Robert E. Lewis is currently the interim director of public works with the City of Suffolk, Virginia. He has more than three decades of traffic engineering and public works experience and  has been the key stakeholder for the implementation and systemic development of Opticom™ Priority Control in Suffolk. A past president of the Virginia Section Institute of Transportation Engineers, he’s a well-respected leader in traffic safety throughout the Tidewater area and the Commonwealth of Virginia.

Chris Watkins, a field solution engineer with Whelen Engineering, joins the podcast to discuss a new partnership between the Connecticut-based lightbar manufacturer and Global Traffic Technologies, the makers of Opticom. 

As part of the new Whelen Cloud Platform for enhanced fleet management, first responders in vehicles equipped with the Whelen Cloud Platform will be able to deploy Opticom centralized preemption.

Global Traffic Technologies Senior VP of Sales Terry Griffith joins the podcast to discuss a recently-released white paper from the company that describes how Internet of Things-based transportation, transit and public safety technology solutions can transform cities by enhancing safety, delivering efficiencies and reducing harmful pollutants.

In the paper, GTT proposes six calls to action designed to improve road infrastructure and transit systems while prioritizing safety, health and equity. 

Today’s episode focuses on the white paper's second call to action, in which GTT echoes President Biden’s goal of reducing traffic accidents and eliminating traffic deaths entirely by advancing “Vision Zero” in communities nationwide. 

Ravi Shah, the VP of product development at Global Traffic Technologies, joins the podcast to discuss  the first and sixth calls to action of the recently released GTT white paper about significantly increasing intersection connectivity by 2030, and connecting the cloud and intersections with all new vehicles by 2035. This is the second episode of a special six-part podcast series that explores each of those calls to action in greater detail.

Global Traffic Technologies President Nicole Rennalls joins the podcast to discuss a recently-released white paper from the company that describes how Internet of Things-based transportation, transit and public safety technology solutions can transform cities by enhancing safety, delivering efficiencies and reducing harmful pollutants. In the paper, GTT proposes six calls to action designed to improve road infrastructure and transit systems while prioritizing safety, health and equity. This is the first episode of a special six-part podcast series that explores each of these calls to action in greater detail.

Captain Pat McDermott is a 26-year veteran of the Metro West Fire Protection District in the St. Louis area. He spearheaded the district’s transition from IR to radio-based preemption. 

Chris Tuff is the Deputy Chief Executive Officer of the Central New York Regional Transportation Authority (aka, CENTRO) in Syracuse, NY. He joined the podcast to talk about how CENTRO has dealt with the COVID-19 pandemic and about how lessons learned from 2020 may impact the transit industry moving forward. 

Tommy Donley, a patrol officer with the Mason (OH) Police Department, shares stories about the impact of priority control he has seen first-hand in the field.

Mike Borrello has been a paramedic and volunteer firefighter for 25 years and is the host of the popular YouTube channel, Heroes Next Door.  He joined the podcast for a wide-ranging conversation on the channel's mission, it's immense popularity and why preemption is so beneficial to the industry.

Eric Wood, chief innovation officer with the police department in Chula Vista (CA), was the department's police technology manager for nearly five years. In 2020, he helped launch a pilot program with the CVPD, GTT and Motorola to make the CVPD the first law enforcement agency in the country to deploy a new cloud-hosted, incident-based priority control solution from Opticom™.