The Department of Rail Transit and Civil Aviation Engineering in the School of Transportation Engineering of Chang’an University, China originated from the two undergraduate major branches in Rail Transit Engineering (since 2008) and Airport Engineering (since 2010) at the School of Highway of Chang’an University, China. In 2019, since the undergraduate major in transportation engineering was transferred to the newly established College of Transportation Engineering, this department came into force in the beginning of 2020,

The Department of Rail Transit and Civil Aviation Engineering mainly shoulders the full responsibility of talent education and training program among undergraduate and graduate students in the field of rail transit and civil aviation engineering, and takes part in the development of undergraduate major in transportation engineering (i.e., national first-class major, national specialty major, Shaanxi Province famous brand major), which had acquired the professional engineering education certification in June 2017. Now it has thee laboratories that serve the undergraduate and graduate students, namely the simulation system of urban rail transit operation organization, the ATC simulation platform for automatic control of urban rail transit operation, and the display platform of urban rail transit system. It has established the efficient off-campus partnership with many rail transit construction and operation companies in Xi’an, Beijing, Chengdu, Chongqing and other cities in China, such as the China Western Airport Group, China Railway First Survey and Design Institute Group Co., Ltd, China Railway Eryuan Engineering Group Co. Ltd, Railway Engineering Consulting Group Co., Ltd, China Railway Fifth Survey and Design Institute Group Co. Ltd, Beijing Urban Construction Design & Development Group Co., Limited, CSCEC AECOM Consultants Co., Ltd, Xi’an Metro, Nanjing Metro, Chengdu Metro, Qingdao Hisense Network Technology Co.,Ltd, etc. to provide practical training for students.

There are 10 teachers in the department, including four professors, two associate professors, and three lecturers, all of whom have Ph.D degrees. During the previous decade, they have published several papers in reputable journals, such as Transportation Research Part B, Accident Analysis & Prevention, Safety Science, and international conferences (i.e., TRB Annual Meeting, WTC, CICTP). They have also won the Shaanxi Province Teaching Achievement Award, Changan University Teaching Achievement Award, etc. and published "Urban Rail Transit System", "Rail Transit Line and Track Engineering" and other series of textbooks.

The Department of Rail and Civil Aviation Transport pays equal attention to teaching and research, and supports students to participate in international exchanges. A large number of teachers and students participate in the research of national key research and development projects, the National Natural Science Foundation of China, National Social Science Fund of China and other major engineering construction projects to improve the education and teaching performance as well as the level of student cultivation in scientific research practices. Over the years, it has continued to carry out exchanges and joint student training with world-renowned universities such as the Illinois Institute of Technology in the United States, the University of Birmingham in the United Kingdom, and the University of Queensland in Australia, as well as with Tongji University, Northwestern Polytechnical University, Beijing Jiaotong University, Southwest Jiaotong University and other universities in China so as to establish a wide range of collaboration relationship in sustainable education reform and innovation.