William R. Black is Professor of Geography and Public and Environmental Affairs at Indiana University/n-/Bloomington. During his career at Indiana University he has directed 16 transportation research projects for state and federal transportation agencies and published more than 200 research papers and reports. He served on the activation task force that created the Consolidated Rail Corporation in the 1970s and was the first director of the Indiana Department of Transportation in 1980. He has served as chair of the Transportation Specialty Group of the Association of American Geographers (AAG) and as North American Associate Editor of the I> Journal of Transport Geography. I*> He is the recipient of the AAG's 1995 Ullman Award for contributions to transportation geography. In 2000 he presented the Fleming lecture in transport geography at the annual AAG meeting. He is active in the Transportation Research Board (TRB) of the National Research Council where he served as Chairman of the Committee on Social and Economic Factors in Transportation, and continues to serve as a member of several other committees and project panels. He received a Distinguished Service Award from the TRB in 2002. He is currently coordinator of STAR, a sustainable transport analysis and research thematic network funded by the National Science Foundation.