Dr John Armstrong BE, MSc, EngD, CEng MICE, MIRO, MCIHT
Senior Research Fellow
Dr John Armstrong is a Senior Research Fellow within Engineering and Physical Sciences at the University of Southampton.
John is a transport engineer and planner with over twenty years' experience in transport-related matters, primarily in railway operations planning and analysis. He is a Senior Research Fellow at the University of Southampton’s Transportation Research Group (TRG). John has 10 years of experience in highway and other civil engineering construction work, and over 20 years in the assessment, planning and design of transport systems and facilities, working in consultancy and academia. This includes the economic assessment of highway schemes, public transport route planning, and railway capacity and performance analysis. He completed an Arup-sponsored Engineering Doctorate (EngD) at TRG in 2005, based on the simulation of railway operations and performance and the management of disruptive incidents.
Having been a Visiting Research Fellow since completing his EngD, John formally joined TRG as a part-time Senior Research Fellow in 2010 (while continuing in a part-time role at Arup), to work on the OCCASION and subsequent DITTO (Developing Integrated Tools To Optimise) Rail Systems projects, in which he developed methods and tools to assess the capacity utilisation and performance of railway links and nodes. These were subsequently applied to the national network in collaboration with Arup, for the recalibration of Network Rail’s Capacity Charge. More recently, John has investigated the relationships between the planned railway timetable and the resulting punctuality, to develop methods for improving timetable quality.
John also has wider interests in railways, and has published work on their future prospects. This was used with Arup to develop an Operational Philosophy for Britain’s railways. Rail has a significant role to play in mitigating climate change, but is also vulnerable to its effects, notably sea level rise, increased rainfall intensity and flooding, and needs to adapt to these, while considering the associated economic costs and benefits; John also works in this area.
BE, Civil Engineering, National University of Ireland, Galway, 1986
MSc, Urban and Regional Transport, University of Wales, Cardiff, 1997
EngD, Transport Knowledge and Systems Engineering, University of Southampton, 2005
Senior Research Fellow, University of Southampton, 2010 –
Transport Engineer and Planner, CH2M Hill/Jacobs, 2018 – 2019
Transport Engineer and Planner, Arup, 1997 – 2017
Civil Engineering Laboratory Technician, CSIRO-DBCE, 1991 - 1992
Site Engineer and Engineering Surveyor, 1987 – 1991, 1992 - 1997