We’ve completely revamped the themes for this year’s contest, making them broader and simpler.
Basically, they are based on what we here at AASHTO call “modes” – that is, the ways that people and goods get around.
Motor Vehicles
Car, trucks, motorcycles – you name it. If it has an engine and has people in it or on it, we want to see it.
Roadways & Bridges
In a typical year, we get lots of photos of pretty roads and bridges – without people using them! Give us those same beautiful roadways with lovely faces.
Pedestrians & Bicycles
Walking, running, biking, hiking – the possibilities are endless as long as they are people-focused.
Ships & Boats
The water makes a gorgeous setting for this mode of transportation, whether it’s for recreation, freight, security, or any other maritime-related activity (with people).
Trains
Railways and transit are a natural for photography. Show us those passengers who are using the system to get around the city, or across the country.
Planes
Jetting off to a business meeting, to a vacation with the family, or to an exotic locale (even shipping packages by air freight) can be exciting and make a good photo.
Sparks fly as construction crews work quickly to remove an old bridge over I-235 in Oklahoma City during a complete closure of the entire interstate overnight.
After a year’s hiatus, we’ve retooled, revamped, and reorganized the Faces of Transportation Photo Contest. Gone are the broad categories that made photographers try to shoehorn images into descriptions that didn’t really fit. And gone are the restrictions that that placed on your creativity.
Now you’ll find that we have opened up the categories to be much more focused on transportation subjects. Here at AASHTO, we talk of “modes” (planes, trains, and automobiles!) that move people and goods around the country. It’s much more natural to be taking a photo of a worker on a road or bridge, or a person on a bike, or the conductor of a train, or of an experienced truck driver – than it is to classify a beautiful photo into something like Building the Future. (What were we thinking?)
So. Get out there. Take some great photos. (Be careful!) Free up your creativity. Show us the wonderful faces that make transportation across our beautiful nation. Enter today!
The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2015 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 48,000 times in 2015. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 18 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.
Two aesthetically intriguing photographs and two compelling videos won top prizes in the 2015 Faces of Transportation competition sponsored by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials.
Chris Solan, an ironworker with Mammoet USA, ensures that a 105-foot-tall modular lift tower is running smoothly before it hoists sections of the SR 99 tunneling machine to the surface for repairs. The custom-engineered tower in downtown Seattle is rigged with 7 miles of steel cable.
Two photographs taken of people working behind the scenes at state DOTs won the Grand Prize and the People’s Choice Awards. A judge selected the Grand Prize photograph and more than 4,500 online votes decided the People’s Choice award winner. Three other photographs capturing highway construction workers and citizens using transportation facilities also received awards. (See all of the photos in the Gallery on the right of this page.)
Kayti Ewing holds a flat of milkweed she is about to plant in right-of-way off I-430 in Little Rock, Arkansas. The plants are meant to help the habitat of Monarch butterflies as they migrate through Arkansas.
Twenty-nine transportation department employees from 16 states and nine private citizens submitted 103 photographs and 12 videos in the competition. The photographic entries were judged in three categories: People building America, People Touring America, and Innovators in Transportation. Videos competed in two categories: Professional Production and In-House/Amateur/Novice.
The Grand Prize in the photography competition was awarded to Washington State Department of Transportation photographer Greg Phipps for this photograph of Chris Solan, an ironworker making sure that the lift tower of the state route 99 tunnel boring machine in downtown Seattle was running smoothly.
An Idaho Transportation Department worker oversees placement of girders for the Meridian Interchange in Meridian, Idaho. The overnight job began at 10 p.m.
The People’s Choice Award was presented to photographer Rusty Hubbard who captured Kayti Ewing from the Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department about to plant a flat of milkweed in the median off of Interstate 430 to help the monarch butterflies that migrate through the area.
Idaho Transportation Department photographer Mark Hall took this dramatic shot of a worker overseeing the placement of girders during an overnight job in Meridian to win the People Building America category.
The Brookfield Floating Bridge is a hidden gem in the center of Vermont. The bridge is a major source of tourism, and plays a key role in the economic vitality of the small town of Brookfield. The bridge was replaced in 2015 after being closed for 7 years.
Eric Goldmann, a private citizen in Burlington, Vermont won the People Touring America category with this picture of the Brookfield Floating Bridge, a hidden gem in the center of Vermont, which plays a key role in the economic vitality of the small town after which it’s named.
Nebraska Department of Roads photographer Daniel Luedert won the Innovators in Transportation category with his photograph of a worker surveying the grade of a new bypass near Kearney, while a grader works behind him.
Work continues and a grader passes along the new bypass near Kearney, Nebraska, as a worker surveys the grade.
In the video competition, the Tennessee Department of Transportation won in the Professional Production category for its high quality production highlighting the state’s multimodal freight plan in a video entitled “How TDOT Ensures You Get Your Stuff”.
And, last but not least, the Nevada Department of Transportation won the In-House Production/Amateur/Novice category for its up-close and personal video of a Snow Plow Ride-Along on Mount Rose in the western part of the state.
Thank you to all the entrants, and look for more information about next year’s competition right here!
“Hey, dispatch! I thought you told me I’d missed the deadline for submitting an entry into the Faces of Transportation competition! Over…”
“Say again? I was annoyed that I thought I had another week! Over…”
“You’re telling me they’ve EXTENDED the deadline for 1 more week?! Roger that! But… I shouldn’t delay! All entries must be submitted by August 7 at midnight to qualify. 10-4! On my way to put in the entry now! Over and out!”
