Teaching transport geography: American Association of Geographers, Los Angeles, California, March 18-23, 2002

摘要

The issue of teaching transport geography at the undergraduate level has rarely been the focus of much discussion, although geographical education itself has received a lot of attention. Over the last 40 years, transport geography has been part of the curriculum of many geography programs, providing a significant contribution, both conceptually and methodologically. Indeed, many spatial theories are relying on the concepts of distance, mobility and accessibility, perspectives on which transport geography offers a solid background. More recently, transportation networks and spatial organization issues have been notable contributions by the discipline to understand contemporary economic and social processes. With these issues in mind a panel on teaching transport geography was jointly organized by Frederick Stutz (San Diego State University) and Jean-Paul Rodrigue (Hofstra University) for the 2002 conference of the American Association of Geographers (AAG) in Los Angeles. The panel was sponsored by the AAG Transport Geography Specialty Group and held in honor of Edward Taaffe, a leading transport geographer who passed away in 2001. In addition to the presentations of the co-organizers, five panelists discussed various issues: Morton O'Kelly (Ohio State University), Richard Knowles (University of Salford), Claude Comtois (Universite de Montreal), James Wang (University of Hong Kong) and Bruce Ralston (University of Tennessee).