Paul B. Fossier, Jr., P.E., F.ASCE

 

Paul has been employed with the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development for over 32 years beginning his career as an engineer intern in 1979 and currently serves as the Bridge Design Engineer Administrator.   He also currently serves as a volunteer adjunct instructor with the LSU Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering teaching the Bridge Design and Conceptual Design Courses.  He received a B.S. degree in Civil Engineering from Louisiana State University and a Masters of Civil Engineering from Tulane University.  He is a licensed professional Civil and Environmental Engineer in Louisiana.

 

Paul has been the engineer-of-record and/or project manager for numerous bridge design and bridge load rating projects throughout the State of Louisiana for both fixed and movable bridge structures.  Some of the major projects include the new John James Audubon Mississippi River Cable Stay Bridge near St. Francisville, the cable stay replacement of the Hale Boggs Mississippi River Bridge near Luling, and the emergency repairs of the I-10 Twin Span Bridge across Lake Pontchartrain following Hurricane Katrina.  He was also the engineer-of-record for the Charenton Canal Bridge replacement, the first all High Performance Concrete Bridge built in Louisiana.  He has also spent a significant part of his career developing the roadside safety hardware standards used by DOTD for guardrail, roadway barriers, cable barrier and bridge railings.

 

Paul is the primary Louisiana voting member for the AASHTO Subcommittee on Bridges and Structures (SCOBS) that is responsible for the AASHTO LRFD Bridge Design Specifications.   He is currently Chairman of the AASHTO T-8 Movable Bridge Technical Committee, is a member of AASHTO T-7 Guardrail and Bridge Rail Technical Committee and T-11 Research Technical Committee.   He is also a member of the AASHTO Technical Committee for Roadside Design (TCRS) which is responsible for the AASHTO Roadside Design Guide and the AASHTO “MASH” document for crash testing roadside safety hardware.  He also led Louisiana’s efforts with the Roadside Safety Pooled Fund group to develop projects to update our roadside safety standards.

 

He served as the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) Baton Rouge Branch President in 1989 and the ASCE Louisiana Section President in 1994 and was the first editor of the Louisiana Section Civil Engineering Magazine.   He was awarded the 2009 Outstanding Government Engineer of the Year by the Baton Rouge Branch of ASCE and the Louisiana Section of ASCE.  He received the Charles Dunbar, Jr. Career Service Award from the Louisiana Civil Service League in 2012, the highest award given to civil service employees by the State of Louisiana.   He is a 2013 inductee into the Louisiana State University Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Hall of Distinction and is a member of the Tulane University Department of Civil Engineering Hall of Fame.

Magued Iskander, PhD, PE, F.ASCE

Professor & Chair, Civil & Urban Engineering Department

New York University

 

Geotechnical engineering educator with over 25 years of experience in analysis, design, and construction of foundations including teaching, research, and consulting. Recognized as the leader of two areas of geotechnical research: (1) modeling of soil structure interaction and flow using transparent soil surrogates, and (2) behavior of piling made of recycled polymers.  Additionally performed notable research on plugging of pipe piles, non-destructive testing of drilled shafts, seismic earth pressure, and soil structure interaction of rigidly framed structures. Recipient of the National Science Foundation CAREER Award and five highly regarded teaching awards.  Presented over 25 invited research presentations, 70 conference presentations, and 35 short courses to professional groups across the United States and Canada. Professor Iskander has authored over 170 publications, including 4 authored books, 10 edited books, and 80 journal articles.

Armin B. Mehrabi Ph.D., P.E., MBA 

Phone: (716) 523-5952

Email: AMehrabi@BESbridge.com

 

Dr. Mehrabi is the President and Principal Engineer in the Bridge Engineering Solutions specializing in inspection, evaluation, cable vibration and wind assessment, health monitoring, and rehabilitation of cable-supported bridges.  He has developed non-destructive evaluation and inspection methods for bridge structures, and has been involved in inspection, evaluation of 13 cable-stayed bridges, and 11 other cable supported bridges in the US and abroad.  Dr. Mehrabi is co-inventor of a Laser-Based Cable Monitoring System developed with the support of US Federal Highway Administration, for which he was awarded as “One of Top 25 Newsmakers of the Year, 1997, By ENR.”   He has published extensively on the subject of inspection and evaluation of bridges, and laboratory testing and seismic analysis of masonry and infilled frames. His thesis on Seismic Behavior of Masonry Infilled RC Frames won the Most Outstanding Thesis Award by The Masonry Society.  One of his recent projects is the Complete Stay Cable Replacement of the Luling Bridge in Louisiana.  Dr. Mehrabi managed the inspection, monitoring, evaluation, life-cycle-cost analysis, and rehabilitation design for this bridge. From 2009 to present, he served as Consultant to Louisiana DOTD for Construction Support Services and QC/QA for Complete Stay Cable Replacement of the Luling Bridge, the first of its kind in North America.  Dr. Mehrabi has served as Complex Bridge Specialist and consultant for the Sunshine Skyway and Dames Point (ongoing) Cable-stayed Bridges for instrumentation, non-destructive testing, and periodic stay force and damping measurement. He is currently conducting inspection of external post-tensioning tendons for the Second Vivekananda Bridge in Kolkata, a 6 km extradosed, cable-stayed bridge in Kolkata, India.

 

 

Hani Nassif

Civil and Environmental Engineering

 

Dr. Hani Nassif, FACI, is an Associate Professor of Structural Engineering at Rutgers University. He teaches courses in the areas of bridge engineering and structural safety. His research includes the structural health monitoring and field-testing of bridges; structural concrete; creep and shrinkage behavior of high-strength concrete, and advanced cementitious materials. Dr. Nassif has several years of practical engineering experience as an engineer in the design of bridges, sewage treatment plants, and other civil engineering structures. Professor Hani Nassif is currently working in the research area of Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) and Field Testing of Infrastructure facilities with emphasis on railroad as well as highway bridges. His research interests include non-destructive testing and structural health monitoring of bridges; structural safety and reliability-based design of buildings and bridges; finite element modeling and dynamic analysis of bridges, and many others. Dr. Nassif received his B.S. and M.S Civil Engineering from the University of Detroit and his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan.

 

 

Tommy Cousins

Professor & Associate Chair

Glenn Department of Civil Engineering

Clemson University

 

Prof. Tommy Cousins has focused on solving problems associated with materials and methods as well as developing new methods and materials for bridge design and construction. Recent research topics include:  Long term behavior of bridge structures, use of lightweight, high performance prestressed concrete in bridge structures, behavior of fiber reinforced polymer composite and other lightweight bridge deck alternatives, building bridges with Ultra High Performance Concrete, bond properties between prestressing strand and concrete, and time-dependent movements in bridges.

Sreenivas Alampalli, Ph.D., P.E., MBA

Director, Structures Evaluation Services Bureau

New York State Department of Transportation

50 Wolf Road, Albany, NY 12232

Sreenivas.Alampalli@dot.ny.gov

 

Dr. Sreenivas Alampalli is the Director of the Structures Evaluation Services Bureau at the New York State Department of Transportation (NYSDOT).  His responsibilities include managing Structures Inspection, Inventory, and Safety Assurance programs at the NYSDOT. He is a strong advocate of working together with researchers, industry, and owners in development and implementation of innovative technologies to assure effective infrastructure management at reasonable costs.

 

Dr. Alampalli obtained his Ph.D. and MBA from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, M.S. from Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur, India, and B.S. from S.V. University, Tirupati, India.  His interests include infrastructure management, innovative materials for infrastructure applications, nondestructive testing, structural health monitoring, and long term bridge performance. Dr. Alampalli is a Fellow of American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), American Society for Nondestructive Testing (ASNT), International Society for Structural Health Monitoring of Intelligent Infrastructure (ISHMII), and Structural Engineering Institute (SEI). He authored or co-authored more than 250 technical publications. He co-authored a two-volume Book on “Infrastructure Health in Civil Engineering,” that is published by CRC press in late 2011. He also contributed to other books including “International Handbook of FRP Composites in Civil Engineering” and “Bridge Handbook.” In 2015, he co-edited and contributed to two books on “Inspection, Evaluation, and Maintenance of Suspension Bridges”, and is currently co-authoring books on Risk Management and Multihazard Considerations in Civil Infrastructure, to be published in 2016.

 

Dr. Alampalli is an active member of several technical committees in TRB, ASCE, and ASNT; served on the ASNT Board of Directors, and currently chairs the Transportation Research Board Standing Committee on Field Testing and Nondestructive Evaluation (NDE) of Transportation Structures (AFF40). He is on the editorial board of the ASCE Journal of “Bridge Engineering,” Journal of “Structure and Infrastructure Engineering: Maintenance, Management, Life-Cycle Design and Performance,” and Journal of “Bridge Structures: Assessment, Design and Construction.” Among the awards he received include Bridge NDT Lifetime Service Award (2014) from ASNT, Henry Michele Award for Industry Advancement of Research (2013) from ASCE, Charles Pankow Award for Innovation awarded by the Civil Engineering Research Foundation (2000), Herbert Howard Government Civil Engineer of the Year Award from ASCE Met Section (2009), and ASNT Mentoring Award (2009).