Education
He studied Civil Engineering, Transportation Science and Urban Planning between 1968 and 1975 and completed his doctoral thesis, "Trip Relationships in Urban Areas", in 1980.
He studied Civil Engineering, Transportation Science and Urban Planning between 1968 and 1975 and completed his doctoral thesis, "Trip Relationships in Urban Areas", in 1980.
He is Professor of Transportation Planning at University of Kassel, Germany. Helmut Holzapfel is a civil engineer, transportation scientist and urban planner, but he was working in very different fields from his original education as well: So he worked on human lifestyles, computing and reality, strollology (the science of strolling and perspective, invented by Lucius Burckhardt) and many other interdisciplinary topics as well. Since 1993, he has been a professor at the faculty of Architecture, Urban and Landscape Planning at the University of Kassel.
From 2005 until 2008 he was dean of the faculty.
Since 2009 he has led the research project "Sintropher" in close collaboration with Sir Peter Hall (urbanist). Cooperation on several projects has been also taking place with John Whitelegg.
Since 2015 Holzapfel is head of the Centre for Mobility Culture in Kassel, Germany. From 1985 until 1993 he was a government official at the Transport Ministry of North Rhine-Westphalia.
Between 1995 and 1998 Holzapfel was the highest transport official in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt.
He is also co-editor of the transport planning journal "World Transport Policy and Practice" and a member of the scientific advisory board of the Berlin based Institute for Ecological Economy Research (IÖWest).