|
|
|
Planning & Information Systems
Richmond Regional
PDC Richmond, VA 23235 Phone: 804.323.2033 Fax: 804.323.2025
Office Hours: Monday - Friday
8:00 a.m. - 4:30
p.m.
|
Speaker/Panelist Biographies
Richard
L. “Dick” Beadles
Richard L “Dick” Beadles currently serves, without compensation, as Virginia High-Speed Rail Development Committee (VHSRDC) Executive Director, having been one of the organizers of VHSRDC in 1997. Mr. Beadles career
includes positions involved with transportation, urban development and real
estate advisory services. He
gravitated to the VHSRDC mission as an imperative for the future of economic
development competitiveness and livability in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeast,
with a primary focus on linking downstate Virginia urban regions with Northern
Virginia, Washington, D.C. and the Northeast Corridor. Mr. Beadles was, for many years,
associated with the former RF&P Railroad Co., where he served briefly as
president in 1985-86, prior to accepting a position as President of CSX Realty
(1986), the real estate management and development unit of CSX Corporation, from
which he retired in 1992. Upon leaving CSX, Mr. Beadles and others founded MGT
Realty Advisors, Inc., a Richmond-based real estate advisory firm, which served
well-known corporate and institutional clients with a variety of services,
including planning and execution of real estate asset management and development
strategies. Effective January 1, 1999, Mr. Beadles sold his interest in the
firm, which now operates under the name of Realty Advisors, L.C. While at RF&P, and later at CSX,
Beadles was personally involved in many large-scale urban, as well as some large
suburban, real estate development projects, including Crystal City in Arlington,
Potomac Yard, Washington Harbor and others in the greater Washington area, plus
similar activities in Baltimore, New York and Chicago. Long accustomed to
seeking to maximize the usual development objectives, including as much highway
infrastructure as possible, Mr. Beadles is devoting his senior years to
advocating some of the long-neglected, non-traditional transportation solutions
to compliment and enhance the total urban landscape and the quality of life
therein. A long-time resident
of the Richmond area, Beadles is active in numerous professional and community
service organizations at national, state and local levels.
Jack
Berry was raised outside of Chicago, Illinois.
He attended Loyola Academy, and graduated from Georgetown University in
1974. He was a tennis instructor at
Glenbrook Racquet Club in Northbrook, Illinois for two years.
In 1975 he moved to Salisbury, Maryland to work for the Independent
Players Association. Its Executive
Director, the late Bill Riordan, managed Jimmy Connors and Ilie Nastase, and
promoted an indoor men's professional tennis circuit.
In
1979 Norfolk SCOPE hired Mr. Berry as the Promotion and Sales Manager of the
multi‑purpose facility. He moved to Richmond, Virginia in 1988 to become
Director of Marketing & Sales for the Richmond Centre for Conventions &
Exhibitions. The City promoted him
to General Manager in 1990. In
December 1992 he was named President of the Richmond Convention & Visitors
Bureau (RCVB). In 1997 and 1999 the RCVB was named as one of the top 50
Convention & Visitors Bureaus in the industry by Meetings
and Conventions Magazine.
Mr. Berry is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Children’s Museum
of Richmond, the International Association of Auditorium Managers, the Virginia
Society of Association Executives and the International Association of
Convention & Visitors Bureaus; chairman of the board for Virginia Civil War
Trails; and the past president of the Virginia Association of Convention &
Visitors Bureaus.
Leo
Bevon is currently the Director of the Virginia Department of Rail and Public
Transportation. This Department was established by the General Assembly on July
1, 1992. Its mission is to establish, maintain, improve and promote public
transportation services and passenger and freight rail transportation systems
that offer citizens mobility and transportation choices; to advise the Governor
and Legislature on choices that promote a balanced multi-modal transportation
system in Virginia; and to oversee the distribution of state and federal funds
allocated for mass transportation in a manner consistent with legislative and
regulatory directives. Mr. Bevon was originally appointed by Governor L. Douglas
Wilder as the first Director of the Department, and was reappointed to that
position by Governor George F. Allen and again by Governor James S. Gilmore.
Before
coming to Virginia, Mr. Bevon worked for 10 years with the Southern California
Rapid Transit District. In his last assignment he was the Assistant Director of
Transportation for the RTD with responsibility for managing the daily operation
of a fleet of 2,000 buses serving 220 bus routes. He also supervised operation
of the 22 mile rail line called the METRO Blue line, with a peak fleet of 18
trains and for operational start-up of the first segment of a subway in Los
Angeles known as the METRO Red line. Previously, he was the Planning Manager for
the District with responsibilities for preparation of the capital and operating
financial plans totaling more than a billion dollars a year.
Prior
to the RTD, Mr. Bevon was a Transportation Project Manager with the Ralph M.
Parsons Company and worked on a variety of airport and transportation projects
in the U.S., Asia, Europe and the Middle East. He holds a Master of Science
Degree in Transportation Planning from Florida State University and a Bachelor
of Arts Degree from the University of New Orleans.
Mr.
Bevon serves on the Northern Virginia Transportation Commission, Virginia
Railway Express Operations Board, Tidewater Transportation District Commission,
and the Potomac and Rappahannock Transportation Commission
Ken
Briers
Ken
Briers was born and raised in Baltimore, and is a long time resident of
Washington DC, currently living 4 blocks from Union Station. He received a BS in
Transportation Management from the University of Maryland, and, due to his draft
status, he took a temporary job on the Penn Central Railroad as a freight
brakeman. The temporary job lasted 17 years, including 12 as a Locomotive
Engineer on the Northeast Corridor.
Mr.
Briers returned to Baltimore in 1988, to work on the design and construction of
the Central Light Rail Line. Three years later he joined De Leuw, Cather, one of
the Parsons Transportation Group’s predecessor companies. While at Parsons he
has worked on the design of numerous railroad and transit projects throughout
the world.
Mr.
Briers and his wife, Sally, have restored an 1892 house in the very small town
of Choptank, MD, on the Eastern Shore. He now spends most of his spare time
driving his 1950 Ford pickup truck, which has been restored as a Pennsylvania
Railroad utility vehicle. The Lionel train layout is next!
The
Honorable Joseph E. Brooks, City Council, Richmond, Virginia Joseph
E. Brooks is a native of Virginia. He received his Bachelor of Science degree
from the E. Claiborne Robins School of Business of the University of Richmond
with a major in accounting and his Master of Business Administration from the
University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. He served with the United States Army
in Korea as a member of the staff of the Commanding General of the 25th Division
Artillery. He and his wife, Pauline, a graduate of Westhampton College and a
teacher for twenty years, live in Richmond, Virginia.
They have two daughters.
Mr.
Brooks' area of employment have been with the Commonwealth of Virginia as a bank
examiner; KMPG-Peat, Marwick in public accounting; University of Virginia
Extension Division as an accounting instructor; thirteen years with B.W. Wilson
Paper Company. a wholesale distributor of printing papers and nineteen years in
the commercial printing industry, the last eight of those as President of
Whittet and Shepperson, Incorporated. His responsibilities have included
finance, accounting, personnel, sales and executive management. After selling
Whittet and Shepperson in September 1988, he began his on consulting practice in
management training.
He
was elected to Richmond City Council in 1992.
As a member of city council he serves as chairman of the Finance
committee. He is currently Vice-chairman of the Richmond Regional Planning
District commission and Chair of the Metropolitan Planning Organization. He is a
member of the Port of Richmond commission, active in the National League of
Cities, and is past Chair of the Finance, Administration and Intergovernmental
Relations (FAIR) Policy Committee. He served as NLC's representative on the
Federal Tax association's steering committee on sales and use tax on electronic
commerce. He is currently a member of the Board of Directors of the National
League of Cities and a member of the Executive Committee of the Virginia
Municipal League, a member of the Virginia Legislative Commission on Educational
Infrastructure and, member of the Virginia Municipal League/Virginia Association
of Counties advisory committee studying a new tax structure for Virginia
Mr.
Brown has been Senior Planner for City of Raleigh for 15 years where he is
responsible for Comprehensive Planning, Area Planning, Economic Development,
Special Projects, Annexation and Development Support.
Prior to coming to Raleigh in 1985, Mr. Brown was Planning Director in
Tarboro, NC from 1974-1985. Mr.
Brown has a Masters Degree in Regional Planning from UNC-Chapel Hill and an
undergraduate degree in geography/planning from East Carolina University in
Greenville, NC.
Richard
Cogswell, as staff engineer at the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), has
been with the FRA since 1975. Mr.
Cogswell has been project manager for major signal systems projects for the
South Station Reconstruction Project, and the Northeast Corridor Improvement
Project Systemwide Planning and Integration of Train Services.
He has worked on Corridor Master Plans/Transportation Plans from New York
to Boston; Washington to Richmond; Harrisburg to Philadelphia; New York to
Washington; and Richmond to Charlotte. He
has also served as manager for the Pueblo Test Tracks Electrification project
and serves as FRA’s representative in the Los Angeles Basin Electrification
Study. Ms. Cogswell has also
extensive foreign travel experience on railroad related work with trips to
China, Japan, Sub-Sahara Africa, Holland, and Kazakhstan.
From
1970 to 1975, Mr. Cogswell work as Manager of Research and Planning for the
Illinois Central Railroad. He
served with the United States Air Force from 1965 to 1969 as an Aircraft
Maintenance Officer. He received
his B.S. in Mechanical Engineering in 1965 for the University of New Hampshire.
David
Carol began his career with Amtrak in 1984 as Assistant General Counsel
(Litigation) in the Amtrak Law Department.
In 1987, he became Amtrak’s Sr. Director of Government Affairs, where
he oversaw congressional, federal, state and local relations.
With the initiation of the Northeast Corridor High-Speed Rail program in
1992, Mr. Carol moved to Old Saybrook, CT, as Vice President High-Speed Rail to
oversee the management of the program, including electrification and
infrastructure work and acquisition of new high-speed trainsets.
In 1999, Mr. Carol was made a member of Amtrak’s Management Committee
and Vice President High-Speed Rail Corridors Development, where he is
spear-heading the development of new high-speed rail corridors around the United
States.
Mr.
Carol majored in Russian Studies at Amherst College, where he received his B.A.,
magna cum laude, in 1977.
He earned a Juris Doctor and Masters (Foreign Affairs) degrees from the
University of Virginia in 1981, after which he worked in the law firm of
Ginsburg, Feldman and Bress before coming to Amtrak.
He currently lives in Old Lyme, CT, with his wife Karen and two sons. Mr. Corder is the former
administrator of what is now Virginia's Rail and Public Transportation
Department. He was Virginia's first
administrator for rail transportation planning and initiated development of the
state’s first rail plan which was the catalyst for getting Virginia involved
in providing funds for both rail freight and passenger service. Mr. Corder is nationally
known in the transportation planning field, particularly in rail planning.
He helped organize the National Conference of State Railway Officials,
served as Virginia's delegate to that organization and was chairman
of Region 2 (southeastern states) of that organization.
During his tenure as rail administrator, he successfully urged the state
to embrace funding for the rehabilitation of shortline railroads, the
construction of rail spur lines into business sites, and the Virginia railway
express commuter service.
In recognition of his
work in rail transportation, Mr. Corder received the president's modal award
from AASHTO for providing exemplary service in furthering the interests of rail
transportation in the United States. He was also awarded the transportation achievement award by ITE for his
efforts in restoring rail service on Virginia's eastern shore. Mr. Corder is a member of
the International Institute of Transportation Engineers.
He has served as chairman of ITE's District 5
(southeastern states),
president of the Virginia section of ITE, and has served on numerous ITE
committees.
Tom
Dugan has been Executive Director of the Chattanooga Area Regional
Transportation Authority (CARTA) since
1980. In this capacity he is
responsible for a transit agency of 170 employees with a $10 million operating
budget. CARTA provides traditional
fixed-route transit services and paratransit services for the disabled.
In addition, CARTA operates the Lookout Mountain Incline Railway and is
the operator of the largest electric bus system in the world as part of its
unique downtown shuttle and parking system.
For
most of 1999 and early 2000, Mr. Dugan was on leave of absence from CARTA and
worked directly for Chattanooga Mayor Jon Kinsey as a transportation advisor.
Among the projects undertaken on behalf of the Mayor were: (1)
development of new transportation policies regarding distribution of Surface
Transportation Funding so as to allocate more funds to transit, pedestrian, and
bicycle projects; (2) researching work done on smart growth policies and their
impact on transportation; (3) representing the City on the Atlanta-Chattanooga
Maglev Project Steering Committee; (4) representing the City at meetings
involving passenger rail.
Prior
to coming to Chattanooga, Mr. Dugan worked with the Ohio Department of
Transportation and the Fort Wayne Public Transportation Corporation. He holds a Bachelor’s degree from Denison University and a
Master’s degree from Ohio State University.
Raymond
H. Ellis
Raymond
Ellis is the National Director of
the Transportation Consulting Practice of KPMG Peat Marwick LLP.
He provides oversight and direction to the planning and consulting
assignments which KPMG undertakes for state, and local departments of
transportation; public transit agencies; metropolitan planning organizations;
and the Federal Highway Administration and Federal Transit Administration of the
U.S. Department of Transportation. Dr.
Ellis has over 30 years of transportation consulting experience.
He received his B.S. degree in Civil Engineering from Swarthmore College
and his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Civil Engineering from Northwestern
University. Roger
Figura
Roger
Figura is a senior manager in
KPMG Consulting LLC Transportation Practice.
He has over twenty-five years of experience. His work focuses on economic and financial analysis of
transportation investments and operations, economic impact and benefit-cost
analyses, and innovative financing. Dr.
Figura’s projects include financial feasibility analyses, financial capacity
assessments, financial planning and management, innovative financing and joint
development; asset management, and economic impact and benefit-cost analyses. He
conducted the economic impact analyses for KPMG's work in the Washington
DC-to-Charlotte and Raleigh-to-Charlotte high-speed rail corridors. He also was
lead analyst and manager for the economic impact analysis of the New York to
Montreal high-speed rail corridor. He is the project manager for our nearly
completed work on the Atlanta-to-Chattanooga Maglev project, KPMG's financial
plan for the LAX to Ontario Maglev project, and has developed the financing
strategy for the $1.5 billion Cross Harbor Tunnel linking Brooklyn and the New
Jersey waterfront. Dr Figura has presented results of economic impact studies at
two national Rail-Volution meetings and land use impacts of rail investments at
a national meeting of the Urban Land Institute.
Rex
Hammond, President
Rex
Hammond is the President of the Lynchburg Regional Chamber of Commerce. He has
managed business associations since 1984 in South Dakota, North Carolina and
Georgia prior to moving to Virginia one year ago.
Mr.
Hammond is a graduate of South Dakota State University with a degree in
Journalism. He has done graduate work at the University of North Carolina and
East Carolina University. He
graduated from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Institute for Organization
Management at Stanford University.
Mr.
Hammond has additional career experiences as a newspaper editor, a congressional
press secretary, a lobbyist, and an aide to the Governor and Lt. Governor of
South Dakota. He has quickly become immersed in the Greater Lynchburg
business community and serves on several local board including: Regional
Renaissance, Sister City Plus, Lynchburg Area Development Corporation, Central
Virginia Foundation for Economic Education and Improvement, Sports Capital of
Virginia, Business Development Centre, Greater Lynchburg Transit Company, and
the Institute of Manufacturing Technology.
He is the executive secretary for the Committee to Advance the
TransDominion Express and the chairman of the Central Virginia Council of
Chambers.
James
R. Hassinger, Ph.D., AICP
Jim
Hassinger is Executive Director of Richmond Regional Planning District
Commission and current Chairman of the American Planning Association Division of
Intergovernmental Relations. He previously worked as Planning and Development Director for
the City of Jackson, Mississippi and worked on the City’s train terminal
restoration project there - a key link on the City of New Orleans route.
Prior work included Executive Director of Chattanooga Venture and
Advanced Planning Director for the Chattanooga-Hamilton County Regional Planning
Commission & MPO. He served as
a faculty member with the University of Alabama-Birmingham, Center for Public
Affairs and the Department of Public Administration and Political Science, where
he conducted contract research on fiscal and environmental impact studies.
He also chaired the City of Birmingham industrial museum project
involving adaptive reuse of the city's iron furnaces into a visitors center and
cultural events facility. He is an
alumnus of Penn State University with degrees in psychology, regional planning,
and man-environment relations.
The
Honorable Timothy M. Kaine, Mayor, City of Richmond, Virginia
Timothy
M. Kaine was elected to Richmond City Council in 1994 and became Mayor in 1998.
He graduated Summa Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Missouri
in 1979, and received his law degree Cum Laude from Harvard Law School in 1983.
During law school,
Mr.
Kaine took a leave of absence for one year to serve as the principal at the
Institute Tenico Loyola, a vocational school teaching carpentry and welding to
youngsters in El Progreso, Honduras.
As
a City Councilman and Mayor, Mr. Kaine has focused his energies on improving
public safety, strengthening the city's public schools, promoting economic
development that respects the character of Richmond’s history and
architecture, and making city government more accessible to all citizens. The
City has attracted national attention during Mr. Kaine's tenure for its dramatic
reductions in violent crime-homicide has fallen by 60% since 1994 and total
violent crime has dropped by 45%.
Mr.
Kaine has led efforts to construct new schools as part of a strategy to reduce
school and class sizes. Richmond has opened four new schools since 1998 -the
first new construction done in the city’s system in over 20 years. Instead of
a historic trend of spending 11% of city capital funds for education. Mr. Kaine
had led a re-prioritization so that the city now invests 40% of its capital
budget in school construction and rehabilitation.
Richmond's
economic development has been strong, with a huge increase in high-technology
business anchored by a Bio-Tech Research Park in the downtown area that is a
collaboration between the city government, surrounding jurisdictions, the
Medical College of Virginia and the Commonwealth of Virginia. Together with his
colleagues on Richmond City Council. Mr. Kaine implemented a property tax
abatement program in 1995 that has spurred significant rehabilitation of
Richmond's historic building stock. Recently, the city re-opened its historic
canal system-designed by George Washington -as a primary downtown development
feature complementing the wilderness beauty of the James River running through
the heart of the city.
In
addition to his public role, Mr. Kaine is a director at McCandlish, Kaine, &
Grant, a Richmond - based law firm with offices in North Carolina, France and
China. He is a trial lawyer with extensive experience in commercial law and
civil rights litigation, with a special focus on cases dealing with
discrimination in the housing and insurance industries. For his civil rights
work, Mr. Kaine has received awards from the Richmond Bar Association, the
National Fair Housing Alliance and Trail Lawyers for Public Justice. Mr. Kaine
also taught legal ethics for 6 years at the University of Richmond Law School.
Mr.
Kaine has been married to Anne Bright Holton, a juvenile court judge, since
1984. They have three children.
Monica
Long
Monica
Long, a Senior Transportation Planner, joined the Atlanta Regional Commission in
August of 1998, from the Macon-Bibb County Planning and Zoning Commission where
she began her professional planning career as an associate planner. With the Atlanta Regional Commission, Ms. Long is currently managing the
Marietta to Lawrenceville Transportation Study, the first cross-radial, suburb
to suburb study of its kind, and has served as project manager for the Interim
Transportation Improvement Program. Ms.
Long is also responsible for long and short-range transit planning for the
Atlanta Region which includes programming projects for Metropolitan Atlanta
Rapid Transit Authority, Cobb Community Transit, interagency coordination, FTA
liaison, monitoring transit studies, Commuter Rail, etc., in addition to
Chairing the Transit Operator’s Subcommittee. Ms. Long is also the planning
representative for two of the fastest growing suburban counties, one of which
includes the only suburban transit system in the 13 county non-attainment area.
Ms.
Long received her Master’s Degree in Urban and Regional Planning from the
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1997, the same institution in
which she received her bachelor’s degree in Psychology. Ms. Long, a native of Chicago, relocated to Georgia to begin her career
in Macon.
Stephen
A. MacIsaac
Stephen A. MacIsaac is currently
serving as the Acting Director of Operations for the Virginia Railway Express.
He has been the Deputy County Attorney for Prince William County since
1989, and has been employed in the County Attorney’s Office since 1982.
In addition to his responsibilities in the County Attorney’s Office,
Mr. MacIsaac has served as legal counsel to the VRE since its creation,
providing all legal services relating to the VRE commuter rail project.
Mr. MacIsaac received his bachelors of art degree from Tufts University
and his juris doctorate from the Washington College of Law of the American
University.
The
Honorable John Mason, Mayor, City of Fairfax, Virginia Mayor
Mason is serving his sixth term as mayor. A resident of the city since 1975, he
served two terms on Council before being elected mayor in 1990. He served as
president of the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments (COG) and serves
on COG's Board of Directors. He is a Vice Chairman of the National Capital
Region's Transportation Planning Board, Vice Chair of the Transportation
Coordinating Council of Northern Virginia and on the Virginia Municipal League
Transportation Committee. He also serves on the city's Community Remediation
Committee, addressing issues associated with the Pickett Road tank farm
remediation. The mayor, who is a Vice President at Science Applications
International Corporation (SAIC), received a B.A. from the University of
Massachusetts and an M.A. in political science from New York University. He
served 21 years in the U.S. Army, including tours in Vietnam and Germany,
retiring as a colonel. He and his wife Jeanette have three adult children and
live in Old Lee Hills. Kevin
Page, a Rail Transportation Engineer Senior, joined the Virginia Department of
Rail and Public Transportation (VDRPT) in 1993. He started with VDRPT as Program and Grants Manager for the
small rural public transportation providers.
He is currently the Project Manager and Grants Manager for the Rail
Industrial Access and Rail Preservation Program. Other areas of responsibility include development of the
state rail map and the state rail plan.
Mr.
Page has held previous positions with the City of Petersburg as Transit Manager,
(1986-1993), and with the Greater Richmond Transit Company as Transit Management
Intern, (1985-1986). Mr. Page
received his B.S. in Urban Planning at Virginia Commonwealth University, School
of Community Services in 1986.
Samuel
S. Reid
The
Rhode Island Governor’s lead advisor for transportation, energy and
environmental issues from 1995 to 1998, and since that time the Director of the
State’s Washington Office, Sam Reid has been involved in the development of
policies and their implementation for a variety of rail issues.
Examples
include negotiating expanded commuter rail service between Providence and
Boston, drafting the State’s filing before the Surface Transportation Board
concerning Rhode Island’s position on the Conrail sale, finalizing the
purchase of the Providence and Worcester’s Washington Secondary line for reuse
as a bike path, and lobbying Congress to fund the State’s $150 million Freight
Rail Improvement Project to bring double-stack clearances to the port of Quonset
/ Davisville.
He
has also been the lead contact on the Governor’s proposal to construct not
only an intermodal train station facility on the Northeast Corridor at the T.F.
Green Airport in Warwick, Rhode Island but also private sector development
including a proposed 300 room hotel and one million square feet of mixed use and
office space integrated with the transportation facility into a “transit
village”. Mr. Reid is a graduate
of Trinity College, Hartford Connecticut and holds a Master’s degree in Urban
and Environmental Policy from Tufts University.
He resides in Washington D.C. with his wife Juliet and two children.
Paul
Reistrup is Vice President, Passenger Integration, for CSX Transportation,
working out of Washington, D.C. He
received a B.S. in Engineering from the United States Military Academy in West
Point, N.Y., in 1954, and started his railroad career in 1959 as an Assistant
Division Engineer with the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad.
From 1961 to 1963, he was a General Yardmaster, Trainmaster, and
Superintendent Car Utilization and Distribution for the B&O Railroad.
In 1964, Mr. Reistrup served as the Director of Passenger Service for the
B&O/C&O Railroad, then in 1966 became Assistant to the Vice President,
Executive Department, B&O/C&O Railroad.
In 1967, Mr. Reistrup became the Vice President-Passenger Service, for
the Illinois Central Railroad, and in 1968, the Illinois Central Intermodal
Service Vice President. Between
1970 and 1975, Mr. Reistrup served as Senior Vice President-Traffic, for the
Illinois Central. In 1975, Mr.
Reistrup became Amtrak’s President and CEO which he continued until 1978.
From 1978 to 1988, Mr. Reistrup was Vice President for R.L. Banks and
Associates, and in 1988 returned to the railroad business as President of the
Monongahela Railway Company. From
1992 to 1994, Mr. Reistrup served as the General Manager for the Railroad
Development Corporation. In 1994,
Mr. Reistrup was Vice President for the Parsons Brinckerhoff, Railroad
Development Corporation. In 1997,
Mr. Reistrup came to CSX Transportation in Washington D.C., where he is
currently Vice President for Passenger Integration.
Mr.
Reistrup is a member of the Transportation Research Board’s Committee on
Electrification and Train Central System. He
also has membership on the American Railway Engineering Association, the
American Association of Railway Superintendents, and the Association of
Transportation Law, Logistics, and Policy.
Mr.
Reistrup was born in Sioux City, Iowa, and his family includes his wife, Mary
Caffey Reistrup (“Tat”) and four children.
Richard
Remington is the Director of Communications for Amtrak’s Northwest Corridor
since early 1995. Mr. Remington is
the chief spokesman for the Acela High-Speed Rail project.
Prior to his current position, Mr. Remington worked for New Jersey
Transit Corporation and as a reporter for the Newark Star Ledger covering
transportation at the state capitol in Trenton, New Jersey.
Mr.
RePass is President and CEO of the bi-partisan National Corridors Initiative, an
outgrowth of the Northeast Corridor Initiative founded by Mr. RePass in 1989.
The NCI developed broad-based support for the restart of the Northeast Corridor
Improvement Project (NECIP), to bring true High-Speed Rail (150 mph+) to
America. The National Corridors
version of that regional effort was launched in January of 1995, and held its
first Conference “The National Corridors Initiative: Reinventing the Land
Grant” in August 1996 in Newport, RI, shortly after groundbreaking for the
final phase of NECIP, which Amtrak now calls the Northeast Corridor High-Speed
Rail Project. It has also held national conferences in Atlanta, New Orleans, and
Washington, DC, with former Presidential candidate Michael Dukakis and Amtrak
Reform Council Chair Gil Carmichael as keynote speakers in 1999. Amtrak Board
Chair Tommy Thompson and APTA President Bill Millar, as well as Sen. Kay Bailey
Hutchison (R-TX), are confirmed for 2000’s June 26-27 conference.
For
the Northeast Corridor Initiative, Mr. RePass organized and led three high-level
delegations to the White House. These meetings culminated in an agreement by the
Office of Management and Budget to cease blocking the release of funds for the
Corridor. These funds, initially $125 million, were then made available to
Amtrak through the efforts of Sen. Frank Lautenberg and Sen. Pat Moynihan and
others. Amtrak used the money to let contracts for the design engineering for
the electrification of the Corridor, and other infrastructure improvements to
permit High-Speed Rail operation. Former Senator Claiborne Pell of Rhode
Island, a rail transportation advocate and author of critical legislation
backing rail development in the United States, has publicly credited Mr. RePass
and the NCI with being responsible for breaking a 10-year logjam permitting the
re-start of the Northeast Corridor project, which at this point a decade later
is nearly complete.
Mr.
RePass has served on the Governor’s Blue Ribbon Panel on Infrastructure
Finance for the State of Rhode Island. He was asked by the U.S. Department of
Transportation to comment on the drafting of the USDOT’s proposal for the
successor to the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act, TEA-21, and
was also asked to testify before the United States Senate on this matter. In 1995 he served as a member of the National Forum for the
Future of Passenger Rail, whose recommendations were a part of the basis for the
1997 Amtrak Reform and Accountability Act of 1997. This Act, which provided
access to $2.3 billion in immediate capital and $5 billion over five years in
authorizations, was signed by the President in December of 1997 and marked what
many believe was the turnaround event in the survival of the national passenger
rail system.
The
National Corridors Initiative is an attempt to bring to bear the same
bi-partisan organizational and advocacy skills developed for the Northeast
Corridor effort to other regions of the United States where Corridors—some
high-speed, some not, but all sharing the potential for economic viability if
properly funded and structured—are trying to happen.
Mr.
RePass is a graduate of Wesleyan University with a degree in Government, and was
trained as a journalist at The Washington Post and The St. Petersburg Times. He
is a principal of RePass & Lyons Inc., a management consultancy founded in
1983 which specializes in the design and execution of marketing strategies for
technology, energy and transportation companies. A native of New Orleans, he
lives in Boston. Elizabeth
Sanford, AICP
Elizabeth
Sanford is founder and principal of Sycamore Consulting, Inc. in Decatur
(metropolitan Atlanta), Georgia. As
a leading consultant in public participation and environmental justice issues,
Ms. Sanford has acted as a community relations specialist for EPA on Superfund
sites, served as public involvement coordinator on numerous west coast
transportation projects, provided consulting expertise for public involvement on
the Hartsfield (Atlanta) International Airport project, and currently provides
on-call technical assistance on matters dealing with public involvement and
environmental justice for the American Association of State Highway Officials.
Ms Sanford’s accomplishments in environmental justice include acting as
team leader for environmental justice assessments and public participation for
the Atlanta-Chattanooga Maglev Deployment Program, provided environmental
justice analysis for the I-16/I-75 Improvement Project, and prepared the
environmental justice analysis of potential impacts associated with adding a
sixth runway to Hartsfield Airport. Ms.
Sanford also has extensive experience in environmental impact studies,
transportation planning, and transportation demand management programs.
Prior
to starting her own consulting firm, Ms. Sanford worked at the Atlanta Regional
Commission as a Principal Planner, Weston Consultants as a Senior Planner and as
an Environmental Planner with TAMS Consultants, Inc.
Ms. Sanford holds a Master’s Degree in City Planning from the Georgia
Institute of Technology, and a B.A. in Urban Studies from Colgate University.
She is a member of the American Planning Association, the American
Institute of Certified Planners and was a past member of APA’s International
Division Executive Committee. In
her free time, Ms. Sanford serves as
President of the Atlanta Chapter of the Women’s Transportation Seminar, has
served on the Transportation Research Board’s
Committee on Environmental Analysis and Sub-Committee on Environmental
Justice, and has authored four nationally recognized publications on
transportation and environmental issues.
A
native of North Carolina, Mr. Simmons has lived and worked in the Tar Heel State
from the mountains to the sea-coast. He,
and his wife Sue reside in Raleigh. They
have one son.
Mr.
Simmons is a graduate of New Hanover High School (1970), Cape Fear Community
College (1970, Marine Technology) and the University of North Carolina at
Wilmington (1976, BA in Psychology and BS in Marine Biology) and has completed
graduate work in public administration at Louisiana State University.
Mr.
Simmons transportation credentials span design and operation of the AppalCART
public transportation system, which serves Boone, Appalachian State University
and Watauga County, to planning for high-speed rail operations.
He was initially recruited by the NCDOT to develop and manage rural and
small urban transportation programs. Mr. Simmons managed the State’s
Rail Program from 1988 to 1992, and following an excursion into niche market
computer software sales, he re-cycled back to the NCDOT in September 1994 to
direct the newly-formed Rail Division.
Ann
Steedly, EIT
Ms.
Steedly joined the NCDOT Rail Division as a planner in July of 1998.
Her duties during her first year included improving communication between
the Rail Division and metropolitan planning organizations, preparing a summary
report of Rail Division activities and helping put on a statewide Rail and
Transit conference for approximately 500 political leaders and planners.
Ms. Steedly currently manages many of the public outreach aspects of the
Southeast High-Speed Rail Corridor Tier I Environmental Impact Statement study
from Washington, DC to Charlotte, NC. Outreach
activities on this project include 26 introductory public and elected officials
workshops, a public opinion survey, direct mail outreach to over 225,000
addresses along the study corridors, development of a project database, written
materials including newsletters, fact sheets and a web site, community outreach
research targeting historically underrepresented groups and 60 small group
meetings that provide the project team with flexibility for further outreach.
Before
Ms. Steedly came to the NCDOT Rail Division, she worked outside of Washington,
D.C. at Black & Veatch, a private engineering firm, doing strategic and
financial planning for municipal utilities throughout the Mid-Atlantic.
In addition to developing financial models and forecasts, she
administered and interpreted survey results that compared a given utility’s
performance to that of other utilities. She
also worked actively with citizen advisory groups to obtain their input and
develop position papers based on their concerns regarding utility operations and
long-term planning.
Ms.
Steedly received a Bachelor of Science degree in Civil Engineering from Virginia
Tech in 1994 and an MBA from the University of Georgia in 1996.
G.
Alexander Taft
G.
Alexander Taft, a transportation professional with nearly twenty-five years of
experience, was appointed Executive Directive of Association of Metropolitan
Planning Organizations (AMPO) on February 28, 2000.
AMPO represents metropolitan planning organizations throughout the nation
responsible for coordination, review, and approval of transportation plans,
programs and projects. Previous to
his appointment, Mr. Taft was on the board of directors of AMPO and was
Executive Director of WILMAPCO, the metropolitan planning organization in
Wilmington, DE, where he directed the development of an innovative long-range
transportation plan and received a national excellence award for an outstanding
public participation process.
Mr.
Taft previously was Transportation Director for the City of Wilmington,
Delaware, where he introduced modern management of downtown parking, improved
public transit operations and instituted effective traffic control.
He formerly was a Senior Associate with Cambridge Systematics, Inc, of
Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he managed a transportation section and directed
numerous projects. He began his
transportation career in the City of Boston, rising from Traffic Management
Assistant to Transportation Advisor to the Mayor.
Mr. Taft received a B.S. from Washington & Lee University and a
Master’s Degree in Urban Affairs from Boston University.
Alan
C. Tobias
Alan
Tobias, a Rail
Transportation Engineer Senior, joined the Virginia Department of Rail and
Public Transportation in 1993. He
is currently the Project Manager for Rail Corridor Studies in the Washington
D.C. to Richmond Corridor, Richmond to Newport News, and
the Bristol Rail
Passenger Study. He is also the
Grant Manager for Virginia Railway Express (VRE) and rail station renovation
projects across the Commonwealth and is involved in all studies concerning
improving passenger rail services in Virginia.
In
the fall of 1996 and 1997, Mr. Tobias served as an Adjunct Professor, Land Use
and Transportation, at Virginia Commonwealth University.
Mr. Tobias has held previous positions as Assistant General Manager for
the Greater Lynchburg Transit Company (1986-1989); Assistant to the Director for
Chapel Hill (NC) Transit (1982-1986); Transportation Planner for the Central
Virginia Planning District in Lynchburg, Va. (1981-1982); and Transit Management
Intern with NCDOT, 1980. Mr. Tobias
received his Masters in Urban and Regional Planning in 1981 from the University
of North Carolina; and received his B.A. in Sociology (with honors) in 1979,
from the University of Virginia.
As
Director of the Federal Railroad Administration’s (FRA) Office of Passenger
Programs, Mr. Yachmetz has direct management responsibility for all of FRA's
non-safety related passenger program responsibilities. This includes the
Department's complex relationship with Amtrak, the Next Generation High-Speed
Rail technology development and demonstration program, the Department's
participation in the Pennsylvania Station Redevelopment Corporation, capital
assistance to the passenger operations of the Alaska Railroad and the
Secretary's responsibilities as a member of the Amtrak Reform Council.
Prior
to assuming this position, Mr. Yachmetz held a number of management positions in
FRA including: Director of the High-Speed Rail Staff; Executive Director of the
National Maglev Initiative; Chief of the Community and Shipper Assistance
Division; and as a program manager in the National Freight Assistance program.
He has also served as Special Assistant to FRA Administrators John Riley and Gil
Carmichael. In
1989, Mr. Yachmetz was selected as a Congressional Fellow and served as a senior
member of the professional staff (majority) of the Committee on Energy and
Commerce of the U.S. House of Representatives.
Mr.
Yachmetz has a degree in Civil Engineering from the University of Maryland, is
married and lives in Alexandria, Virginia.
The
Honorable Shirley J. Ybarra, Secretary of Transportation, Commonwealth of
Virginia Shirley
Ybarra, Secretary of Transportation for the Commonwealth of Virginia, was
appointed to her present post by Governor Jim Gilmore, effective January 18
1998. She brings wide experience in both commercial and governmental
transportation policy-making to her position, in which she is responsible for
the state's transportation programs. The
Secretary is charged with oversight of the development and implementation of
Virginia’s transportation program. She has management and budgetary
responsibility for the Department of Transportation, Department of Motor
Vehicles, Department of Aviation, Department of Rail and Public Transportation,
the Motor Vehicles Dealer Board, and the Virginia Port Authority. These agencies
combined employ over 12,000 people with a total budget of over S3.2 billion. In
addition, the Secretary of Transportation serves as Chairman of the Commonwealth
Transportation Board, which oversees highway construction, highway use
regulations, compliance with federal transportation laws, and administration of
the Transportation Trust Fund and The Highway Maintenance and Operating Fund. Most
recently, Secretary Ybarra served as Deputy Secretary of Transportation,
appointed by Governor George Allen in April 1994. In 1995, Governor Allen
appointed Deputy Secretary Ybarra to serve as one of the Administration
representatives on the newly established Commonwealth Competition Council. The
Council examines and promotes methods of providing some government-provided or
government-produced programs and services through the private sector through a
competitive contracting program. Further the Council encourages innovation and
competition within state government. Ms.
Ybarra was the special assistant for policy to U.S. Secretary of Transportation
Elizabeth Dole from 1983 to 1987. She managed the effort to secure passage of
federal, state and District of Columbia legislation to transfer National and
Dulles Airports to a new, independent, regional authority. She chaired the
transition team through the planning and implementation of financial and
administrative Systems to enable the new authority to operate the airports She
also analyzed legislative and regulatory issues affecting all transportation
modes and recommended appropriate policies to the Secretary. Just
prior to being appointed deputy secretary, Ms. Ybarra was executive vice
president of Stateside Associates, a state government affairs consulting
firm in Arlington, Virginia. As chief operating officer, she directed financial
and administrative functions as well as projects for the company. Earlier,
Ms. Ybarra was president of the Americas of ABC International, where she
reorganized the operations ofan1Anierican subsidiary of the United
Kingdom's largest publishing and information company. She also had served as
vice president and partner with the New York consulting firm of Siam, Helliesen
and Eichner, Inc., where she designed and directed transportation and economic
consulting projects for airlines, aerospace firms and related trade
associations. She
received both her undergraduate and master's degrees from the University of
Nebraska.
|
