Named for the first President of ASCE, the annual prize was first established in 1912 and recognizes a member "who has made a definite contribution to the advancement of transportation engineering, either in research, planning, design, or construction, these contributions being made either in the form of papers or other written presentations, or through notable performance or specific actions which have served to advance transportation engineering."

Eva Lerner-Lam has 33 years of international experience in transportation planning, operations, research and policy making. Founder and President of the Palisades Consulting Group, Inc., she has been working in China since 1992. In 2009, she established the Palisades China Group, LLC and Palisades China Fund, LP to provide advisory and investment services to investors and entrepreneurs in the heartlands of China and America.

Eva was the elected President of the Board of Governors of the Transportation and Development Institute of ASCE in 2006 and served on the expert panel for the ASCE 2005 Infrastructure Report Card. She is the Past Chair of the Transportation Security Committee of the ASCE and serves on numerous professional society and homeland security-related committees and panels dealing with civil engineering issues, including the Infrastructure Issue Team for the Center for the Study of the Presidency and Congress' "Strengthening America's Future Initiative." She was a member of the 2007 Transition Team for the Governor-Elect in New York State and an expert advisor to the China Emergency Assistance Investment Co., Ltd. (an enterprise of the China Ministry of Civil Affairs), China Academy of Transportation Sciences, China Ministry of Communications Highway Department, Beijing Municipal Urban Planning Commission and the Beijing Highway Design Research Institute. She was the Steering Committee Chair for the First International Symposium on Transportation and Development Innovative Best Practices (TDIBP2008), held in Beijing, China, in April 2008.

Eva was the Project Director of the Federal Transit Administration's 2006 State of the Art Report on Transit Intelligent Transportation Systems and was Project Director of the US Department of Transportation's Transit Communications Interface Profiles (TCIP) standards development project. She was a founding member of the Transit Standards Consortium, Inc. (TSC). As a planner for the San Diego Metropolitan Transit Development Board in the early 1980's, she worked as a planner on the start-up of the San Diego Trolley and later became Director of Planning and Operations for MTDB. In 1988, Eva was appointed by Governor Thomas H. Kean of New Jersey to serve on the New Jersey Transit Corporation's Board of Directors. She also served as Interim Executive Director of Princeton University's Intelligent Transportation Systems Program and taught Urban Transportation Planning at the New Jersey Institute of Technology Graduate School.

A graduate and former Trustee of Princeton University, Eva earned a Masters degree in Civil Engineering/Transportation Systems Division from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.