Professor Debbie Hopkins

I am a human geographer interested in how and why people and things move, and what those movements mean for people, places and the climate. Much of my research focuses on transport and mobility, particularly road freight and aviation, and on how these carbon-intensive sectors might change in ways that are both fairer and compatible with a changing climate.

As Professor of the Human Geographies of Mobility, I am jointly appointed to Oxford’s School of Geography and the Environment and the Sustainable Urban Development programme in Oxford Lifelong Learning. I am also an Official Fellow of Kellogg College and an International Research Affiliate of the Centre for Sustainability Research at the University of Otago, Aotearoa New Zealand. I am the Social Science Division Advocate for Fixed Term Researchers and Research Culture, and am a harassment advisor for my college and for SoGE.

My current research takes me into some very different settings: from talking with truck drivers about working life on the road, to examining debates about aviation and climate change, and exploring how universities themselves can rethink travel. Across this work, I am particularly interested in everyday experiences of large-scale economic and environmental change.

My academic journey has taken me between the UK and Aotearoa New Zealand. I completed my master’s degree in Geography at King’s College London and my PhD at the University of Otago, before returning to Oxford for postdoctoral research. I joined Oxford’s School of Geography and the Environment in 2017, became Associate Professor in 2019 and Professor in 2026. I also hold a Postgraduate Certificate in Teaching and Learning in Higher Education from Oxford.

Alongside my research and teaching, I contribute to academic publishing and research culture. I serve on the editorial boards of several journals in transport, mobility, tourism and geography, and from 2027 I will co-edit Edward Elgar’s Transport, Mobility and Spatial Change book series. I have co-edited Low Carbon Mobility Transitions and Transitions in Energy Efficiency and Demand. Two further books are in development: Freight Matters: Critical Social Science Perspectives and, with Professor Tim Schwanen, the Routledge Handbook on Geographies of Transport and Mobility.

My research asks how we can move towards a lower-carbon future while paying close attention to who benefits, who bears the costs, and whose experiences are heard and whose are marginalised. My work currently centres on three connected areas: road freight and logistics; aviation and the climate crisis; and mobility within academic life. I work with researchers from different disciplines and countries, as well as with people in industry, government and other organisations.

Road freight, logistics and working lives

I lead Trucking Lives: Making Space for People in Truck Driving Work, a UKRI Economic and Social Research Council-funded project involving colleagues at Oxford, Sheffield, Newcastle and Durham. Truck drivers are essential to everyday life, yet their experiences can be overlooked in discussions about supply chains, automation and the future of freight. Our research looks at drivers’ everyday working lives and asks what needs to change to recruit and retain a more diverse workforce and improve working conditions. It also examines how supply chain capitalism, and “just-in-time” delivery affect workers, whose bodily and family needs do not always fit neatly with the demands of tightly scheduled supply chains. You can see the Trucking Lives Exhibition here: https://www.truckinglivesphotography.co.uk/

I also lead the UK research for INCLUCity+, a European project running from 2026 to 2028. The project examines proximity-based urban planning across four European cities, with particular attention to people and places that may sit outside the assumptions behind these approaches. For the Bristol case we’re focusing on urban logistics, and how particular ideas become embedded within planning processes. 

Aviation and the climate crisis

I work with an international group of researchers examining the rapid growth of air travel and what it means for efforts to address climate change. Our work asks difficult questions about whether continued aviation growth can be compatible with climate goals, who flies and why, and how flying has become embedded in everyday expectations and institutions. We have explored, for example, how ideas about “sustainable aviation” are communicated, how social media helps to normalise carbon-intensive travel, and how governments can simultaneously support aviation growth while pursuing climate targets. For me, an important part of this research is thinking about fairness: what might a genuinely climate-compatible future for aviation look like, and how could we get there?

Academic travel

I’ve been researching academic travel since 2013. Universities are international institutions, and travel can be valuable for research, collaboration and careers. But this also creates substantial carbon emissions and raises questions about who has access to mobility and who benefits from it. My research examines how university recruitment, promotion, conferences and professional expectations can encourage travel. At the same time, I’m interested in avoiding simplistic solutions, wherein reducing travel can affect researchers differently, and those differences matter.

Working with colleagues around the world, I’m exploring how universities, technologies and changing practices might support lower-carbon forms of academic life without creating new inequalities.

Teaching is an important part of my work at Oxford, and I teach students at undergraduate, master’s and doctoral levels.

In the School of Geography and the Environment, I teach sustainability within Human Geography and lead an option for second- and third-year undergraduate students. In Oxford Lifelong Learning, I teach on the MSc in Sustainable Urban Development, where I lead the Climate Change teaching week and contribute to teaching on critical sustainability, urban futures and how transitions are governed. I am also Director of the DPhil in Sustainable Urban Development.

Beyond these programmes, I teach at the Oxford School of Climate Change and have contributed teaching at University College London and the University of Otago, as well as speaking to groups within and beyond Oxford. I supervise master’s dissertations and doctoral researchers in Geography and Sustainable Urban Development. I particularly welcome conversations with prospective researchers interested in:

• Mobilities, critical logistics and working lives
• Just transitions in carbon dependent economic sectors
• Critical aeromobilities, including multi-scalar controversies
• Contested imaginaries and post-carbon lifeworlds

I normally support one prospective doctoral candidate each year.

Current Graduate Research Students

I currently supervise research on topics ranging from platform-based transport services and the working lives of flight attendants to electric car sharing, migration and urban climate governance, tourism and island communities, and animal companionship in road haulage.

Completed Graduate Research Students

I enjoy taking research beyond academic audiences and working with people who encounter the issues I study in their everyday and professional lives.

Through Trucking Lives, I work closely with the UK road haulage sector, including Eddie Stobart, the Road Haulage Association and other industry groups. I have written for trade publications and spoken on national news about issues including roadside services, infrastructure and government policy.

Earlier in my career, I spent part of my time working with the New Zealand Ministry of Transport, leading a project examining how different kinds of knowledge and evidence can be better incorporated into policymaking. I have also contributed to local and national policy discussions, written for regional and national newspapers, and been involved in organisations supporting early-career researchers and climate action.