmental Engineering Alumni Association Board or Directors and in 2005 received the University of Illinois Alumni Association Distin-guished Alumnus Award.c

fessor in the University of Illinois at Chicago’s Department of Architecture.

Gavlin will teach undergraduate and graduate courses in structural design, including Structural Systems Design, the senior design course she is currently teaching. The course helps seniors syn-thesize what they have learned in other undergraduate classes and apply their knowledge to practical design challeng-es, Gavlin says.

“The theoretical background they learn from the professors here is ex-tremely important, but at the same time the students should have some ad-ditional knowledge of what they’re go-ing to be facing as designers in the real world,” she says.

Gavlin’s professional affiliations in-clude serving as Past President of the Structural Engineers Association of Illinois. She currently is a member of


Department News

Won-Young Ahn, a student of Professor Mark Clark, in August received a Student Paper Award at the International Congress on Membranes and Membrane Processes 2005 in Seoul, Korea, for the paper, “Prepa-ration of a Porous Polymer Adsorbent and its Effect on Membrane Fouling by NOM.”

Associate Professor William G. Buttlar of the transportation engineering group has been appointed a Narbey Khachatu-rian Faculty Scholar. The Narbey Kha-chaturian Faculty Scholars program was established to recognize and support out-standing young faculty in the department. Professor Emeritus Narbey Khachaturian retired in 1989 following many years of distinguished service on the faculty. He maintained the highest standards of excel-lence in teaching, research and professional service. The Narbey Khachaturian Faculty Scholars program is made possible by the generous support of his son, Jon Khachatu-rian (BS 78), a graduate of CEE and found-er of Versabar Inc. of Belle Chasse, La.

Assistant Professor Ximing Cai of the de-partment’s Environmental Hydrology and Hydraulic Engineering group received the Best Paper Award for 2002 of Water Inter-national, the journal of the International Water Resources Association (IWRA). The title of the paper is “Global Water Demand and Supply Projections,” by Ximing Cai and Mark W. Rosegrant, Part 1 and Part 2. The IWRA called the paper “a significant milestone in the understanding of global water supply and demand and their projec-tions to 2025.” The award was presented at the 12th World Water Congress November 22-25 in New Delhi, India.

Professor Sam Carpenter was named a Chapter Honor Member for the Chi Ep-silon student chapter at Texas A&M Uni-versity.

Professor Mark Clark delivered the key-note lecture at the symposium, “Water and Wastewater Treatment and Reuse,” October 11 at the China/U.S./Japan Joint Chemical Engineering Conference in Bei-jing. Clark’s talk was entitled “Adsorption of Micropollutants and Membrane Fou-

lants by Micropo-rous Polymer Par-ticles and Polymer Aggregates.” It was a review of work by Clark’s research group and others on removing nanogram per liter amounts of hor-mones and other endocrine disrup-tors from wastewater and removing mem-brane foulants from water supplies treated with reverse osmosis and other membrane technologies. Endocrine disruptors are a new classification of trace chemicals that are suspected of disrupting hormone sys-tems and reproduction in humans, ani-mals and amphibians. Clark’s group has developed and patented a new material for capturing pollutants and foulants made of a polymer called polysulfone.

Professor and Head Robert H. Dodds, Jr., was elected an Honorary Fellow of the International Congress on Fracture (ICF) at the 11th quadrennial meeting in Tu-rin, Italy. Membership of this 40-year-old organization comprises several thousand of the leading researchers in fracture and fatigue. The total number of living Hon-orary Fellows is limited to 50 worldwide. Election as an Honorary Fellow recognizes Dodds’ contributions in research leading to improved understanding in the fracture mechanics of structural metals and for his international leadership in research and education on fracture mechanics. The ICF is the premier international body for pro-motion of worldwide cooperation among scientists and engineers concerned with the mechanics and mechanisms of fracture, fa-tigue and strength of solids.

Professor Marcelo H. García of the Envi-ronmental Hydrology and Hydraulic En-gineering group was elected a Correspond-ing Member of the National Academy of Engineering of Argentina. García holds the Chester and Helen Siess Professorship. The Argentine Academy of Engineering was founded in 1970 by initiative of the Argentine Center of Engineers, fulfilling a

longstanding desire of Argentine engineers. Election to membership in the Argentine Academy requires “outstanding perfor-mance in scientific or technical research and an excellent public reputation.”

Associate Professor Youssef Hashash was one of 88 young engineers selected to participate in the National Academy of Engineering’s 11th annual Frontiers of En-gineering symposium, held in Niscayuna, N.Y., in September. The three-day event brought together engineers ages 30 to 45 who are performing cutting-edge engineer-ing research and technical work in a variety of disciplines. The participants, who came from industry, academia and government, were nominated by fellow engineers or organizations and chosen from 220 appli-cants. The purpose of the event is to en-courage collaboration among promising young engineers from various fields. Ha-shash also was selected as a National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA)/UIUC Faculty Fellow. His project entitled “Large scale numerical simulations via re-configurable computing hardware: an ap-plication using discrete element modeling of granular material” will be supported by the NCSA/UIUC Faculty Fellows Pro-gram for the 2005-06 academic year.

Associate Professor Barbara Minsker of the Environmental Engineering and Sci-ence group was selected to receive the Out-standing Achievement Award by the Envi-ronmental & Water Resources Institute of the American Society of Civil Engineers. The award acknowledges exceptional per-formance of an important task or series of activities over a short period of time that advances the work of the water resources planning and management profession. Minsker was cited “for effort and leader-ship in the creation and subsequently as the driving force and chair of the successful Task Committee on Long-Term Ground-water Monitoring and its exceptional re-port “Long-Term Groundwater Monitor-ing Design: The State of the Art.”

Tias Paul, a graduate student in Assistant Professor Timothy Strathmann’s research group, won an award for the best graduate


Staff SpotlightStaff Spotlight

Sheree WaltzHuman Resources Coordinator

One of Sheree Waltz’s responsibili-ties as Human Resources Coordinator is, as she puts it, making sure people get paid. This isn’t anywhere near as easy as it sounds, given the department’s di-verse work force of academic profession-als, civil service staff, graduate research assistants, visiting international schol-ars and academic hourlies. Fortunately, after eight years on the department staff and 16 with UIUC, Waltz has become well-versed in the complexities of the University system.

“I’m the answer woman,” she says. “I know a lot about policies and proce-dures on campus.”

Putting that knowledge to work on behalf of the hundreds of people who keep the department going every day is all in a day’s work for Waltz. Visitors to her office, no matter how vexing their payroll issue, will get a laugh right away from the Far Side cartoon she routinely has hanging on her door. She hangs a new one each month. If first impres-sions really are everything, the cartoon-

of-the-month conveys a sense of humor and an appreciation of the absurd that must come in handy when navigating the quirks of a large bureaucracy.

Even while buried in forms and regulations, Waltz appreciates the hu-man aspect of her job. One of her most rewarding duties, she says, is working with graduate students, particularly those from other countries. For many of these, Waltz’s office is one of the first stops they make after arriving at Illi-nois.

“When the international students come in, they’re hesitant, and then with-in a couple of weeks they may come back into my office for something and I just see them totally assimilated,” she says.

A lifelong resident of Illinois, Waltz now lives in rural Metcalf, a small town about 45 miles southeast of Urbana, with her husband, Kent, a corn and soybean farmer. They have two grown children: Lisa, who lives in Blooming-ton, Ill., and David, who lives in Sul-livan, Ill.c

student presentation at the 28th Midwest Environmental Chemistry Workshop held in Evanston, Ill., in October. The title of her presentation was “Ciprofloxacin Degra-dation using UV- and Visible Light-Medi-ated TiO2 Photocatalysis.” Tias’ research is supported by the Center for Advanced Materials for the Purification of Water with Systems (CAMPWS).

Professor Bill F. Spencer, Jr., has been elected as a Foreign Member of the Polish Academy of Sciences by the members of the Academy in the Division of Engineering Sci-ences. The five elected foreign members this year include distinguished engineers and scientists from the University of California at Berkeley, UIUC and Europe. The Pol-ish Academy of Sciences is a state scientific institution founded in 1952. It functions as a learned society acting through an elected corporation of top scholars and research or-ganizations, via its numerous scientific es-tablishments. It has also become the major scientific advisory body in Poland through its scientific committees.

Professor Leslie J. Struble has been selected to receive the Award of Mer-it by the Ameri-can Society for Testing and Ma-terials (ASTM). The title of Fellow in ASTM Inter-national accom-panies the award.

The Award of Merit was established in 1949 by the ASTM Board of Directors and is the highest society award granted to an individual member for distinguished ser-vice and for outstanding participation in ASTM committee activities. In selecting Struble for this award, ASTM Committee C09 on Concrete and Concrete Aggregates cites her contributions to developing and advancing concrete and concrete materials standards that benefit the industry. Struble serves as chair of Committee C01.99/C09.99 on Research and as an Associate Editor for the Journal of ASTM Interna-tional. She has been previously honored by ASTM with the 2003 Sanford E. Thomp-son Award for an outstanding technical paper and with Honorary Member Awards for Committee C01 and Committee C09.


Alumni News

Generations of Boy Scouts will enjoy camping in the mountains of Southern California thanks to CEE alumnus Nick Pokrajac (BS 40). Below, Pokrajac and his wife, Addie, of Monrovia, Calif., pose before a plaque honoring him for his work in establishing, building and improving Camp Trask, a local Boy Scout camp.

As an active member of Rotary In-ternational, an organization of business and professional leaders that provides humanitarian service, Pokrajac has been the driving force behind the camp since the early 1980s. At that time, he stepped in to complete the camp’s administration building when the local Boy Scout orga-nization ran out of funds. Since then,

Pokrajac has devoted his time and talents to upgrading the camp, drawing in fellow Rotarians to help with a variety of proj-ects. These have included construction of a lake for boating and fishing; rifle and archery ranges; a dining hall; a kitchen; a bathroom; shower rooms; an amphithe-ater; a swimming pool; a bridge; and a life-sized western fort. Pokrajac’s work at Camp Trask was featured this summer in Rotary Corner, a column in The Arcadia Weekly by Joe Miller.

Pokrajac, 90, spent his career in California as a contractor specializing in building schools. He and Addie have two sons, Nick and John. The Pokrajacs are longtime supporters of the department, having made several significant gifts in support of student fellowships.

Boy Scouts benefitfrom alumnus’ work

1960sAnthony E. Fio-rato (MS 68, PhD 71), president and CEO of CTLGroup in Skokie, Ill., is vice chairman of ASTM Internation-al’s board of direc-tors.

Donald Oglesby (BS 63, MS 65) of Springfield, Ill., marked his 50th anniversary of ser-vice to Hanson, a national consulting firm.

Stanley T. Rolfe (BS 56, MS 58, PhD 62), Alfred P. Learned Distin-guished Professor of Civil and Environ-mental Engineering at the University of Kansas, received the Lifetime Achieve-ment Award from the American In-stitute of Steel Construction for his engineering contributions and his work in fracture mechanics.

1970sMichael Matzke (BS 75) of Spring-field, Ill., marked his 30th year of ser-vice to Hanson, a national consulting firm.

James K. Wight (PhD 73) was ap-pointed the Frank E. Richart Jr. Col-legiate Professor of Civil Engineering

at the University of Michigan. The professorship was named in honor of Professor Bill Rich-art, who held B.S., M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Il-linois and was a former Chair of the Department of Civil Engineering at Michigan. His father, F.E. Rich-art, was a famous professor at UIUC.

1980s

Keith Meyer (BS 82, MS 83) and his business partner, Ken Taylor, have launched an execu-tive consulting firm in Chicago, Taylor Meyer Associates.

Tim Tappendorf (BS 80) was recog-nized by Crawford, Murphy & Tilly Inc. Consulting Engineers for 25 years of service with the firm. He is co-manager of CMT’s St. Louis office and manager of the St. Louis Water and Wastewater Group. The focus of his career has been on wastewater, drink-ing water and storm water projects.

1990sPaul Eickenberg (BS 96, MS 97) was named Minnesota Young Engineer of the Year. A high-way and municipal engineer for SRF Consulting Group in Minneapolis, he is an adjunct professor at the University of Minnesota.

Rick Powell (BS 91, MS 92) of IDOT was featured in the cover article of the August 2005 issue of “Public Works” magazine, for his in-volvement in several highway engineering projects in Kendall County, Ill., the fast-est growing county in the U.S.

Andrew W. Richard-son (BS 78) was elected pres-ident of the American Water Works A ssoc iat ion (AWWA) at the organiza-tion’s annual conference June 15. Richardson is a principal with Greeley and Hansen based in the firm’s Phoenix, Ariz., of-fice. He will serve a one-year term as AWWA president.

Richardson and nearly 100 oth-er association members traveled to Washington, D.C., this summer for AWWA’s fourth annual “Water Mat-ters! Fly-In.” Members visited more than 300 congressional offices to discuss major issues facing the water industry. The key issue identified by AWWA was the need for Congress to invest in water infrastructure and security.

In assuming the presidency of the 57,000-member organization, Rich-ardson follows in the footsteps of his father and fellow CEE alumnus, the late William H. Richardson (BS 52), who served as AWWA president in 1984.

Richardson elected president of American Water Works Assoc.

Keith Meyer


Obituaries

There’s an easier way.

To a student making tough decisions about classes,

internships and job opportunities, an

alumni mentor can make all the difference.

The Alumni/Student Mentor Pro-gram needs volunteers willing to guide and advise students as they develop professionally and prepare for careers in civil and environ-mental engineering. Mentors and students are matched according to their professional interests.

It takes only a couple of hours a month

to mentor a student.

For more information,visit cee.uiuc.edu/alumni/mentor

or contact Carla Blue, Program Coordinator,

(217) 333-8691, [email protected]

Mark A. Baxter (BS 75) died May 30. He joined SMU Cox in 2001 and was director of the Maguire Energy Institute. Baxter was a registered profes-sional engineer in Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Ohio and Texas.

Donald M. Carlson (BS 60) died January 5 in Cheektowaga, N.Y. Carlson served with a Navy con-struction battalion during the Korean War and later was an engineer with Nuss-baumer & Clarke, Stetson-Harza of Columbus, Ohio, and URS Corp. He was also head civil engineer at Acres American.

Donald N. Cor-tright (BS 39), professor emeritus of civil engineering at the University of Michigan, died June 11 at age 91. Cor-tright was a director of the University’s surveying and geol-ogy Camp Davis in Jackson Hole, Wyo.

Thomas P. Delaney (BS 84, MS 85) died June 18 at age 44. A structural engineer, Delaney worked most recently for Montgomery Watson Harza in Cleveland, Ohio. He volun-teered in the Big Brothers Big Sisters organization and as a mentor with inner-city Cleveland youth. Richard W. El-dredge (BS 50)

died May 28 at age 78. Registered in 16 states as a pro-fessional engineer, Eldredge was known as the father of the modern landfill. In 1996 the Solid Waste Association of North America awarded him their Lifetime Membership Award.

Norman C. Emer-ick (BS 49, MS 50) died November 6, 2004, in Seattle. He founded Norman C. Emerick Inc., a consulting engineer-ing firm.He was a veteran of World War II.

Joseph W. Ganci (BS 60) died Sep-tember 10, 2004, in Springfield, Ill. A Korean War vet-eran, Ganci served 35 years as a civil engineer for the Il-linois Department of Transportation.

Robert C. Hiero-nymus (BS 36) died May 12 at age 90. The 1936 winner of the Ira O. Baker Prize, he spent his career at Union Carbide Corporation and retired in 1978. He played the flute with the Charleston Symphony from 1936 until 1941. He was an active civic volunteer, serving on the boards of a num-ber of Charleston or-ganizations. He was dean of the business school of the Uni-versity of Charleston from 1979 to 1980.John C. Holmquest (BS 60) died Feb. 25 in Pima, Ariz. He

was a Korean War veteran and a retired principal engineer at Valmont Electric in El Paso, Texas.

Barbara L. Schmidt Hornkohl (BS 48) died in January 2005 in Chicago.

John Langas (BS 51) died November 1, 2004, in River-woods, Ill. Founder and president of Ka-min & Langas Inc. Steel Erectors, he built buildings and bridges throughout the Chicago area.

George Yan-Chok Leung (BS 55) died December 4, 2004. Born in China, Leung earned de-grees from UIUC and the Massachu-setts Institute of Technology. From 1967 until his retire-ment in 2003, he was a physicist and professor of physics at the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth.

Arnold A. Mazzucco (BS 42) died July 15, 2004, in Joliet, Ill.

Cyril A. Milens (BS 33), of Prairie Vil-lage, Kan., died June 15.

Henry C. Norcom Sr. (BS 61) died Feb. 10 in Clifton, Va. A civil engineer for the federal government, he retired from the U.S. Army as a lieu-tenant colonel after serving for 28 years, including during the Korean and Vietnam wars.

Frank Novotny Jr. (BS 36) died in June 2005 at age 91. He was the founder of Frank Novotny and Associates, where he worked until he was 88 years old.

Thomas Sancken (BS 81) died at home in Marseilles, Ill., on May 23 at age 47.

Howard E. Schwark (BS 42) died April 27 at age 87. He served as Kankakee County superinten-dent of highways from 1952 to 1982, when he retired. Active in the com-munity, Schwark served as president of the Kankakee Park District board and was a former direc-tor of the Kankakee Chamber of Com-merce.

Edward E. Varnum (BS 35, MS 36) died in July 2004 in Colorado Springs, Colo.

Douglas N. Whit-lock (BS 03) of Springfield, Ill., died May 23 of inju-ries sustained in a traffic accident. A project engineer at Structural Rub-ber Products Co., he was a member of the American Society of Civil Engineers, Illinois Society of Professional Engi-neers, and a lifetime member of Knox Knolls Free Method-ist Church, where he served as trea-surer, Bible quiz coach and worship leader.


just a few of the social events that have al-ready been planned, and several service events are being lined up for the holidays. The speaker at our first general meeting gave a presentation on the structural analysis of the collapse of the World Trade Center and how building codes can be improved to make future buildings safer. We welcome any in-volvement from alumni who might want to serve as mentors, present resources for em-ployment opportunities, sponsor events or speak at one of our general meetings. Please email Steve Spradau, Chi Epsilon president, at [email protected]. –Thomas Janicke, Secretary

The student chapter of the Earthquake Engineers Research Institute (EERI) organizes seminars and disseminates in-formation and summary reports from previous conferences on earthquake engi-neering held at the University of Illinois. Visit the EERI website at https://netfiles.uiuc.edu/ro/www/EarthquakeEngineerin-gResearchInstituteStudentChapter/–Ab-dolreza Osouli, President

Engineers Without Borders at U of I is now entering its third year of existence. With the culmination of our flagship proj-ect in India this summer, we continue to expand into the community and the inter-national scene. In May we sent five stu-dents back to the Indian village of Bada-kamandra where they implemented a year-and-a-half of research and design, install-ing a biodiesel generator and several other income-generating applications. Our three new international projects include research for cooking stove monitoring devices in Central America, continued work on pedal power generators near Mumbai, India, and a new water hydrology and storage project in the state of Enugu, Nigeria. On cam-pus, our fundraising teams are working hard to secure grants and awards to ensure the financial stability of our organization and our projects. We have brought several guest speakers to campus. We welcome in-volvement from alumni and faculty. Please visit our website at www.uiuc.edu/ro/ewb or contact [email protected]. –Jessica Koschmeder, President

The Institute of Transportation Engi-neers (ITE) has a busy semester ahead, with a wide range of events planned. ITE has already participated in Engineers’

Night, an informal gathering to encourage entering freshmen and transfer students to get involved at U of I. The ITE annual golf outing was held October 19 during the An-nual Illinois Traffic Engineering and Safety Conference. ITE has also scheduled three general meetings for this semester with guest speakers. We are also planning field trips to transportation-related sites, social activities and community service projects. Visit our web site at http://www.cee.uiuc.edu/groups/ite/ or email the society at [email protected]. –Riley Edwards, President

The student chapter of the Structural Engineers Association provides an en-vironment for students to gain a better understanding of structural engineering outside of the classroom. At our meetings, engineers speak about projects they have worked on and experiences they have had throughout their careers. These meetings are invaluable in conveying a sense of mean-ing and purpose to the material we learn in the classroom. Project topics range from structural failure and forensic engineering to more traditional design-based engineer-ing. We strive to attain speakers who have worked on unique projects in order to ex-pose our members to aspects of structural engineering they may have never consid-ered. –Noah Fehrenbacher, President

The UIUC section of the Society of Wom-en Engineers is planning to start an annual Alumnae Reunion Banquet to be held every fall in Champaign-Urbana. Currently, we send an Alumnae Newsletter semi-annu-ally. Please visit http://webspace.ncsa.uiuc.edu/swe/alumni.html to view the Spring Newsletter and see what our UIUC section is currently up to. Feel free to contact me at [email protected]. –Laura Gawinski, Alumnae Relations Director.

The purpose of the student chapter of the Water Environment Association is to pro-mote student interest in the environment and to provide an avenue for the exchange of information and ideas between students and members in both the Member Associa-tion serving their geographical area and the Water Environment Federation. We fea-ture monthly speakers and panels and are seeking opportunities for industry and job tours for the organization. For more infor-mation please contact me at [email protected]. –Joe Good, President

The American Concrete Institute (ACI) encourages student interest in the study of concrete materials, structures, and construc-tion and develops an awareness of the mis-sion and the work of ACI International. We participate in ACI International Conven-tions through student competitions, com-mittee involvement, and technical presen-tations. We also host invited speakers each semester and provide a forum for students to present their research. This year we will again be helping Engineering Open House (EOH) attendees create personalized mor-tar coasters and directing the high-strength concrete cylinder competition. We encour-age alumni with ties to either ACI or the concrete construction industry to let us know if they have an interest in speaking at our meetings or an idea for field trips. Check out our website at http://www.cee.uiuc.edu/groups/aci/ for contacts and more information. –Zach Grasley, PresidentThe student chapter of the American So-ciety of Civil Engineers (ASCE) will of-fer many events, including the Steel Bridge Competition, the Concrete Canoe Competi-tion, and Engineering Open House. Small-er scale events include general meetings, in-tramural sports, Crane Bay Cinema, social activities, and field trips. This fall ASCE is planning a field trip to several buildings and construction sites in Chicago and St. Louis. We are always interested in collaborating with alumni for field trips or speakers at our general meetings. Please visit our website at http://www.uiuc.edu/~asce. –Derek Jacobs, President

Chi Epsilon officers are busy planning so-cial activities, service activities, and general meetings. Playing softball, cooking out at the park, and watching a hockey game are

Student Organizations


a lot of research on his background in an attempt to adequately introduce him as the speaker. I made the mistake of memorizing this rather than reading from notes. In speaking to the student body, I was concentrating so hard on his history that when it came time to say Professor Shedd’s name, I had what today I would call a senior moment. I could not come up with it. After a few seconds that seemed like an eternity to me, Professor Shedd gave me a knowing look and a lighthearted laugh, which the student body joined in, and my head cleared. One of life’s most embarrassing moments salvaged by a fine man.

I thought the entire Civil Engineering faculty and staff at that time was superb, as I believe they must be now. It was the best of times. The entire University faculty and staff were up to the task of handling a tremendous jump in enrollment at the end of World War II and the problems of service men and women trying to get back in the college education groove. In my first year out of the service I was flunking calculus, thus my desire for an engineering education was in question. I was referred to Lucretia Levy in the mathematics

Former student organization presidents:

Where are they now?

When I graduated, I went to work in the construction and mining business with Peter Kiewit Sons Inc. and worked there 38 years until my retirement as an officer of the corporation. Some of my experience was in bidding on and building large earth fill dams. I referred to my text and notes from Professor Ralph Peck and Professor Walt Hanson many times. Their classes were great in every way I can measure.

I also had the benefit of their knowledge in their consulting work to the owners of these large dams, such as the Portage Mountain Dam (since renamed the WAC Bennett Dam) for British Columbia Hydro on the Peace River in northern British Columbia. Professors Peck and Hanson, through their knowledge and manner, brought deserved credit to the University wherever they worked.

I believe it was the year I served as President of the student chapter ASCE that I had classes under Professor Thomas Clark Shedd. I was enthralled by his knowledge of private industry as well as the academic field. He consented to my request for him to make a presentation to the entire Civil Engineering student body on the private business world. I did

department. She, like many other faculty members throughout the campus, was conducting evening and weekend special sessions to try to help us. In three evening sessions she unlocked my brain. I never had any more trouble with calculus. She was magical and wonderful. Since that experience I have needed no convincing on the importance of a good teacher.

I was born and raised in an environment I cherish in the small town of Ludlow, approximately 25 miles north of the Champaign-Urbana campus. After the war, I married Joan Archer from the nearby town of Paxton, whom I had known since childhood. During her life she was the primary factor in my pursuit of an education at Illinois and my ability to use it in a large part of the world.

I have remarried, and Carol and I live in Omaha, Neb., part of the year, not far from Kiewit corporate headquarters, and the other part in Hawaii. c

By Wendall Lee Rowe (BS 49)RetiredFormer president of Chi Epsilon student chapter

Confirmed presentations include:aRebuilding New Orleans, Jon Khachaturian, Versabar Inc.aFoundations for the World’s Tallest Buildings, Clyde Baker, STS ConsultantsaSelling Value of Structural Engineering, Jon Magnusson of Magnusson and KlemencicaStability Analyses, Shankar Nair, Teng and AssociatesaSeismic Assessment of Major River Crossings, Mark Capron, Jacobs CivilaHealth Monitoring of Wacker Drive in Chicago, Rich Lindenberg, Wiss, Janney and ElstneraDesign and Construction of Moveable Bridges, Chris Brown, HNTB.

For more information, visit www.conferences.uiuc.edu/structural or

contact Elaine Wolff (217) 333-2880, [email protected]

or conference chairman Dan Abrams (217) 333-0565, [email protected]

Sixth Annual Structural Engineering ConferenceApril 6, 2006

University of Illinois campus

If you are a former student organization president from any graduating class, please consider submitting an essay for this space. To contact the editor, see the masthead on the inside front cover.


The Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering thanks its alumni and friends who have made it possible for our students and faculty to pursue their education and research

in one of the best departments in the country. We could not do it without your support.

Donors to any fund in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering from July 1, 2004, to June 30, 2005, are listed below. We strive to make these lists as accurate as possible. If your name is listed incorrectly or omitted, please accept our apologies. For corrections or further information about making a gift, please contact Marilyn Boland, [email protected], (217- 333-5120.) Gifts made at the College of Engineering level will be recognized in the College of Engineering an-nual donor report.

President’s Council

The department thanks its graduates and friends who have joined the University of Illinois President’s Council with a commit-ment of $15,000 or more. Listed below are members who joined before June 30, 2005, and who have given to the depart-ment.

Robert H. and Donna J. AndersonMiguel A. and Nora E. Andrada Alfredo H. and M. Mae AngPatrick S. and Millie L. AuArmen G. AvedisianLouis A. and Clara M. BaconWilliam F. BakerEdward Balson TrustJohn E. BarrettThomas A. and Suzanne M. BeckWilliam K. BeckerDonald G. and Della M. BeiserStephen W. Benedict Estate

Thomas E. BergerJames D. and Wylma M. BergstromThomas B. and Jeannie M. BernsDonald L. and Maryann D. BitzerPhillip E. and Lehna K. BorrowmanOliver H. Briggs Jr.John W. and Catherine BriscoeEdward A. and Helen E. BrooksJames J. BrownSpencer F. and Maev C. BrownWill K. BrownMichael A. and Gloria L. BursonBarbara Boulware CampRichard F. and Elizabeth B. CavenaughBei Tse and May ChaoWoodrow C. Chenault Jr. and Miriam I. ChenaultChin-chuan and Mu-chin L. ChengKeh-Yung and Kuo-Ping ChengWeng Cho Chew and Chew Chin PhuaTai Chiang and You-Hua ChuDouglas J. and Jean Ratty ChidleyCharlotte Presler ChiltonRobert L. and Gertrude A. ClapperJames G. ClarkEli W. and Georgia A. Cohen

Joseph P. and Mary Stuart ColacoW. Leighton CollinsHugh H. ConnollyJohn P. and Mary Ann CoombeEdward J. and Norma G. CordingW. Gene and Lynd W. CorleyVictor C. CorsettiRichard Cramond Jr. and Helen A. CramondDavid C. and Carolyn M. CrawfordGeorge L. Crawford Jr. and Patareka CrawfordJohn E. and Betty J. CribbetRonald W. and Lois T. CrockettRonald D. and Mary Jane CrowellRobert W. and Andrea C. CusickCindy L. DahlGordon B. and Monalea DalrympleM. T. and Marlene DavissonDon U. and Carmen G. DeereBarry J. and Pauline G. DempseyNorman Allen and Lee Ann DobbsRobert H. Dodds Jr. and Deana Bland-DoddsNolda J. DohmeLeo J. Dondanville Jr. and Ann L. DondanvilleRichard J. and Sylvia C. EckhardtDonald E. and Arlene B. Eckmann

Donors


Robert Eisner Jr. and Elizabeth Robinson EisnerJohn S. EndicottMary E. EngelbrechtRalph J. EpsteinSidney and Sondra Berman EpsteinRichard J. EricksonCharles R. and Shirley H. FagoAnna Allen FarnsworthMelvin and Theda FebeshGeorge M. C. and Ann FisherRichard H. Foley and Joanne Bresee FoleyWilliam D. Fooks TrustHerbert L. FrankEdwin C. and Margaret L. FranzenGary L. and Susana B. FranzenEdward S. and Elsie T. FraserJohn A. FrauenhofferAugusto Rodriguez GallartJames H. and James H. GallivanWilliam R. and Shaun P. GastonNancy L. GavlinHarvey L. GoodellHelen F. GrandoneRalph C. and Nancy M. HahnWilliam J. and Elaine F. HallRobert E. and Shirley M. HamiltonDelon and Sonia M. HamptonWalter E. and Sue R. HansonErnest C. HartmannNeil Middleton and S. Ann HawkinsWatson A. and Celeste F. HealyGeorge F. and Carol HeckMorris L. Hecker Jr. hand Martha Z. HeckerPerry C. and Linda S. HendricksonEdwin E. and Susan L. HerricksRobert C. and Dorothy R. HieronymusGlenn E. Hodges EstateWilliam D. and Patricia HolmesLyle W. and Nancy M. HughartRichard E. Hulina and Bonnie Ramond HulinaH. Harvey Hunt and Marilyn Smith Brown HuntJames C. and Arlys R. HuntWilliam A. Huston Jr. and Delores HustonHerbert O. and Mary L. IrelandRichard Jaccoud EstateBenjamin H. and Ruth J. JandaArthur R. Jensen Jr. and Judy B. JensenGuy E. and Babette JesterWilliam P. Jones Jr.Herman H. Jost Jr. and Marguerite L. JostJoseph M. and Patricia A. KaiserStephen R. and Sally A. KannakaPryce L. and Dorothy L. KeagleCurt and Jo Ellen KeimRalph E. Kelly and George-Anne Oliver KellyWendel F. and Evelyn C. KentJon E. and Barbara B. KhachaturianNarbey and Margaret M. KhachaturianPaul D. and Barbara C. KochClement C. Lee and Ellen Liaw LeeMorris W. and Jean B. LeightonRobert E. and Doris B. LenziniBurton A. LewisJon C. and Judith S. LiebmanRobert P. LinkThomas K. Liu and Olive M. Chen-LiuKathryn Allen Looney EstateHarry F. LovellEdgar J. and Willette LuetzelschwabClarke and Karen P. LundellTracy K. and Kathy P. LundinStuart M. and Donna J. Mamer

Charles Robert Marek and Sunny L. Suhr MarekRobert J. MayerjakPaul M. and Susan A. MayfieldKenneth G. Medearis and Mary Barlow MedearisDohn H. Mehlenbacher and Nancy J. MossJoshua L. Merritt Jr. and Eleanor W. MerrittJames P. and April MessmoreCarl A. MetzJohn A. and Barbara MifflinRobert W. and Donna MikitkaJ. Wallace MillerKay J. MillerRichard W. Miller and Janet L. Pritchett MillerRuth Smith MillerRudolph A. MonsonRaymond L. MooreRobert E. MorganRobert J. and Stella F. MosborgCharles H. Mottier Jr. and Audrey Kramer MottierCarl W. MuhlenbruchArthur C. and Virginia L. NaumanFrank J. and Jeanette NesselerNathan M. NewmarkRichard A. and Joan F. NewmarkBert E. and Cathy J. NewtonRobert G. and Flo Anne O’BrienGerald R. and Audrey G. OlsonMyron E. and Ruth P. OppenheimGeorge Pagels Jr.Ralph L. PalmerRichard D. PayneRalph B. PeckDavid A. and Kathleen A. PecknoldSergio ‘Satch’ and Rosemary PecoriDavid G. and Janet S. PeshkinJohn T. and M. Alice PfefferNick and Addie PokrajacJoseph H. and Joan R. PoundGerald E. QuindryVernon Glenn and Margaret B. RathsamWilliam H. and Marie T. RichardsonHarry D. RimbeyNorman C. and Sharon L. RiordanDonald L. and Bertha RisslingArthur R. RobinsonSteve R. and Lynn L. RoeschleyStanley T. Rolfe and Phyllis Williams RolfeVernon C. and Marilyn RosenberyJ. Kevin RothWendall L. RoweLeroy J. and Mary L. RueschWalter W. and Patricia A. RustRobert A. SachsHarold R. and Alice L. SandbergA. L. Ralph SandersOtto W. Schacht Jr. and Mrs. Otto W. SchachtJohn E. and Loudean SchmittJeffrey C. SchneiderLouis W. SchummFrederick W. ShappertJessie E. Shaw-BrookeRobert S. and Helen J. ShierryChester P. Siess EstateEugene T. and Emma K. SimondsWilliam D. and Lisa H. SniderVern and Jeannie SnoeyinkHermia G. SooMete A. and Joan B. SozenHarold J. Spaeder P.E.William E. and Margarite D. StallmanDavid J. Stoldt and Constance S. WrightGlenn E. and Helen L. Stout

Larry M. and Rose Marie SurRobert H. and Barbara W. SuterWayne C. and Eleanor H. TengLott H. and Su Ann J. ThomasRaymond TimponeA. Robert and Mary K. TwardockFrank K. and Alice L. VeasmanMaurice A. and JoAnn WadsworthRonald Lee and Susan Leona WarsawRonald R. and Margaret M. WatkinsBenjamin E. and Roberta R. WeeksYi-Kwei and Irene Yu-Ten WenBryan D. and Kathy M. WesselinkLarry C. and Rhonda S. WesselinkEugene R. and Elaine A. WilkinsonDamon S. WilliamsJames L. and Doris I. WillmerHarry K. and Carol A. WindlandMarvin A. and Karen K. WollinAlbert Y. C. Wong and Fernadina ChanGeoffrey and Helen YehK. C. and Margaret YehRuth Chao YenKathryn A. Zimmerman and Robert R. Holthusen

Dean’s Club

The department is honored to acknowledge members of the Dean’s Club of 2005-2006. Listed below are those who gave $500 or more to CEE from July 1, 2004, to June 30, 2005.

Alfredo H. and M. Mae AngRichard E. and Janet L. AtenWilliam F. BakerJohn E. BarrettThomas A. and Suzanne M. BeckRobert A. and Sharon L. BloechleLouis Bowman Jr.W. Gene and Lynd W. CorleyAshley B. Craig Jr.Richard Cramond Jr. and Helen A. CramondDavid C. and Carolyn M. CrawfordRonald W. and Lois T. CrockettDavid DarwinGary C. DeisNorman Allen and Lee Ann DobbsRobert H. Dodds Jr. and Deana Bland-DoddsMichael J. and Christina U. K. DrouetDonald E. and Arlene B. EckmannWilliam N. EkstrandWilliam G. EmrichJohn S. EndicottHenry J. EppelRichard J. EricksonRon Juamiz EsmillaSoledad Juamiz EsmillaEugene J. FasulloMelvin and Theda FebeshJerry J. Felmley USAFEdward B. FinkelKenneth M. FloodyThomas D. Y. FokMichael W. and Jean D. FrankeEdward S. and Elsie T. FraserJohn A. FrauenhofferGlenn E. FryePhilip A. Gazda and Kathleen McMahon Gazda


Robert A. GilletteKent R. GonserRobert R. Goodrich Jr.Warren A. GrassoEdward C. GrayDavid D. GreunkeDaniel A. GuillRichard A. GuinnGerman R. GurfinkelDelph A. GustitusRobert W. HahnH. S. HamadaTodd K. HamiltonGerald E. HannWilliam T. HannaThomas E. HavenarHiroshi HayashiJohn Rives HayesJohn M. HealyMorris L. Hecker Jr.Richard W. HeilCarlos A. HernandezStanley M. HerrinRyokichi HigashionnaJohn C. HillThomas F. HintzKeith D. HjelmstadAlan J. HollenbeckHarry M. HornRobert B. HunnesJames C. and Arlys R. HuntMarilyn Smith Brown HuntClair E. HutchisonRuth J. JandaAlexander R. JansenDonald J. JanssenJames O. JirsaApostle JohnsonHarry L. JonesPaul H. KaarArthur M. KaindlJimmey L. KaiserHarrison KaneKevin J. KellRalph E. KellyLev KhazanovichErnest H. KidderPaul J. KilgallonByung R. KimDavid L. KingElwyn H. KingWilliam A. KitchPatricia A. KlausJames R. KleinG. William KnopfLester J. KobylarMark A. KoellingArnold F. KohnertMichael J. KoobD. Stanton KoristaWalter S. KosWilliam KreutzjansChester R. KropidlowskiPaul A. KuhnJohn A. Kuske Jr.Gregory J. LakotaJeffry E. Lamb

Kristina A. LangDavid A. LangeKay L. LantripRichard F. LanyonCharles W. LarsenArmas LaupaDavid M. LeeGary M. LeopardoRobert N. LeslieJames R. LeveyRichard W. LiesseJeffrey A. LiggettF. Jay LindhjemMichael G. LombardJesus O. LopezMaria T. LuClarke LundellRichard J. LunkesEdmund F. Mackin Jr.Fred D. MacMurdoStephen J. Madden IIIStephen M. MagelliRobert D. MahanGary R. MarineBenjamin D. MartinRobert J. MathewsSusan B. MatthewsCurt A. MatyasDarrell J. MaxeyDavid E. McClearyGloria Caban McCutcheon and William J. McCutcheonEverett E. McEwenMichael E. McNeillGeorge P. MeisterMary L. MillerJack P. MoehleCathleen R. MortonRobert J. MosborgClinton C. MudgettCarl W. MuhlenbruchLori A. MuhsWilliam H. MunseBilly J. MurphyWilliam G. MurphyWilliam E. MyersDavid T. NaumanCortney R. NehlsNicholas A. NicholsonRichard T. Nickel P.E.John V. O’HolleranLaura C. OlsonRoy E. OlsonJames T. OlstaMyron E. OppenheimJoseph H. PannyRichard H. PaoHarvey W. ParkerAnthony J. PasquinelliRonald J. PerishoEdward R. PersheDonald W. PfeiferMaynard A. PlamondonDeborah H. PoinierRobert N. QuadeAndrew J. QuerioBrian G. RamsayS. Ranjithan

Dale E. BookMarco D. BoscardinMark D. BowmanTimothy P. BrabetsJohn M. BrandtOliver H. Briggs Jr.Wilbur C. BuckheitMartin G. BuehlerNed H. BurnsThomas J. ByrnePatrick K. Callahan

Larry M. CampbellKyle E. CamperJohn L. CarratoCharles E. CarterJames K. ChanStephen J. ClarkHarold R. ColdwaterKevin R. CollinsEdward E. CondermanErik P. CookMarvin E. CriswellJose R. DanonThomas J. DarcyDallis G. DawsonThomas E. DeLaetRobert L. DineenThomas E. DoebeleVernon E. DotsonCharles H. Dowding IIIWilliam L. DritzDean M. DuboffBrent P. EastepGary W. EhlertAmr S. ElnashaiMark R. EricksenMarion S. ErwinCurt M. EvoyRobert L. FarkDouglas W. FieneThomas F. FlynnRobert A. FosnaughDouglas A. FoutchJohn S. FraserHoward Y. FukudaGilles H. GarciaShaun P. GastonAnthony F. Gaudy Jr.Robert L. GendeWalter W. Giffhorn Jr.

Raymond F. and Arlene L. WojcieszakSharon L. WoodRichard N. Wright III and Teresa R. WrightJames T. P. Yao and Anna Lee YaoElias Zewde and Catherine E. Holden

Sponsoring Associates

The department is honored to acknowledge the Sponsoring Associ-ates of 2005-2006. Listed below are those who gave $100 to $499 to CEE from July 1, 2004, to June 30, 2005.

Kakuichiro AdachiWalter L. Allen Jr.Robert J. AndresRoy Micheal ArmstrongDean J. ArnoldJerrold R. AsalTung AuLouis A. BaconDaljit S. BaisJohn A. BallingBarry R. BalmatEdward Robert Bau-mannDan S. BechlyDennis D. BeckmannRobert W. BeinHans F. BellDennis J. BenoitL. Jerome BensonWalter A. Bishop Jr.

Hershell Gill Jr.William J. and Elaine F. HallRobert E. and Shirley M. HamiltonDelon and Sonia M. HamptonWalter E. and Sue R. HansonJames Robert HarrisJohn F. and Linda S. HarrisNeil Middleton and S. Ann HawkinsGeorge F. and Carol HeckPerry C. and Linda S. HendricksonMoreland and Nancy HerrinRobert C. and Dorothy R. HieronymusWalter and Sylvia R. HowardR. Leroy and Mary H. HubbleWilliam A. Huston Jr. and Delores HustonHerbert O. and Mary L. IrelandGeorge F. Jamison and Mary Lou GoodpasterBruce A. JohnsonJohn B. JungJoseph M. and Patricia A. KaiserBengt and Kathryn A. KarlssonStuart A. and Susan V. KleinBurton A. LewisThomas C. H. and Patsy LumKenneth C. and Amy Jo MaltenPaul M. and Susan A. MayfieldCharles S. MelchingJoshua L. Merritt Jr. and Eleanor W. MerrittRobert W. and Donna MikitkaRichard W. Miller and Janet L. Pritchett MillerJames L. and Ardel B. NicholosGlenn E. NordmarkDouglas J. and Jacqueline A. NymanRobert G. and Flo Anne O’BrienWilliam E. O’NeilDavid G. and Janet S. PeshkinJoseph H. and Joan R. PoundGerald E. QuindryJohn and Eleanor W. RamageWilliam A. RandolphThomas E. ReesArthur R. RobinsonMark J. Rood and Terri MedwedWendall L. RoweJ. Ronald and Sharon A. SalleyBlaine F. and Kathryn G. SeverinRichard J. and Linda SierackiL. Radley and Jean M. SquierDavid J. Stoldt and Constance S. WrightPeter J. StorkLarry M. and Rose Marie SurM. David TayabjiA. Robert and Mary K. TwardockAlbert J. Valocchi and Anne H. SilvisGeorge K. VargheseMaurice A. and JoAnn WadsworthHoward P. and Jeanette A. WaltherLarry C. and Rhonda S. WesselinkHerbert L. White EstateDale R. WilhelmEugene R. and Elaine A. WilkinsonDamon S. WilliamsJames L. and Doris I. Willmer


Bruce L. RatterreeJoseph A. ReichleMark F. RhodesJohn G. RiceThomas E. RiordanThomas M. RiordanRobert J. Risser Jr.William A. RochfordRonald J. RomanJohn R. RossWallace W. SandersJoseph ScarpelliTerrence L. SchaddelDietmar ScheelLee ScherkenbachEarl J. SchroederMark C. SchroederThomas E. SchroederJoseph C. SciandroneRon SharpeYa-Hu ShenRobert S. ShierryByong S. Shin PhDTony F. ShkurtiVan A. SilverJames R. SimsJohn C. SingleyHarry E. SkinnerJoel SmasonMelvin B. SmithVern SnoeyinkDavid W. SnyderDavid T. SoongRichard P. SpragueArthur N. StankeyGary G. StokesJames A. TamblingJerome F. ThibeauxLawrence E. ThomasThomas L. Thomas Sr.Donald E. ThompsonMarshall R. ThompsonEdmund H. Tupay Jr.Thomas J. Van DamAnestis S. VeletsosGeorge S. VlahosChristine M. VujovichJohn C. VukovitzWilliam H. WalkerLeon Ru-Liang WangAlfred D. WebsterPatricia S. Weggel-LaaneRobert J. WendlerFrank R. WenglerEric M. WidstrandJames K. WightPatrick F. WilburJerry L. WilhoitGary A. WilkenTheodore R. WilliamsMatthew A. WinefieldRobert L. WinkelhausRichard A. WisemanRonald A. and Lois WisthuffKam W. WongVirgil A. WortmanRobert S. Wozniak

Frederick S. WuTze S. WuDavid K. WuethrichGuangyao YaoMichael Zihal

Contributors

The department is honored to acknowledge the Contributors of 2005-2006. Listed below are those who gave up to $100 to CEE from July 1, 2004, to June 30, 2005.

Harold J. AbramowskiRaymond J. AckermanJames J. AdrianDaniel E. AgramonteA. Osman AkanDouglas G. AllenIman L. Al-QadiPaul R. AnhdersonDavid AriolaAnthony M. BarattaMark E. BartosFariborz Barzegar-JamshidiJason BauerRoger W. BaugherGeorge M. BayerRichard J. BeckFredrick R. BeckmannDorothy L. BellJames V. BildilliYngve S. BloomquistJohn J. BlueThomas G. Board Jr.Alan C. BoothGlen R. BowmanJames J. BozekRobert F. Bradford Jr.Philip C. BrumbaughGeorge A. BrunnerDavid V. BubenickHarold G. BudkaDanny N. BurgessDaniel F. BurkeTed BushellThomas W. Cahill Jr.Barbara Boulware CampGary N. CantrellMark J. CapelleLuca CaracogliaGregory D. CargillSamuel H. CarpenterVirginia R. ChampiMichael S. CheneyEric S. ChristiansenRalph J. CoffeyJohn E. ConroydBruce M. Cowan

James T. CoyleMichael J. CroninLawrence K. CunninghamRichard L. Curl USARobert G. CurrieRobert H. CurtisEric Andrew DahlJeffrey W. DarlingKatherine A. DarrDavid D. DavisPeter J. DeWitt

Timothy J. DeWittMark E. DixonJohn DmochowskiGene L. DonnerSue E. DotsonRoxy A. DrewsArmando DuarteRobert Eisner Jr.Virginia K. ElliottMark S. EngelenMary J. ErioSamuel J. ErreraLance S. EscueWayne EtterDonald D. FowlerRandolph M. FreemanNelson E. FunstonJohn P. FyieMarilyn J. GabelWilliam R. GainWilliam L. GambleCheryl A. GantzRobert E. GatesThomas W. GeorgeJamshid GhaboussiJohn G. GoetzJohn D. GoodellRichard A. GoschRichard G. GossettJoseph G. GrahamErik D. W. Greven PEWilliam E. Griffin Jr.Michael D. GrimmWilliam T. GrisoliHal D. GrossJohn W. HackettJames P. HallJohn D. HaltiwangerStephen G. Hammill

Matthew J. HarizalWayne S. HarralNeil H. HarrisEric Michael HaysGregory B. HeckelJames M. HeinzWayne M. HelgeEdward A. HemstreetWilliam S. HennessyKathy HeplerSusan L. Herricks

David R. HeselbarthWilliam A. HickmanShane M. HillRussell D. Hinkle Jr.James P. HollowayGary J. HuelsMyles R. HutchinsonJohn R. JenkinsJoseph J. JenoCheryl E. Rottmann JohnsonEric JohnsonStewart W. JohnsonLaura A. JosephThomas R. KaarAhmed-Zameem Kaja-MohideenAlfred G. KalusLeonard KaplanIraj I. KasparJohn A. KerriganKyle A. KershawMary Anne KeslerAbdul R. KhanDominique M. KilmanSarah KimTimothy P. KingMark T. Erickson KirkThomas D. KnoxJames E. KnuckeyWilliam E. KozakDaniel A. KuchmaScott D. KulatLawrence A. Kulman Jr.Alichan A. KupelianJames M. LaFaveLarry F. LanierFrederick V. Lawrence Jr.Mark C. LeePeter A. Lenzini

Kin C. LeungJon C. LiebmanEarl L. LilesLiang Y. LiuJohn P. LouieKenneth A. LudwaJohn A. MakarJack C. MarcellisGuy J. MarellaRobert M. MarkunasJoel C. Maurer

Daniel S. and Helen T. MayRichard D. McConnellWilliam J. MebesSandra E. MenkeRobert L. MillerWayne V. MillerBrian S. MinskerEberhard F. MorgenrothStuart A. MoringWilliam J. MottershawMitri A. MunaAnthony G. MyersRichard A. NackCarl M. NagataKeri A. NebesCraig A. NethToan T. NguyenSara A. Stephens NovakRobert W. NowakMiroslaw NoyszewskiJanice C. OlsonMonica J. OnyszkoJuan C. PaezThomas S. PalanskyWilliam A. ParsonsKrishna C. PatnamGlaucio H. PaulinoThomas M. PawlowiczLawrence N. PerkoMark M. PetersenMichael N. PleiJohn S. PopovicsRhonda J. PowellShaoying QiDale A. RasmussenJohn W. RatzkiSteve R. RauppAndrew J. ReitzDavid E. RensingKimberly A. Restoff

William A. RettbergWilliam M. Rexroad IIJohn M. RiemerDavid R. RieslandNorman C. RiordanJeffery R. RoeslerTerence J. RosapepDaniel J. RubelPaul E. RussellPatricia A. RustDavid W. RydeenSteven W. RydenSophie B. SaccaJohn L. SanerJames A. Santangelo USNNorbert M. SchertzerArthur R. SchmidtJeffrey G. SchmidtKarl J. SchneiderDavid A. SchoenwolfDaniel T. SchultesJohn D. SchulzRobert J. SchumannAmy M. SchutzbachBruce R. ScottJohn J. ServatiusMichael W. SheltonKenneth Peter SmorynskiJoyce M. SniderJames N. SomersBillie F. Spencer Jr.M. G. SpieseJoseph C. SpitekJames E. StallmeyerRonald J. SteeleCharles J. StenzelSteven R. StrussRobert H. SuesMichael P. Sullivan Jr.Richard C. SustichJulius I. TabachBruce L. TanouyeTimothy P. TappendorfAndrew T. TunPaul R. TuttScott A. TwaitRichard A. VaiciulisDavid R. Van BoekelJoseph W. VespaMatthew James WagnerAubry R. WagonerW. Robert Watson IIIHarold D. WeisenbornWilliam R. WeissLloyd W. WellerTodd A. WellsYi-Kwei WenEric B. WilliamsonRonald WinburnM. Anthony WolffJohn R. WolosickHomer S. WongMey E. WongGeorge T. WoznyVincent C. Wroblewski Jr.William W. Wuellner Jr.Mark S. WylieHuiming YinRoger L. ZebarthWilliam J. ZelnioJulie ZillesAlan Zimmer


As a renowned educator, researcher, and water resources engineer, Ven Te Chow significantly influenced the understanding and importance of water resources throughout the world.

Chow was born in Hangchow, Checkiang, China, on August 14, 1914. He received his B.S. in civil engineering with honors from National Chiao Tung University, China, in

1940, his M.S. in Structural Engineering from Pennsylvania State University in 1948, and his Ph.D. in civil engineering (hydraulics) from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) in 1950. He joined the faculty of the Department of Civil Engineering at UIUC in 1951, advancing through the ranks to Professor of Hydraulic Engineering in 1958. In the intervening years between earning his degrees, he held a variety of technical positions in China and the United States. As a professor he was immersed in research, instruction and national and international professional assignments.

A summary of Ven Te Chow’s known activities and honors would fill more than three single-spaced pages; a few highlights follow. Ven was a founder and first president of the International Water Resources Association. He was also president of the American Geophysical

Union’s Section on Hydrology, as well as fellow and founding member of the American Academy of Mechanics.

He received honorary doctorates from universities in India, Korea, France and Canada. The Louis Pasteur University in Strasbourg, France, awarded him an honorary doctorate, and the Louis Pasteur Medal (1976). He was elected to the National Academy of Engineering (1973), named a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, honored as Academician of the Academia Sinica and the China Academy, and on and on. Among his long list of awards were the Silver Jubilee Commemorative Medal of the International Commission on Irrigation and Drainage. Medals and awards galore came from such groups as UIUC, the American Society of Civil Engineers, the Western Electric Fund, Fulbright-Hays, and the National Science Foundation. The State of Texas named him an Honorary Citizen.

Chow was a consultant and lecturer to many governments, governmental agencies and private entities in many countries. His professional contributions of major societal importance included USAID assistance to the Pan American Union, TVA, and the Texas Water Development Board. He was an adviser on water problems to the United Nations Secretariat, as well as to the U.S. State Department on foreign policy on water management in developing countries.

Chow was the author and editor-in-chief of two well-known books, long considered to be classics: Open-Channel

Hydraulics (1959), and the Handbook of Applied Hydrology (1965). He was the co-author of another popular textbook, Applied Hydrology, published after his death in 1988. He wrote his first book at age 27 on the Theory of Structures (in Chinese). He was the author or co-author of more than 218 other publications covering a range of subjects in hydrology and water resources. He was editor of and contributor to many journals, such as Water Resources Research, the Academic Press Series’ Advances in Hydrosciences, Journal of Hydrology, the Elsevier’s series Developments in Water Science, McGraw-Hill’s Water Resources and Environmental Engineering. He was editor-in-chief of Water International until very shortly before his death.

Admired and respected by colleagues, Chow also was revered by his legion of students both at UIUC and worldwide. He often was described as a giant in his field, both a developer and a disseminator of knowledge. It is fair to describe him as a worldwide educator and public servant in hydrology and water resources, a stature rarely achieved. He was a true ambassador and leader for the then-emerging field of Hydrologic Science; he organized the first U.S. Meeting of Hydrology Professors at UIUC in 1969.

Chow died on July 30, 1981, in Champaign. He and his wife, Lora, had two children, Margot and Marana.c

By Professor Emeritus William J. Hall and Professor Marcelo H. García

Ven Te ChowEducator, hydrologist, water resources engineer

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