Staff Pavement Engineer

ARA is seeking a staff pavement engineer with a focus on pavement engineering and data science to join our growing Transportation Division. This is a full-time position in our Ventura, CA office. At ARA, you’ll be part of a collaborative, innovative, and mission-driven team. We support engineers who want to grow technically, contribute to high-quality deliverables, and evolve into subject matter experts.

The staff pavement engineer will help transform pavement evaluation data into actionable engineering and asset-management decisions. You’ll work at the intersection of nondestructive pavement testing, data science / AI, and mechanistic-empirical pavement design, contributing to research and consulting projects for state DOTs, local agencies, and federal sponsors. This role is ideal for someone with hands-on experience using Traffic Speed Deflection Devices (TSDD) and Falling Weight Deflectometer (FWD) data and a passion for building data-driven and AI-based tools that improve infrastructure decisions.

What You’ll Do as a Staff Pavement Engineer :

• Import, process, and analyze TSDD, FWD, ground penetrating radar (GPR), and other pavement condition datasets; develop quality-control workflows and automate repeatable analytics.
• Derive network- and project-level structural indicators, remaining life estimates, and treatment triggers; support pavement management system strategy development.
• Build predictive and mechanistic-informed models (e.g., performance forecasting, transfer functions, layer moduli backcalculation pipelines) using Python and modern machine learning frameworks.
• Leverage large language models / AI to accelerate data cleaning, metadata extraction, report drafting, proposal writing, and interactive Q&A over large engineering document sets and databases.
• Conduct applied research and consulting work in pavement and geotechnical engineering, including design, analysis, materials testing, and condition evaluation.
• Integrate and visualize results in geographic information systems (GIS) and dashboards for internal teams and client stakeholders.
• Support mechanistic-empirical pavement design tasks; prepare inputs and interpret results from AASHTOWare Pavement ME Design (PMED).
• Contribute to proposals, technical reports, and client presentations; present findings at industry conferences and other venues.
• Participate in field investigations (periodic travel) to support data collection, validation, and client coordination.
• Collaborate with senior engineers and subject matter experts while developing toward independent technical leadership on research and consulting workstreams.

Staff Pavement Engineer Requirements :

Preferred Qualifications :

Salary & Benefits :

The anticipated salary range for this position is $75,000 to $85,000 / year, depending on education and experience.

ARA offers competitive benefits that address our employees’ needs now and in the future. Learn more about each of our benefits at

How to Apply :

Please submit your resume / CV, a brief cover letter highlighting relevant TSDD / FWD and data-analytics experience, and two sample outputs (e.g., report excerpt, dashboard screenshot, or code snippet) demonstrating your pavement data analysis work.

About ARA :

ARA is an employee-owned international research and engineering firm recognized for solving complex challenges in the physical sciences. We provide cutting-edge services in civil and geotechnical technologies, pavement analysis, software and simulation, environmental testing, and defense systems.

As an employee-owned company, ARA fosters a culture of innovation, collaboration, and ownership. Our motto — “Engineering and Science for Fun and Profit” — captures the spirit of our work : technically challenging, impactful, and rewarding.

Join us and help shape the future of transportation infrastructure.

Equal Opportunity Employer / Protected Veterans / Individuals with Disabilities

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