Seminar: Infrastructure in Canada and the US, the problem with our approach

Are we too busy filling today’s potholes to focus on tomorrow’s threats and opportunities?

Dr. Stephen Blank will critically examine the way Canada and the US approach infrastructure needs at the next seminar hosted by the department of supply chain management and the Transport Institute.

The Canadian and US infrastructures of roads, bridges, wires and pipelines are deteriorating and suffer from delayed and incomplete maintenance. The result is declining efficiency – from potholed highways to perforated pipelines, things move slower, time is wasted and costs rise. The competition seems to do it better. Even in the US, where the infrastructure crisis is worse, total collapse is unlikely. We are clever enough to muddle through. But there is significant risk involved in patching and mending outdated systems in an era of profound geopolitical, economic and technological change. Are we too busy filling today’s potholes to focus on tomorrow’s threats and opportunities?

What: Infrastructure in Canada and the US: the Menace of Muddling Through
Where: Winnipeg Free Press Cafe, 237 McDermot Ave.
When: Friday, Sept. 12, 7:30 a.m. until 9 a.m.

About the speaker

Dr. Stephen Blank / Macdonald-Laurier Institute

Stephen Blank (BA Dartmouth, MA Cambridge and MA and PhD Harvard) was the Fulbright Visiting Research Chair in Governance and Public Administration at the University of Ottawa 2012-13 and serves as Special Advisor to the University’s Collaboratory on Energy Research and Policy.  He is also Senior Fellow, Macdonald-Laurier Institute.

Dr. Blank was a member of the University of Pittsburgh’s Political Science Department (1967-74) and Pace University’s Lubin School of Business (1986-2006), where he served as Director of the Center for Canada-US Business Studies and the Center for International Business Studies. In 2002, Stephen Blank was awarded L’Ordre National du Quebec by the Government of Quebec. In 2009, he was granted the first North American Citizen award by the North American Center for Transborder Studies at Arizona State University and the first North America Works award by the organizers of the annual North America Works conferences in Kansas City, Missouri.

Dr. Blank is the author or co-author of eleven books and many articles. He has written extensively on North American trade corridors and freight transportation issues and spoken on these matters at many conferences and seminars in the US, Canada and Mexico.