Zhanchao Yang

Key work

• Analyzed Minneapolis–St. Paul Travel Behavior Inventory data from 2019, 2021, and 2023.
• Modeled commuting and non-work travel behavior using count and ordinal models and matching approaches.
• Identified a nonlinear relationship between telework intensity and trip generation.
• Examined the implications of hybrid work for transportation demand and planning.

Output

How Daily Telework Intensity Reshapes Weekday Trip-Making: Evidence from the Twin Cities, Transportation Research Part A, under review.

Key work

• Constructed a traffic-speed panel containing approximately 40,000 OD pairs and more than 120,000 observations.
• Developed measures of transit-cut exposure.
• Applied quasi-experimental approaches using Philadelphia as the treatment city and Boston and Chicago as comparison cities.
• Integrated GTFS data to evaluate changes in transit travel time.
• Examined spatial heterogeneity across radial and non-radial travel markets.

Key work

• Analyzed five years of U.S. traffic fatality and American Community Survey data.
• Examined metropolitan and county-level variation in traffic safety outcomes.
• Co-designed a Qualtrics survey measuring professional perceptions of metropolitan traffic fatality rates.
• Contributed to an interactive survey tool allowing respondents to estimate and compare traffic safety outcomes geographically.

Key work

• Investigated scalable pedestrian-infrastructure measurement using computer vision.
• Combined U-Net aerial-image segmentation with YOLO street-view object detection.
• Integrated outputs with street-network intersection graphs.
• Produced GIS-ready pedestrian-infrastructure datasets.
• Developed a web interface demonstrating the planning application.

Key work

• Supported research on residential location choice, affordability, and perceptions surrounding Bogotá's metro project.
• Led exploratory segmentation of public attitudes using latent class analysis, k-means, and hierarchical clustering.
• Examined how infrastructure design choices, including elevated versus underground rail, affected public opinion.
• Connected opinion segments with potential engagement strategies.

Key work

• Supported research evaluating curb extensions and traffic crashes.
• Applied propensity-score matching to construct comparable treated and control intersections.
• Conducted spatial-autocorrelation analysis to assess spatial structure in crash outcomes.

Related publication

The Effects of Curb Extensions on Traffic Crashes and Injuries, Transportation Research Record.

Key work

• Conducted a public survey with more than 200 participants.
• Combined UAV and ground-based spatial data acquisition.
• Evaluated trail accessibility and environmental conservation tradeoffs.
• Developed recommendations for inclusive trail improvements.
• Created a project subsequently usable by other undergraduate researchers learning geospatial research workflows.