Featured Speakers   

Dennis Walsh 

Having worked in the transport sector both public and private for the past 35 years, Dennis is the Chief Engineer of Transport and Main Roads. He oversees all technical matters as they relate to the delivery of the Queensland Transport and Road Infrastructure Program. A Chartered Professional Engineer, member of Engineers Australia and graduate of Australian Institute of company directors. He has worked across areas including strategic planning, traffic and transport planning, road safety policy and engineering, road design, road operations, rail regulation, heavy vehicle operations and Intelligent Transport Systems. He has contributed to a range of national groups and is the Queensland Director on the ANCAP Board, a board member and Vice President of ITS Australia. Has recently been appointed as a Board member and Interim Chair of Transmax and Queensland's board Austroads board member.  He is also on the interim board of CCAT.  He is a honoury member of Institute of Public Works Engineers Australia. He is also the recipient of the outstanding QUT Alumni Award 2021, the Engineers Australia National Transport Medal 2023 and received the Public Service Medal (PSM) in the 2024 Australia Day Awards. Dennis is committed to bringing together skills and knowledge of his team and their partners to embrace new technologies, engage with customers and drive new ideas into action for benefit of the community.

Kate Mackay

Kate has a track record in delivering innovative and creative solutions to transport planning and policy issues, complimented by her in-depth understanding of behaviour change. Currently a Technical Director with Mott MacDonald based in Brisbane, Kate has worked as a transport planner for over 25 years and held a variety of senior leadership and technical roles. This includes leading the Australia transport planning practice, Framework Manager for the UK’s largest transport advisory framework, strategy lead for ThinkChange (the Sunshine Coast travel behaviour change program), and advisor to Queensland Government on vision led planning in the face of uncertainty. She has an MSc in Transport from Imperial College London and a BA Hons degree in Geography from Newcastle University.

Professor Michael Milford

Michael conducts interdisciplinary research at the boundary between robotics, neuroscience, computer vision and machine learning, and is a multi-award winning educational entrepreneur. His research models the neural mechanisms in the brain underlying tasks like navigation and perception to develop new technologies in challenging application domains such as all-weather, anytime positioning for autonomous vehicles. From 2022 – 2027 he is leading a large research team combining bio-inspired and computer science-based approaches to provide a ubiquitous alternative to GPS that does not rely on satellites. He is also one of Australia’s most in demand experts in technologies including self-driving cars, robotics and artificial intelligence, and is a passionate science communicator. He currently holds the position of Director of the QUT Centre for Robotics, Australian Research Council Laureate Fellow, Professor at the Queensland University of Technology, and is a Microsoft Research Faculty Fellow and Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technology and Engineering.

Associate Professor Ashim Debnath

Ashim Debnath is an Associate Professor of Transportation Engineering and the Head of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Deakin University. He is the Director of the ‘Safe Future Mobility Research Lab’ at Deakin where he leads a strong multidisciplinary group of researchers interested in road safety and mobility research. With a strong focus on translating research into implementable policies and practices, he has delivered many research projects and produced industry-facing outputs in partnership with the major transport departments and agencies across Australasia. He sits on several transport and road safety committees in Australia and internationally and provides editorial services to key transportation journals and conferences. He is passionate about training future leaders in Civil and Transportation Engineering through his teaching and research activities.For more details, please visit Ashim’s profile here.