Guang Tian, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor of City and Metropolitan Planning and faculty member of the Scientific Computing and Imaging Institute at the University of Utah. Before joining the University of Utah, Dr. Tian was an Associate Professor and coordinator of the GIS graduate certificate at the University of New Orleans, where he founded the Center for Equitable Transit-Oriented Communities (CETOC) – a U.S. Department of Transportation designated University Transportation Center. CETOC focused on preserving the environment by promoting transit access, multimodal infrastructure, compact and efficient land use patterns, as well as resilience and climate adaptation. Dr. Tian received his Ph.D. in Metropolitan Planning, Policy, and Design from the University of Utah.
Human beings build settlements and cities to accommodate population growth. Some evolve into massive urban areas housing tens of millions of residents. As part of the larger ecological system on Earth, these cities and urban areas must minimize consumption of natural resources—such as energy, water, and land—while reducing harmful impacts like emissions, pollution, and waste. At the same time, cities must remain efficient and affordable—homes where everyone can thrive. My scholarship promotes the creation of efficient, healthy, sustainable, and affordable urban built environments for everyone by learning from history, analyzing current trends, and planning for the future.
Dr. Tian has published dozens of academic papers in peer-reviewed journals of transportation, planning, and geography. His interests and research focus on land use and transportation planning, travel behavior and built environment, sustainability and climate, urban data science and analytics (statistics, GIS, machine learning, AI, etc.).
