Dr. Darter initially studied at the University of Utah, where he earned a Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering in 1966 and a Master of Science in Civil Engineering in 1968.
SALT LAKE CITY, UT, September 19, 2024 /24-7PressRelease/ -- Michael I. Darter, PhD, PE, has been included in Marquis Who's Who. As in all Marquis Who's Who biographical volumes, individuals profiled are selected on the basis of current reference value. Factors such as position, noteworthy accomplishments, visibility, and prominence in a field are all taken into account during the selection process.
With over five decades of experience in civil engineering to his credit, Dr. Darter has availed himself in multiple roles throughout the course of his career, with a strong focus on the transportation sector. Widely recognized initially as an expert resource on highway and airport pavement evaluation, maintenance and rehabilitation, his career expanded into design developments that made their way into the wider corpus of knowledge that surrounds the field, including official design procedures, training courses and detailed techniques that now see routine use in the field. In addition to his extensive work in government service and the private sector, Dr. Darter also spent 30 years in academia as a professor of civil engineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where he earned emeritus status in 2003. During this time he published hundreds of technical publications on transportation engineering infrastructure.
Dr. Darter began his career as a civil engineer at the Utah Department of Transportation, where he worked as a bridge, pavement and materials engineer from 1965 until 1970. Following this period, he joined the faculty staff at UIUC. In this capacity, he developed and taught the first highway/airport pavement evaluation and rehabilitation course in the nation in 1978 and lent his knowledge to several government bodies, including the Federal Highway Administration, the Federal Avaiation Administration, and the Transportation Research Board.
During his time in academia, Dr. Darter held a part-time role with the U.S. Army Construction Engineering Laboratory from 1975 to 1982, developing the Pavement Condition Index (PCI) for the U.S. Air Force. The PCI eventually saw widespread adoption by all branches of the military, as well as by the Federal Aviation Administration as ASTM 6433 Standard for use in evaluation and rehabilitation of civilian airport pavements.
Dr. Darter also joined partners in establishing ERES Consultants Inc., where he managed parttime from 1980 until 1999. In 1998, he helped secure a large contract with the national Transportation Research Board to develop an advanced mechanistic-empirical design procedure for highway pavements, which after development was unaminously adopted by AASHTO in 2007 and implemented by many States, drawing widespread national and international recognition. Offering their expert services on transportation infrastructure engineering to many clients for nearly two decades, ERES Consultants grew to 60 professional staff that was acquired by Applied Research Associates Inc. in 1999, where Dr. Darter remained active as senior principal engineer until his retirement in 2022.
Outside of his primary endeavors in the field, he has also earned distinction as author of a bestselling book titled "Vanished in Valor: A Cold Case Search for My MIA Brother" in 2024. "Vanished In Valor" required years of searching in the US and Europe to discover what happened to his brother, Sgt. Eugene F. Darter who served in the Eighth Air Force in WW2.
Dr. Darter initially studied at the University of Utah, where he earned a Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering in 1966 and a Master of Science in Civil Engineering in 1968. Following this accomplishment, he went on to receive a PhD in the same subject at the University of Texas at Austin in 1973. Since then, he has traveled and made invited presentations and engineering studies across the globe in many countries such as China, Taiwan, South Africa, Australia, Chile, Argentina, Columbia, Boliva, Saudi Arabia, Isarel, Canada, Mexiceo, India, and in Europe.
Well-regarded for his extensive contributions to the field of civil engineering infrastructure, he received a number of accolades throughout the course of his career, including the Carlos Jofre Award from the EUPave at the 14th International Symposium on Concrete Roads in Krakow, Poland, in 2023; the Hartmann-Hirschman-Egan Outstanding Achievement Award from the American Concrete Pavement Association in 2017; the Swedish Concrete Award in Stockholm in 2017; a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Utah DOT and Utah ACPA in 2015; America's Transportation Award Grand Prize (I-15 CORE Project) to Utah DOT (Darter was Pavement Engineer of Record) from the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials in 2013; the D. Grant Mickle Award from the Transportation Research Board in 1989; among others.
In accounting for his overall success, Dr. Darter credits the influence of his supportive parents and five children, and former students. His father, a U.S. Navy veteran and civil engineer, introduced him to the field, while his mother provided him unwavering support and guidance especially in striving to improve his writing and speaking. His five children for many of lifes lessons and great hapiness. His graduate students who conducted many challenging research projects that were implemented into practice. Looking toward the future, he is currently working with a Hollywood producer who has shown genuine enthusiasm for his written work "Vanished In Valor", developing a screenplay and anticipates the need for substantial efforts to fully develop the complex storyline for a full length feature film.
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