Move the Era Podcast

Jonathan French is a licensed professional engineer residing in Hallowell, Maine and a member of the Advisory Board at Build the Era and webinar co-host. He's the Engineering Data Manager at Maine DOT with 6 years in construction, 19 years in design and a specialty in roundabout design. Join host Jeanne Acutanza as she chats with Jonathan about the American Jobs Plan, his passion for roundabouts and safety, and how roundabouts can be a part of that solution.

Vicki Scuri is the creative force behind Vicki Scuri Siteworks(1)We discuss her early career starting with her work on the Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel including an interview back in 1990 with the New York Times(2). Her current work includes beautiful new screens at the
South Bellevue Light Rail Station(3) and lighting as part of the East Kellogg corridor improvements in Wichita, KS(4) and read her blog(5) about the design process. You can see photos of Vicki's selected works at https://buildtheera.com/vscuriphotos

1)http://vickiscuri.com/
2)https://www.nytimes.com/1990/10/04/garden/currents-in-commuter-tunnel-art-at-every-stop.html
3)https://www.soundtransit.org/system-expansion/south-bellevue-station
4)https://vickiscuri.blog/2019/11/04/progress-update-east-kellogg-in-wichita-ks/
5)https://eastkelloggimprovements.com/about

Join host Jeanne Acutanza as she chats with Dr. Laura Schewel, the CEO of Streetlight, a big transportation data purveyor who talks about the American Jobs plan with the pitch to measure our progress. Laura started Streetlight after recognizing the expansive use of GPS and geospatial locational data to evaluate transportation patterns. Join in as they discuss the different applications for assessing bike travel patterns, safety, an assessment of pandemic travel patterns, evaluating climate impacts and assessing socio economic data. Laura also talks about the American Jobs Plan.

Learn more about Streetlight Data: https://www.streetlightdata.com/who-we-are-streetlight-data/
Dr. Schewel's recent article "We can’t meet America’s equitable, sustainable transportation goals until we “grade” our progress" can be found at: https://bit.ly/3z0669c

Dr. Anne Goodchild is a Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering who founded the Supply Chain Transportation and Logistics Center at the University of Washington and advises the work of the Urban Freight Lab. Dr. Goodchild oversees cutting- edge research in the area of Urban Freight. On this episode we talk about the incredible growth in urban freight during the pandemic, and how the pandemic may have been the disrupter that might change the future of urban freight. The Urban Freight Lab has done research on the "Last 50 Feet" which is helping to redefine how urban freight is delivered.

Dr. Anne Goodchild
https://www.supply-chain-transportation.uw.edu/academic-experience/faculty-staff/

Supply Chain & Transportation Logistics Center at the University of Washington
https://www.supply-chain-transportation.uw.edu/

The Urban Freight Lab
https://depts.washington.edu/sctlctr/urban-freight-lab-0

Mike Pillsbury is the COO of Henniker Associates (https://www.hennikerassociates.com/). He has a demonstrated history working in the transportation/trucking/railroad industry and a long history working in Government and overseeing Highway Operations and Maintenance, P3’s, Construction, Environmental Awareness, Emergency Response and Contract Management.

The organization Mike mentions at the end of the podcast that provides people returning from prison immediate paid employment, skills training, and ongoing career support is the Center for Employment Opportunities. More info can be found on their website https://ceoworks.org/

Join host Jeanne Acutanza as she chats with Dr. Jeralee Anderson, CEO and Co-Founder of Greenroads International, a globally recognized independent 501(c)(3) non-profit organization leading the green and equitable transformation of the transportation industry and infrastructure through education and the independent third-party sustainability certification of transportation projects.
You can find out more about Greenroads at https://www.greenroads.org/ and check if there are projects in your area that meet the certification at https://www.greenroads.org/portfolio
Find out more about Dr. Anderson here: https://www.greenroads.org/1622/ops-team.html.
Dr. Anderson talks about a different but similar certification tool developed for FHWA that she worked on called INVEST. INVEST (Infrastructure Voluntary Evaluation Sustainability Tool) is a web-based self-evaluation tool comprised of voluntary sustainability best practices, called criteria, which cover the full lifecycle of transportation services, including system planning, project planning, design, and construction, and continuing through operations and maintenance. Find about it at https://www.sustainablehighways.org/
These sustainability certifications for transportation infrastructure are voluntary and not currently required for infrastructure investments; however, these projects are often cost saving and contribute to a more sustainable future. These certifications are similar to the certification system developed by the US Green Building Council https://www.usgbc.org/ for sustainability called LEED. (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) You can learn more about that at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leadership_in_Energy_and_Environmental_Design

You can watch the Ted Talk that Dr. Anderson mentions at: https://www.ted.com/talks/jeralee_anderson_how_can_we_build_greener_roads

Big data has exploded in the last decade, especially as applied in transportation. Starting from GPS in commercial vehicles and evolving to mobile phones, when this data is fused and synthesized it gives us real-time and historical data. From monitoring current road conditions, measuring performance, offering real time choices and making our roads safer, Big Data is helping to transform the industry. Join me when I talk to Ted Trepanier. He started his career with the Washington State DOT and has been with INRIX, a big data fusion company for more than a decade. He’ll talk to us about big data, privacy, and encouraging innovation in our public agencies.

Big Data Moves the Era Show notes
INRIX https://inrix.com/
About Ted Trepanier: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ted-trepanier-14206516/
Contact Ted [email protected]
You can see traffic trends during the pandemic via Inrix here https://inrix.com/covid-19-transportation-trends
WSDOT Driver tips for Thanksgiving Weekend (pre covid) https://wsdot.wa.gov/travel/times/holidays/thanksgiving/driver-tips

Steven Gorcester is the owner of Performance Plane LLC a sole proprietorship consultancy to assist local government agencies in developing, funding and implementing transportation infrastructure.

His work includes developing partnerships, and financing. While he was the Director of the Washington State Transportation Improvement Board (http://www.tib.wa.gov/), he oversaw development of performance monitoring dashboards (http://www.tib.wa.gov/performance/performance.cfm) that received awards. These performance dashboards not only improve delivery but helped build confidence in infrastructure investments across the state.

Steve was instrumental in Relight Washington (http://www.tib.wa.gov/media/newscontent/items/2015/relight%20washington.pdf) to upgrade lighting in small cities to LED lighting to save annual operating dollars (https://www.bothell-reporter.com/news/pse-partners-with-state-to-launch-relight-washington/).

He has been guided by and uses the Toyota Production System (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35422164-the-toyota-engagement-equation) and follows Lean Six Sigma Principles used in industry. He remains committed to the application of Lean principles in government.

Introducing Move the Era, a transportation related podcast with your host, Jeanne Acutanza, who provides a brief summary what this podcast is all about. Come #LearnAboutDOT!