Featured Speakers
Tekin Meriçli, Ph.D. is a co-founder and the CTO of Locomation. Prior to Locomation, he was a special faculty – commercialization specialist at the National Robotics Engineering Center (NREC) of Carnegie Mellon's Robotics Institute, where he was also a senior robotics engineer. Since 2003, Meriçli has been practicing systems engineering across a wide variety of robots and systems, including autonomous and semi-autonomous ground vehicles, mapping, state estimation, and operator assist systems, perception and motion planning for ground and aerial robots, industrial automation and process improvement, wheeled tour guide and service robots, intelligent assistive robotic manipulators and search and rescue robots, and various legged robots. He also has over 40 publications in the areas of robotics and computer sciences, including best paper award recipients.
In 2021, Greg Regan was elected president of the Transportation Trades Department, AFL-CIO, a labor organization consisting of 33 unions that together represent workers in all areas of transportation. TTD focuses on federal legislation, regulatory matters, and policy issues that impact transportation workers.
In his current position, Regan leads and oversees TTD's daily operation and serves as the organization's spokesperson and chief strategist. He collaborates with TTD's affiliated unions to fight for long-term investments in our transportation system, ensure jobs in this sector are safe and secure, and to protect and expand the rights working people have to a union voice. Under Regan's direction, TTD works with elected leaders on both sides of the aisle and focuses on substantive, policy-driven arguments to advance core agenda items.
Prior to being elected president, Regan served as TTD's secretary-treasurer and senior legislative representative and oversaw TTD's work in aviation, passenger rail, and procurement. He is a leading labor expert on issues related to aviation safety and security, and led TTD's fight in 2015 for Amtrak reauthorization legislation that protects and promotes our national passenger rail service and its skilled workforce. In addition, he coordinates TTD's work to reform transportation procurement policy as a board member of the Jobs to Move America Coalition.
Pedro Rivera was named president of Thaddeus Stevens College of Technology in October 2020. Prior to joining the college, he served as Pennsylvania Secretary of Education. Prior to his appointment to Governor Wolf's Cabinet, Rivera served as superintendent of the School District of Lancaster. Additionally, he was a classroom teacher, assistant principal, principal, and executive director for the School District of Philadelphia, as well as a staff member with the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers.
During his time as Secretary, Rivera engaged with educators, administrators, parents and students, as well as business and industry leaders, higher education officials and others to guide the department’s work on issues that were important to the future of Pennsylvania. Through initiatives like PA Future Ready Index, Pennsylvania's Every Student Succeeds Act, Post-Secondary Attainment goals, and the Equity and Inclusion Toolkit, he has demonstrated his commitment to educational equity, a commitment that is foundational to the mission of Thaddeus Stevens College.
Rivera is a first-generation college graduate and earned a Bachelor of Science degree from The Pennsylvania State University, and a Master’s degree in Education Administration from Cheyney University.
Vivian Sun is a member of the senior management team driving customer acquisition and strategic partnerships at TuSimple. She also built TuSimple's automotive ecosystem and strategy with OEMs, Tier ones and suppliers including Navistar and ZF. As one of the earliest employees at TuSimple, she has been a key driver of the company's growth.
As the head of the business development team at TuSimple, Sun and her team consolidate the business resources across the company, streamline information and discover new areas of partnership opportunities. The BD team is unique that it covers both upstream OEM/Tier One relationships and downstream customers and partners.
Sun has leading roles in industry associations. She is a committee member of the American Trucking Association's Communications and Image Policy and Environmental and Energy Policy Committees. She served on the Vision Advisory Panel of San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG) to build the five-year vision of San Diego Transportation and Mobility System. She is also a frequent guest speaker at the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE), Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI) events as well as other leading conferences in the industry.
Sun holds a Master of Public Administration from Cornell University and a Bachelor of Science in Business Management from the University of Surrey.
Selika Talbott is an innovative transportation strategist, and motivational speaker. She is a founding partner of Autonomous Vehicle Consulting LLC, researching and educating on new mobility; shared, connected, autonomous and electric vehicle policy; and its impacts on governments, OEMs, and stakeholder communities. Talbott is a professorial lecturer at American University and, as the former senior advisor to the administrator of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, served as the co-chair for the FMCSA Automated Working Group as well as AAMVA (American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators) Automated Vehicle Work Group.
Talbott' work focuses on The Political Economy of Autonomous and Electric Vehicles and Equity in Transportation. She provides strategic assistance for transportation companies and associations helping to tie inclusion and diversity goals to business objectives as well as drive public engagement. She was formerly the deputy administrator for the State of New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission, the director of field Operations for the FMCSA and has over 18 years' experience as an attorney litigator.
She has spoken in front of audiences across the country and internationally on a variety of policy areas. Talbott currently serves on the Academic Advisory Council of PAVE (Partners for Automated Vehicle Education) and is a member of the Underwriters Laboratory Standards Technical Panel (STP) 4600-2 Evaluation of Autonomous Trucking. She is passionate about supporting people and organizations that are in pursuit of equitable transportation networks that provide mobility and freedom of movement for all.
Breakout Session Speakers
Session: Impact of CAVs in the Public Sector
Katelin Barone is a senior traffic engineer in the mobility engineering unit of the New Jersey Department of Transportation. She graduated from Rowan University with a bachelor's degree in civil engineering, and has been with the DOT for 4 and half years. Barone has experience working on Adaptive Signal Systems and implementing and maintaining these smart systems statewide. She regularly works with computer programs such as SCATS, to monitor and alleviate traffic where possible. Barone has worked on innovative projects including the NJDOT's Hard Shoulder Running, and Connected Vehicle initiatives, and she is looking forward to working toward the many possibilities of future roadway technologies.
Gabby Benson has experience and a strong skillset in traffic management center (TMC) operations, traffic incident management (TIM), and emergency management. Her experience has been obtained throughout her professional career at the Pennsylvania State Police, PennDOT, and as a consultant. During her time as project manager for the PennDOT Statewide Traffic Management Center (STMC), she used innovative TIM techniques to ensure safe and efficient travel, developed TMC operations training programs and standard operating procedures. Currently, Benson works as a TMC operations and incident management specialist for Drive Engineering, supporting PennDOT's Office of Transformational Technology in the development of an Automated Vehicle Incident Response Plan. She also works on multiple projects supporting traffic operations for the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission, NYSDOT, and RiDOT.
Kathleen A. Cameron has over 25 years of experience in the health care field as a pharmacist, researcher, and program director focusing on falls prevention, geriatric pharmacotherapy, mental health, long-term services and supports, and caregiving. Cameron is currently senior director at the National Council on Aging (NCOA), where she serves as subject matter expert on health-related topics, oversees the U.S. Administration on Aging-funded National Falls Prevention and Chronic Disease Self-Management Resource Centers, and leads the National Institute of Senior Centers. Cameron was previously with JBS International as director of a SAMHSA-funded technical assistance center aimed at educating the aging network, mental health providers and policy makers about behavioral health conditions among older adults. She has also held positions at the American Society of Consultant Pharmacists Foundation and the National Council on Aging. She has served as a consultant to various aging and health care organizations in the Washington, D.C., area. Cameron received her B.S. degree in pharmacy from the University of Connecticut and her MPH from Yale University. The topic of her master’s thesis was medication use and risk of falling among community-dwelling older adults.
Tabitha Colter is director of operations at Partners for Automated Vehicle Education (PAVE). In addition to internal organization management, Colter also oversees many of PAVE's outreach efforts including demonstration events, website development, new member recruitment, educational workshops and two advisory councils. Prior to joining PAVE, Colter attended Duke University as a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow where she focused on autonomous vehicle research and received her Master's in Bioethics & Science Policy. She also holds a Bachelor of Science in Physics and Philosophy from Furman University.
Jeff Davis is senior director, IVY Ecosystems, Business Development at BlackBerry. He oversees the company's smart transportation initiatives, working to grow the number of active pilots it's involved in. He also represents the organization from an advocacy standpoint in industry groups such as The Intelligent Transportation Society of America (ITSA), Partners for Automated Vehicle Education (PAVE), ERTICO and the Automotive Information Sharing and Analysis Center (Auto-ISAC), and in directing BlackBerry's development in smart transportation. He previously served as a senior vice president at ITSA, the nation's largest organization dedicated to advancing the research, development and deployment of Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS). Prior to that, he developed new programs throughout the Department of Defense, as a Marine officer and contracted civilian.
Session: Impact of CAVs in the Public Sector
Gene Donaldson serves as operations manager for the Delaware Department of Transportation (DelDOT), where his primary responsibility is to manage DelDOT's transportation management program. The program includes operation of the 24-hour statewide Transportation Management Center; planning and implementation of Delaware's intelligent transportation system; incident and event management; emergency management; and transportation homeland security.
Session: First/Last Mile Freight
Julian Echeverri is a young professional focusing on entrepreneurship. He started working with Kiwibot and is now a strategy and operations manager. He is passionate about last mile delivery through robotics and is currently in charged of Kiwibot's delivery solutions and operations in PA and upcoming expansions in the East Coast.
Jackie Erickson is the director of policy at Optimus Ride, an all-electric, autonomous shuttle company delivering AV technology and mobility services to localized environments such as campuses, communities, and cities. she is responsible for leading Optimus Ride's engagement with local, state, and federal officials and communicating Optimus Ride's mission of connecting communities through a mobility service that addresses critical transportation needs with safe, convenient, sustainable rides. Previously, Erickson served as Southwestern Pennsylvania regional director for U.S. Senator Robert P. Casey Jr. (D-Pennsylvania), where she received the Commander's Award for Public Service from the U.S. Army. Following her time in public service, she transitioned her skills into the tech sector, where she worked in communications and public policy positions in autonomous vehicle safety and autonomous systems startups. Erickson is passionate about working with communities to integrate emerging technologies safely into society. She has been an active member of the Pennsylvania Autonomous Vehicle Task Force since 2017.
Dr. Richard Ezike is an expert on transportation equity, environmental sustainability, and STEM education outreach. He currently works as the director of infrastructure and engagement at CHPlanning Ltd., where he leads the firm's projects around infrastructure and community engagement. He has worked for the Urban Institute, Union of Concerned Scientists, and the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation. He has advised on transportation issues for federal agencies such as the Department of Energy, Department of Transportation, and the Environmental Protection Agency; and for organizations such as the Transportation Research Board, Smart Growth America, the Greenlining Institute, Securing America's Future Energy, and the State Innovation Exchange. He has keynoted at NC State University, the University of Michigan, and at the 2019 Sustainable Cleveland Summit, and has been quoted by the Washington Post and Digital Trends.
Working with the Smart Belt Coalition (SBC) states, Elise Feldpausch is the current chair of the SBC. The SBC was formed in 2016 and is a strategic transportation partnership comprised of 12 organizations, including five transportation agencies and seven research and academic institutions, located throughout Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. The SBC is purposed to foster collaboration involving research, testing, policy, standards development, deployments, outreach, and funding pursuits in the area of connected and automated vehicle technology as well as other innovations in the transportation industry.
As the connected vehicle technical specialist for the Michigan Department of Transportation's statewide ITS Program Office, Feldspausch ensures the continued development of Michigan's statewide connected vehicle program. This program is where statewide project and device consistency operate hand-in-hand with the assurance that Michigan continues to remain at the forefront of the national CAV conversation.
Feldspausch began her career at the ITS Program Office in 2012 with a focus on post-construction asset management, including software system framework development, statewide ITS device and network maintenance, and RWIS program development. She is a licensed professional engineer with the state of Michigan and is a graduate of Michigan State University, where she received a Bachelor of Science degree in civil engineering.
John Harding leads automated vehicle initiatives for FHWA that support the safe and effective integration of automated vehicles into the US's roadway system. He has expertise covering all aspects of connected and automated travel that includes vehicle connectivity, infrastructure, operations, institutional, policy, testing and evaluation, and regulations. Harding has worked on both the roadway and vehicle aspects of the connected vehicle and automated vehicle issues.
Harding holds a Bachelor of Science in civil engineering from the University of Pittsburgh and a Master of Public Administration from George Mason University.
Dr. Yeganeh Hayeri is a faculty of the School of Systems and Enterprises at Stevens Institute of Technology. Her primary research objective is to promote urban sustainability and resiliency. She currently serves as an appointed member of the Transportation Research Board's Vehicle-Highway Automation Committee. Hayeri is among the 82 of the nation's brightest young engineers selected to take part in the National Academy of Engineering's (NAE) 25th annual U.S. Frontiers of Engineering symposium in 2019 to discuss Automated Vehicles, Ethics and Blockchains. By education and career experience, Hayeri is a transportation engineer with expertise in traffic operations, intelligent transportation systems, urban resiliency, and blockchains. She blends her technical knowledge with her education in public policy and her experience working with various public agencies to provide meaningful impacts to the society. Yeganeh received her B.S. degree from the University of Nebraska – Lincoln in civil and environmental engineering, her M.S. from University of – California at Berkeley in transportation engineering, and her Ph.D.s at Carnegie Mellon University in civil engineering and engineering and public policy.
After 22 years as a high school educator, Tim Heffernan founded the Innovation Institute for Tomorrow, a Pennsylvania-based education nonprofit. Since 2018, the Institute's PA Rural Robotics Initiative has provided thousands of students sustainable, world-class STEM education experiences to prepare them for 21st century careers. Heffernan has collaborated with ecosystem partners from postsecondary education, government, nonprofits, business and industry, and workforce and economic development to create and deliver innovative student learning and teacher professional development opportunities across the commonwealth. He was named the 2018 Innovative Teacher of the Year by the Pennsylvania School Board Association and currently serves as a Career Ready PA Coalition Statewide STEM Champion.
Session: Pathway to Deployment
Robert Heilman has over 30 years experience across the Department of Transportation, Department of Defense and the commercial sector in program management, research and development management, science and technology management, systems engineering, systems integration, test and evaluation and flight testing.
Heilman's most recent technology focus has been in the areas of research and testing of autonomous and cyber systems.
He is currently the director of the Highly Automated Systems Safety (HASS) Center of Excellence (COE) within the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Transportation for Research and Technology (OST-R). He was most recently the division chief for the Intelligent Technologies Safety Research Division within the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).
Heilman has a B.S. in aeronautical engineering from California Polytechnic University. He has attained the government's highest level of professional certification in program management and system engineering.
Nathaniel Horadam is a managing consultant and automated vehicle specialist at the Atlanta-based nonprofit Center for Transportation and the Environment (CTE). His work at CTE supports the development and commercialization of zero-emission technologies for medium- and heavy-duty vehicles. Horadam also leads all CTE efforts associated with automation or related technologies, including project work, legislative outreach, and communications. He currently manages a Federal Transit Administration-funded project to demonstrate the first automated transit buses in North America, and another evaluating the performance of collision avoidance systems on transit buses.
Prior to joining CTE, Horadam was part of a research team that produced the Georgia Department of Transportation's automated and connected vehicle planning roadmap, and separately consulted the City of Peachtree Corners on development of its automated vehicle test track. He was also previously a management consultant with Accenture Federal Services. Horadam holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Middle Eastern studies and political science from Vanderbilt University and a Master of City and Regional Planning from the Georgia Institute of Technology, with a specialization in transportation.
Sheila Ireland's hallmark of success is her ability to translate the context of organizational problems to effectively re-align people and processes with organizational objectives. Her ability to create tactical, innovative and strategic initiatives results in programs that drive performance improvement and produce bottom line results in intensely competitive and highly regulated markets.
With more than 25 years of management experience, Ireland has been responsible for the successful leadership of the human resources. training, organizational and workforce development functions in the nonprofit, health care, consulting, government and public utility fields.
Ireland currently serves in the Wolf Administration as the deputy secretary for workforce development in the Department of Labor and Industry for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Prior to joining the Commonwealth, she served in the Kenney Administration as the executive director of the City of Philadelphia's Office of Workforce Development. Ireland began her time in the Kenney Administration as the deputy director of workforce development and inclusion for Rebuild, the City of Philadelphia's $500 million investment in infrastructure improvements to Philadelphia's park, libraries and recreation centers. Previously, she has served as the vice president of workforce solutions at University City District (UCD). She was the founding director of West Philadelphia Skills Initiative (WPSI) and lead its growth to prominence as a national model for innovation and effectiveness in workforce development programming. She also launched and shepherded the growth Green City Works, UCD's first social venture.
Session: Pathway to Deployment
Lauren Isaac is the director of business initiatives for the North American operation of EasyMile. Easymile specializes in autonomous vehicle technology and smart mobility solutions. Its best known product is the EZ10: electric & driverless, the shuttles are designed to cover short distances in multi-use environments. Isaac leads business development for EasyMile in North America in addition to leading the company's North America regulatory efforts.
Prior to working at EasyMile, Isaac worked at WSP where she was involved in various projects involving advanced technologies that can improve mobility in cities. She wrote a guide titled "Driving Towards Driverless: A Guide for Government Agencies" regarding how local and regional governments should respond to autonomous vehicles in the short, medium, and long term. In addition, Isaac maintains the blog, "Driving Towards Driverless," and has presented on this topic at many industry conferences. She recently did a TEDx Talk, and has been published in Forbes and the Chicago Tribune among other publications.
Dr. Stephanie Ivey is the associate dean for research with the Herff College of Engineering and a professor with the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Memphis. She directs the U of M's Southeast Transportation Workforce Center and the West TN STEM Hub, and is associate director of the Division of Transportation and Logistics in the Center for Applied Earth Sciences and Engineering Research. Her technical research includes focus on journey to school in urban areas, livability assessment in urban communities, and strategies to engage citizens in the transportation planning process. She has a strong record of STEM workforce and education research, with special emphasis on transportation workforce development (particularly in TSMO/ITS), partnerships between industry and academia, and increasing representation of women and underrepresented minorities in transportation.
Ivey is a member of the Institute of Transportation Engineers Diversity and Inclusion Committee- STEM Sub Committee, the American Society of Civil Engineers National Engineers Week/Discover-E Task Committee and the TRB Standing committee on Maintenance and Operations Personnel. She also serves on the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis Transportation Industry Council, the TennSMART board and the Board of Directors for the Greater Memphis IT Council.
Milan Karunaratne has over a decade of experience in the transportation industry working for GE and Wabtec Corp. He currently heads the Digital Advanced Technologies & Applied Innovation team under the office of the CTO at Wabtec. Bringing an entrepreneurial spirit to a large enterprise, this dedicated team of AI and automation specialists and product strategists is focused around driving disruptive innovation and new product development across Wabtec's portfolio of businesses. He has extensive experience building and leading innovation in machine learning predictive models for large scale assets and computer vision and perception solutions for automated systems to help advance the future of rail transportation. He holds a B.E. and M.S. in mechanical engineering from Stony Brook University and an MBA from UCLA Anderson School of Management, where he continues to serve as an Advisor at UCLA's Venture Accelerator.
Todd Leiss is the traffic incident management coordinator in the traffic engineering and operations department for the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission. Previously, he worked as an operations center duty officer for more than 15 years in the PTC Traffic Operations Center. Prior to his tenure at the PTC, he worked as an emergency dispatcher at the Derry Township Police Department and at Lebanon County 911. Leiss is a former volunteer firefighter, emergency medical technician, and hazardous material team member. He is a 2018 graduate of the I-95 Corridor Coalition Senior Leadership Operations Academy, a 2019 graduate of the I-95 Corridor Coalition Freight Academy, and was named the 2018 ITS-Pennsylvania Person of the Year, the 2019 Cumberland Valley Volunteer Fireman's Past President Joseph Bukowski Responder Safety Award for Highway Safety award winner and the 2019 ITS-Pennsylvania Project of the Year winner for the Pennsylvania SHRP2 Traffic Incident Management E-Learning Course. Leiss currently leads the statewide traffic incident management program, Pennsylvania Traffic Incident Management Enhancement (PennTIME), and serves as the assistant director of training for the Emergency Responder Safety Institute/Respondersafety.com.
Dr.Taylor Lochrane is a CARMA program manager at Federal Highway Administration in the Office of Operations Research and Development. He is currently leading and managing the CARMA program, part of a USDOT effort to accelerate the research and development of cooperative driving automation (CDA). He is leveraging open source software and using agile software development practices to accelerate innovative concepts aimed to increase the safety and improve the overall infrastructure efficiency of the transportation system using CDA technology.The CARMA program enables a larger community to participate in the development thought open collaboration and testing for the acceleration of CDA strategies and enabling technology from research to market. Lochrane obtained a B.S., M.S. and Ph.D. in Civil Engineering at University of Central Florida.
Roxane Mukai has over 30 years of experience as a transportation engineer in the public and private sectors. As the operations engineer for the Maryland Transportation Authority, Division of Operations, Mukai focuses on innovation, special event planning and freight movement. She is also the MDTA's connected and automated vehicle (CAV) liaison, the coordinator for Maryland CAV Emergency Response SubGroup activities, a co-chair of the Signs for CAVs Joint Task Force within the National Committee on Uniform Traffic Control Devices, and a member of the Transportation Research Board AKD 10 Performance Effects of Geometric Design Committee, the Institute of Transportation Engineers and the American Society of Civil Engineers.
Session: Pathway to Deployment
Ashley Nylen is the assistant director for mobility technology within the Office of Innovative Mobility at the Colorado Department of Transportation. Nylen is responsible for CDOT's strategy with connected and autonomous technologies in Colorado. Her work features evaluation of advanced technologies to achieve CDOT's mission, data collection and usage, encouraging and facilitating interoperability of data and technology, and future policy recommendations. Prior to joining CDOT, Nylen led the Automated Driving Systems Research Division at the National Advanced Driving Simulator at the University of Iowa.
Session: First/Last Mile Freight
Alex Payson has acted as the policy and research lead for Austin Transportation's Smart Mobility Office for the last four years, focusing on the impact of state and local regulations on new and emerging mobility technology. She works closely with various public- and private-sector entities on Austin's efforts related to personal delivery devices. Within Smart Mobility's Pilot Program, Payson also serves as the project manager for innovative parking and curb space pilots, exploring the intersection of technology and asset management. Payson holds a master's of global policy from the University of Texas at Austin.
Bradley Potteiger is a senior professional staff member and embedded exploitation researcher at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab and a member of the PAVE academic council. Potteiger's research focuses on creating secure, resilient, and verifiable security architectures for critical infrastructure, mainly focusing on applications relating to autonomous vehicles, space systems, and national security. He further focuses on assuring next generation artificial intelligence algorithms within autonomous vehicles to fully guarantee safety and reliability when deployed to the public domain. Potteiger also is leading the effort with regards to autonomous vulnerability discovery at scale of embedded firmware, proving the consequences of homogeneous software libraries, and the effects of legacy software on the security of national security infrastructure. Prior to JHU APL, Potteiger received his Ph.D. from Vanderbilt University, where his dissertation focused on leveraging moving target defense strategies to create secure and resilient autonomous vehicle architectures. He has published extensively and has been supported by the NSA Science of Security Lablet program, AFRL, NIST, and NSF. He has had extensive experience within the government, interning at the NSA and White House and developing applications critical to the security and prosperity of the United States.
David Rubin is the head of policy research for Cruise, a provider of all-electric self-driving vehicle services. As part of Cruise's government affairs team, Rubin leads Cruise's engagement with research centers, universities, think tanks, and policymakers to explore the ways in which autonomous, electric, and shared mobility can improve today’s transportation system. In his role, Rubin works with all levels of government as well as non-governmental stakeholders across policy areas impacted by self-driving technology - the environment, road safety, congestion, accessibility, equity, and data privacy. Rubin is passionate about combining technology and policy to drive positive sum outcomes.
Nathan Skrocki serves as the Western Regional Director for the Massachusetts Commission for the Blind (MCB). He assumed his role with MCB in 2018 and has been in leadership role working in or for state government for over 20 years.
Skrocki supports MCB's mission by facilitating access to a statewide network of programs, training and education while developing practices that meet the unique challenges of the Commonwealth. He has led multiple research and data collection projects for MCB and continues to explore opportunities to best serve people who are legally blind.
Matt Smith became president of the Greater Pittsburgh Chamber of Commerce, an affiliate of the Allegheny Conference on Community Development, in June 2015. The Chamber advocates at the local, state and federal levels to improve the economy and the quality of life for all who live, work and do business in the 10-county Pittsburgh region.
Prior to joining the Chamber, Smith represented the 37th Senatorial District serving in the Pennsylvania State Senate. Before being elected to the Senate, Smith served three terms in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives. He worked in a bipartisan manner on reform efforts such as reducing the size of the legislature and championed student health and safety initiatives.
Born and raised in Bethel Park, Smith is a graduate of Bethel Park High School. He earned a Bachelor of Arts in History from Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida and holds a law degree from Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where he was a member of the Duquesne Law Review.
Matt Smith is Michael Baker International's Emerging Technologies Specialty Practice Lead, located in Detroit, MI. He serves as the national lead for C/AV and emerging transportation technology initiatives, supporting over 80 offices nationwide. He is currently the vice chair of the Institute of Transportation Engineer's Connected and Automated Vehicle Standing Committee. He also serves on several nationwide initiatives on Connected and Automated Vehicles through the American Society of Civil Engineers, the Transportation Research Board / NCHRP, and the Society of Automotive Engineers. He has 25 years of experience in Connected and Automated Vehicle Systems, Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS), traffic engineering, and transportation system management and operations (TSMO), serving as the Michigan Department of Transportation's ITS Program Administrator prior to joining Michael Baker. Smith is a proud Penn State alumni.
Anuja Sonalker is the founder and CEO of autonomous vehicle software company, STEER Tech. As such, she was named one of 2020's Top 100 Leading Women in the North American Automotive Industry by Automotive News. She is currently the vice-ehair of the SAE Vehicle Cybersecurity Systems Engineering Committee and co-chair of ISO 21434: Automotive Cybersecurity Framework. Dr. Sonalker also serves on the Board of Partners for Automated Vehicle Education (PAVE), Board of Visitors for the Clark School of Engineering at the University of Maryland, and the Board of Directors of the Economic Development Authority of Howard County, Maryland.
Justin Starr is an assistant professor of mechatronics at the Community College of Allegheny County. In addition to teaching courses on robotics and automated systems, he regularly develops workforce training programs on advanced technologies, including intelligent transportation systems, collaborative robotics, and additive manufacturing. At CCAC, he serves as the PI or Co-PI on the college's Mobility21 workforce development grant, and two National Science Foundation grants to improve remote instruction in technician training programs. He was also named an Engineering Unleashed Fellow for the 2020-2021 academic year for his efforts to integrate entrepreneurial minded learning into career and technical education.
Before joining the faculty at CCAC, Starr was the CTO of RedZone Robotics, a manufacturer of wastewater inspection robots. He also worked on DARPA programs for QinetiQ North America's Technology Solutions Group, including anti-submarine warfare systems and autonomous marine platforms. He holds 11 U.S. Patents, and has authored 13 technical publications. His book, Water and Wastewater Pipeline Assessment Technologies, was published by CRC Press in 2021. Starr earned his A.S. in business from the Community College of Allegheny County, his B.S. in engineering science from the University of Virginia, and his M.S. and Ph.D. in materials engineering from the University of Florida.
Session: First/Last Mile Freight
Anne Strauss-Wieder is a nationally respected senior executive and expert who currently serves as the director of freight planning for the North Jersey Transportation Planning Authority (NJTPA). She has over 40 years of public- and private-sector experience involving supply chains, industrial and economic development, resilience, and freight movement. She has authored numerous assessments of emerging trends and issues and is often at ports, in industrial space, and at other freight operations. Strauss-Wieder is in leadership roles in several national professional organizations including the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals, the Transportation Research Board, and NAIOP. She is an appointed member of the US Department of Commerce's Advisory Committee on Supply Chain Competitiveness and was a member of the US Maritime Administration's Marine Transportation System National Advisory Committee. Strauss-Wieder also developed and teaches a graduate course on freight and public policy at Rutgers University. She has a BA and MA in regional science from the University of Pennsylvania and was a Lead New Jersey 2010 Fellow.
Gregg Troian is the president of PGT Trucking Inc., a multi-service transportation firm offering flatbed, dedicated, international, and specialized services to customers in the steel, building materials, machinery, oil & gas, raw materials, aluminum, and automotive industries.
His career includes over 42 years of experience in transportation, and 35 of those years with PGT Trucking. Throughout his career, Troian has held various positions, including president and CEO of a large 3PL. He has played a major role in the growth and development of PGT Trucking, one of the safest and most reliable flatbed carriers in transportation. PGT Trucking is currently ranked No. 98 in the Top 100 For-Hire Carriers in North America by Transport Topics, the nation's logistics and trucking news leader.
Troian served four years active duty in the U.S. Air Force and two years in the Air National Guard. He is a former board member and chairman of Family House Inc., and a former council member of Seven Fields Borough.
