Brian Large Bursary Fund

Zeqi Xu has won the 2025 Voorhees Large Prize for his Transport Planning Masters dissertation Modelling of mixed traffic flow of CAVs considering stochasticity and spatial distribution characteristics of vehicles, submitted at the University of Leeds Institute for Transport Studies.

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Zeqi Xu, whose Bachelor of Engineering degree was from Chongqing Jiaotong University, China, is currently pursuing a Master of Engineering degree in Traffic and Transportation at Southwest Jiaotong University, China. It was as part of these studies that he studied at Leeds for his Masters in Transport Planning as his second masters qualification.

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Zeqi is committed to research in intelligent transport technologies and the deployment of connected and automated vehicles, with the goal of delivering faster and more environmentally sustainable travel. He has published five papers in journals including the IEEE Internet of Things Journal, IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technology, and Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications.

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His research examines whether when, in a mix with ordinary cars, self-driving cars travel in clusters or spread out. Using simulations that seek to mimic real, random traffic flow, he found that how they are arranged is important; efficiency can differ by nearly 10%, and stability by over 140%. Clustered self-driving cars can boost road capacity and save fuel, but in dense traffic they may also cause larger speed swings and worsen congestion. So, transport planners need to consider not just how many self-driving cars there are, but also where they are placed.

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In his spare time, Zeqi enjoys cooking, playing football and basketball, working out at the gym, and exploring new cities on foot or by bike. These hobbies remind him that transport is ultimately about people’s daily lives, not just models and data.

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Having studied and researched transport for seven years, Zeqi said: ‘winning the Voorhees‑Large Prize is a meaningful recognition of my hard work and dedication, and the most cherished commemoration of my entire student career. I would particularly like to thank my supervisors and the teachers at ITS for their guidance, as well as my family and friends for their support’.