2023-2024 Graduate Research Awards announcement
The Mobility Network at the University of Toronto Mississauga is thrilled to introduce the recipients of the 2023-2024 Graduate Research Awards. Kerstyn Lutz, Scarlett Rakowska, Rhonda Solomon, and Leila Denise Uy will conduct mobilities research that serve people’s well-being, the planet’s future, and the potential of our growing cities to flourish equitably, sustainably and productively.
Read about these award-winning students and their research projects below:
Kerstyn Lutz
Kerstyn Lutz is a Ph.D. candidate at UTM in the Department of Geography, Geomatics and Environment, supervised by Professor Matthew Adams. Her research interests broadly focus on examining built environment exposures, as well as their impact on health and equity.
Kerstyn's research for the Mobility Network aims to identify populations residing in built environments that do not support active school travel (AST), including walking and wheeling to and from school. This pivotal work will empower the strategic targeting of AST interventions to those most in need, ensuring an equitable and impactful approach to enhancing mobility.
Scarlett Rakowska
Scarlett Rakowska is a Ph.D. student supervised by Professor Matthew Adams in the Department of Geography, Geomatics and Environment at UTM. She completed her undergraduate and Masters degree within the department. Her research project for the Mobility Network focuses on associating health diseases with exposure (e.g., air pollution and traffic) and accessibility (e.g., park space and infrastructure) in Toronto neighbourhoods. Her research will use geographic information systems (GIS) and remote sensing to conduct geospatial statistical analyses. She will also create interactive public maps displaying the results to benefit residents.
Rakowska's research interests include urban health, greenness, geospatial analysis, and health diseases.
Rhonda Solomon
Rhonda Solomon is a PhD candidate supervised by Professor Ron Buliung in the Department of Geography, Geomatics and Environment and UTM. Her research project for the Mobility Network centres on the provision of equitable transit access across diverse disability groups.
Solomon’s research interests are ableist design and public infrastructure, with a specific focus on public toilet provision for children with disabilities.
Leila Uy
Leila Uy is an M.Sc. student supervised by Professor Jue Wang in the Department of Geography, Geomatics and Environment at UTM. Her research project for the Mobility Network focuses on human mobility after natural disasters in the context of socioeconomic factors.
Uy's research interests include exploring the effect of climate change on human mobility, animal welfare, and civil infrastructures.
The Mobility Network at the University of Toronto Mississauga congratulates the following recipients of the Fall 2022 Graduate Student Research Award
Kerstyn Lutz
Active School Travel Interventions & Children’s Mobility
Kerstyn Lutz's research project for the Mobility Network focuses on active school travel in Mississauga.
Lutz is a PhD candidate supervised by Professor Matthew Adams in the Department of Geography, Geomatics and Environment at UTM.
Lutz's research interests are children’s air pollution exposure at school and during school travel and how active school travel interventions can increase children’s mobility and reduce school air pollution.
Gonen Steinberg
How Urban Power Relations Shape, and are Shaped by Robotic and Autonomous Systems in Transportation & Delivery Logistics
Gonen Steinberg's research project for the Mobility Network focuses on how urban power relations shape, and are shaped by, robotic and autonomous systems in transportation and delivery logistics.
Steinberg is a PhD candidate at the Faculty of Information, supervised by Professor Beth Coleman in the Institute of Communication, Culture, Information and Technology at UTM.
Steinberg's research employs critical theory to explore the intersection between digital media and urban space and life.
Devin Y. Wu
Exposures to Severe Noise Pollution & its Effects on Human Mobility
Devin (Yongzhao) Wu's research project for the Mobility Network focuses on exposure to severe noise pollution.
Wu is an MSc student supervised by Professor Jue Wang in the Department of Geography, Geomatics and Environment at UTM.
Wu's research interests are GIS, Environmental Health and Human Mobility.
The Mobility Network at the University of Toronto Mississauga congratulates the following inaugural recipients of the Graduate Student Research Award (Spring 2022)
Hanlin Zhou
Walkability Assessment Using Street View Imagery
Hanlin Zhou, is a second-year PhD student in Human Geography in the Department of Geography, Geomatics and Environment. Hanlin Zhou’s research interest is in linking GIS, RS, and CS techniques or data to human activities, such as health behavior, crime problems, and economic issues. Zhou’s research project for the Mobility Network focuses on quantifying the walkability of the micro-built environment (measured by the street view imagery) at a city-wide scale.
Emily Power
Demanding Justice in Transit Planning: A case study of Light Rail Transit Gentrification in Hamilton
Emily Power is a student in the Master of Science in Planning Program in the Department of Geography and Planning. Power’s research interests include planning and social justice, gentrification, financialization of housing, and tenant struggles. Her project for the Mobility Network analyzes transit-induced gentrification and displacement resulting from light rail transit planning in Hamilton, with a focus on the working-class Afro-Caribbean neighbourhoods along the route. This research draws upon Power’s experience as a tenant in the Gibson neighbourhood, living one block south of the proposed LRT, and involvement in King Street Tenants United, a group of tenants fighting back against eviction and demolition of their homes by Metrolinx and the City of Hamilton.
Haifa AlArasi
Grounded mappings of adolescents’ non-school mobility in Mississauga, Ontario
Haifa AlArasi is a Planning PhD candidate focusing on digital ethnographic explorations in reproductions of childhoods and cities. AlArasi’s research examines questions related to practices that are embedded in the environment, the social, and the material. Using grounded spatial visualizations, AlArasi attempts to broaden constructions of marginalized bodies and their associated experiences. Under the Mobility Network, AlArasi will focus on examining fleeting visual narratives of travel produced by newcomer immigrant adolescents that fall under acts of appropriations of claiming the (sub)urban as a legitimate site of childhood.
Sophie Roussy
Spatial associations between marginalization, ambient benzene pollution, and health outcomes: An investigation of environmental inequality across Etobicoke-York, Toronto, Canada
Sophie Roussy is a student at the Master of Science in Physical Geography, Environment and Health Collaborative Specialization. Roussy’s research focuses on the intersection of transportation-related air pollution (TRAP), marginalization, human exposure, including its equitable distribution, and health outcomes. Specifically, Roussy's research uses spatial interpolation techniques to model the spatial distribution of TRAP, with a specific focus on ambient benzene pollution, across Etobicoke-York, Toronto. The research employs spatial analysis techniques, statistical models, and established dose-response relationships of the air pollutants to health outcomes to examine associations between level of marginalization and disparities in human exposure to TRAP and subsequent health risks, thereby identifying environmentally-driven health disparities across Etobicoke-York.
Contact
UTM Mobility Network
Institute for Management & Innovation (IMI)
University of Toronto Mississauga
mobilitynetwork@utoronto.ca