ASCE Plot Points Podcast

This week’s episode of the ASCE Plot Points podcast is the first of what we’re calling Student Sessions. Three ASCE student ambassadors – Alysha Curtis of Fresno State, Peter Yu of the University of Washington, and Evan Brittenham of Western Kentucky University – talk about what thrills them and what intimidates them as they get ready to trade the grad cap for a hardhat.

ASCE has been publishing its Best Places to Be a Civil Engineer rankings for four years now, based on a combination of salary data, civil engineering job opportunities, and cost of living. And over that span, the city that has risen the most up the list might surprise you. It’s a city known for its climate, its beaches, and now its civil engineering. It’s San Diego, California, and in episode 141...

Dimitrios Athanasiou, Ph. D., E.I.T., A.M.ASCE, is a senior associate of environmental and earth sciences at Exponent in Bellevue, Washington; he has a Ph. D. from Texas Tech in civil engineering; and he’s the co-chair of the ASCE EWRI Seattle Chapter. But he began his education with a bachelor’s degree back home in Greece in physics. So he has an interesting perspective on any comparison between...

Kevin Brown, P.E., M.ASCE, is a construction services manager at TranSystems in Philadelphia and an adjunct professor  at the College of New Jersey. And as he’s entered into the leadership phase of his career, he’s approaching these opportunities with generosity and thoughtfulness. In episode 139 of ASCE Plot Points, Brown outlines his journey from student to teacher and talks about how he's tryin...

Infrastructure advocacy takes center stage this week with the ASCE Legislative Fly-In in Washington, D.C. Sarah Matin, P.E., M.ASCE, Orlando office principal for S&ME and chair of the ASCE Public Policy and Practice Committee, is one of the many ASCE members headed to Capitol Hill this week looking to keep the IIJA momentum going. In episode 138 of ASCE Plot Points, Matin talks about how IIJA fund...

You never know how those engineering skills you develop in your career might translate in other areas of your life. Case in point: Jaffer Almosawy, P.E., ENV SP, M.ASCE. He’s a project manager for GCW Inc. in Las Vegas, specializing in water and wastewater design. But recently, he’s also become known as ASCE’s Minister of Love. What exactly does that mean? In this special Valentine’s Day episode o...

Issues of workforce dominate the conversation around civil engineering in 2023. And one of latest workforce trends is the notion of quiet quitting. Jennifer Sloan Ziegler, Ph. D., P.E., M.ASCE, is an engineer and project manager for Cypress Environment and Infrastructure in Jackson, Mississippi, and an ASCE Region 5 governor. In episode 136 of ASCE Plot Points, Ziegler talks about quiet quitting a...

Sustainability has come a long way over the course of Antoinette Quagliata's career – from project add-ons to default requirements. A ​manager of sustainability services for Dewberry, Quagliata, ENV SP, talks on episode 135 of the ASCE Plot Points podcast about the changes she's seen and how current sustainability tools are making her work better than ever.

Brian Brenner, P.E., F.ASCE, is a professor of the practice at Tufts University and a principal engineer with Tighe & Bond in Westwood, Massachusetts. He’s published three collections of essays through ASCE, and he has a new monthly column, “More Water Under the Bridge,” on Civil Engineering Source. Remarkably, all these accomplishments – the teaching, the work, the writing – springs from the mind...

Michel Bruneau, Ph. D., P.E., P.Eng, F.SEI, Dist. M.ASCE, returns to the ASCE Plot Points podcast to discuss his new book, "The Blessings of Disaster." In part one, he argued why learning from extreme weather events and other disasters is essential. In part two, he outlines how such learning can be done.

Michel Bruneau, Ph. D., P.E., P.Eng, F.SEI, Dist. M.ASCE, has a new book out today, “ The Blessings of Disaster ,” that argues the best way forward – if not the only way – is by learning from the extreme weather events and other disasters that beset us. In episode 132 of ASCE Plot Points, Bruneau discusses his new book, the “Three Little Pigs” fable, and why we must find blessings in disasters.

The ASCENT Tower in Milwaukee – at 25 stories – is the world’s tallest timber building. In episode 131 of ASCE Plot Points, the architect behind the ASCENT, Jason Korb of Korb and Associates, talks about the unique challenges inherent to the ASCENT and how collaboration and innovation helped make history possible.

Duncan Wardle, former head of innovation and creativity at Walt Disney Company, will serve as the closing speaker at the ASCE 2022 Convention, Oct. 26 in Anaheim, California. In episode 130 of ASCE Plot Points, Wardle talks about innovation and how to do it.

Colette Easter is not a native Kentuckian. But she’s lived and worked there a long time now, and she cares about the state. An engineer with the Metropolitan Sewer District in Louisville, she played a huge leadership role in the 2019 ASCE state infrastructure report card for Kentucky. So when floods tore through parts of Eastern Kentucky this summer, it spoke to Easter both professionally and pers...

Sarah McEwen has worked as a water resources engineer in Jackson, Mississippi, for nearly a decade. Shawn Miller, entering his senior year as a civil engineering student at Jackson State University, has called the city home his entire life. In episode 128 of ASCE Plot Points, the two ASCE leaders share stories from the recent water crisis as the city seeks a pathway toward resilience.

Stu Walesh is an ASCE distinguished member; a longtime civil engineer specializing in water with experience in the public sector, the private sector, and academia. Through it all, he's approached every day as a chance to learn something new. In episode 127 of ASCE Plot Points, Walesh talks about how he developed that growth mindset and how it helps create positive disruption.  

Every career journey has stops along the way. And for many people, those are just called jobs. But for the lucky among us, those stops along the way eventually add up to a destination job. But for Melissa Hilsabeck, EIT, A.M.ASCE, she’s found that destination job very early in her career. She’s a capital projects coordinator in the construction management division for the Port of Long Beach. On ep...

These days it takes a lot of different people with a lot of different skills to make civil engineering happen. It really comes down to teamwork and technology. On episode 125 of the ASCE Plot Points podcast, Bentley Ruggles, a senior project manager for Dewberry, talks about how virtual reality technology is changing the way projects get done. 

Efficiency is essential these days. There isn’t enough time or money for anything less. And efficiency is borne of innovation. The Office of Public Transportation in Alabama is one such innovation – a partnership between the state department of transportation and the University of Alabama in Huntsville with the simple goal of improving transit for the citizens of Alabama. In episode 124 of ASCE Pl...

Joel Figueroa-Vallines, P.E., F.ASCE, is a structural and forensic engineer and president of SEP+A Engineering Consulting, headquartered in Orlando. He left home to drive south for Surfside, Florida, last summer in the aftermath of the tragic collapse of the Champlain Towers South condominium. He wound up staying for three weeks, helping where he could. In episode 123 of ASCE Plot Points, Figueroa...

Big-picture thinking, long-term planning - they seem to be at a premium these days. But not in Reno, Nevada. Not when it comes to clean water. Danny Rotter is an engineering manager for the Truckee Meadows Water Authority in Reno, and he works as part of a team that is using scenario planning and detailed data analysis to ensure the region's clean water future all the way out to the year 2100. On...

Civil engineering careers can take many shapes. You can work for a giant firm. You can work for a smaller firm. But what about those medium-sized firms? On episode 121 of the ASCE Plot Points, Sam Potts, a transportation engineer in Los Angeles, California, details the benefits of working for a medium-sized firm.

Society members recently voted Marsia Geldert Murphey as the ASCE 2023 president-elect. Clearly, her accomplishments and vision for the organization spoke volumes. But what many members might not know is that six years ago, Geldert-Murphey wasn’t running for ASCE office; she was just hoping to get out of bed, after an accident left her in a coma. In episode 120 of the ASCE Plot Points podcast, Gel...

The ASCE Society-wide concrete canoe competition returns this weekend for the first time since 2019 – June 3-5 at Louisiana Tech University. In episode 119 of the ASCE Plot Points podcast, two senior project leads – Ryan Carrusca and Natalia Hoeppner or the University of British Columbia and Lipscomb University respectively – talk about their teams’ journeys and hopes for the competition. 

May is National Wildfire Awareness Month. Doug Taylor knows. The former president of both the ASCE San Francisco Section and Fresno Branch spent six years as the Region 9 disaster preparedness chair. He's helped get civil engineers trained and certified to serve as site inspectors in the aftermath of wildfires. In episode 118 of the ASCE Plot Points podcast, Taylor talks about how wildfires contin...