Join your municipal colleagues and a roster of national and local experts at a full-day "Connected and Autonomous Vehicle 101" seminar at the Charles I. Ecker Business Training Center in Columbia, Maryland to explore the key aspects of the Autonomous Vehicle Economy and the infrastructure and policy changes that satellite cities, small towns and rural communities in Maryland need to consider in order to take advantage of coming electrification and self-driving technologies. 

            February 5th, 2020

                    8:30 am - 4:30 pm

Charles I. Ecker Business Training Center

6751 Columbia Gateway Drive

Columbia, Maryland 21046

Ragina Cooper Ali is the Public and Government Affairs Manager for AAA Club Alliance in Maryland since 2005. Prior to joining AAA, Ragina served twelve years with the Baltimore Police Department, initially as a police officer and ultimately, as the department’s first female Public Affairs Director and chief spokesperson. In her role at AAA, she leads Maryland’s public and government affairs office to improve traffic safety and represents the organization as a lobbyist and spokesperson. Ragina utilizes her extensive media, criminal justice and government affairs expertise to work with law enforcement, legislators and transportation safety stakeholders to address the issues that impact traffic safety on Maryland roadways. Mrs. Ali chairs the Maryland Chamber of Commerce’s Transportation Committee and is President of the Baltimore Public Relations Council, Baltimore’s oldest organization for PR professionals. Ragina holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from Towson University.

Kathryn Branson is the Executive Director of the Partnership for Transportation Innovation and Opportunity (PTIO). PTIO – a coalition led by the American Trucking Associations, Daimler, FedEx, Ford, Lyft, Toyota Motor North America, Uber, UPS, and Waymo. The PTIO is committed to advancing autonomous vehicle technology in ways that improve quality of life and economic opportunity for all Americans. PTIO launched in June 2018 to prepare American workers for autonomous vehicles and to examine the impact the technology could have on the future of work.Prior to her role with PTIO, Kathryn spent time on Capitol Hill working on a wide array of issues, including labor and employment, education, healthcare, and technology policy.

Carole Delion leads the Connected Automated Vehicles (CAV)

Program for the Maryland DOT State Highway Administration, which includes chairing the agency’s internal CAV working group of nearly 50 employees. She has seven years’ experience at MDOT SHA, with a strong background in planning analysis, forecasting, and performance measure evaluation for emerging technologies. She spearheads discussions on CAV with the statewide working group and is involved nationally with multiple pooled fund studies and organizations leading the charge in CAV. Carole is a fellow TERP from the University of Maryland, College Park where she completed both her BS and MS in Civil Engineering.  

Tom Jacobs Director of the Center for Advanced Transportation Technology at the University of Maryland, has over 18 years of professional experience in the areas of program and project management, traffic engineering, Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS), and Management and Operations.  He has been with the Center of Advanced Transportation Technology since 1999 and in that time has led the Capital Wireless Information Net (CapWIN) Program, overseen development of the Center for Advanced Transportation Technology Transportation Lab, provided ongoing assistance to various Maryland State Highway Administration CHART Program initiatives, and participated in numerous National Cooperative Highway Research projects.   Mr. Jacobs’ areas of interest include traffic incident management, regional information systems, systems engineering, mobile data communications, performance measures, integrated corridor management, commercial vehicle operations, distance learning, technology transfer, and planning for operations. Prior to beginning his work at the University, Mr. Jacobs worked in various capacities as a transportation management engineer with the Federal Highway Administration.  He worked on a number of state, local, and National ITS initiatives such as: providing Federal oversight of transportation management system deployment projects, regulatory reviews and guidance, integration of ITS and planning, ITS Architecture, and National Highway Institute course development and delivery. Mr. Jacobs received his Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering from the University of South Carolina and Master of Science (emphasis in Transportation Engineering) from the University of Maryland.

Jana Lynott AICP is a senior policy adviser with the AARP Public Policy Institute. Her research and videography touch upon a broad arrayof planning and policy issues including public transportation, completestreets, older driver safety, and the travel patterns of older adults. She is the author of a series of publications related to the future of transportation,including her ground-breaking paper that lays out a vision for Universal Mobility as a Service. In Fall 2018, she and an AARP film crew spent eight days in Denmark researching and documenting the successful FlexDanmark transportation system. Jana is the project director for AARP’s Livability Index, a first-of-its-kind online tool designed to help communities better serve their residents across the lifespan. As a land use and transportation planner, Jana brings practical expertise to the research field. Jana serves on the Transportation Research Board’s Safe Mobility for Older Persons committeeand the Transportation Cooperative Research Program’s Development of Open Data Standards for Demand Responsive Transportation. She is passionate about expanding mobility options for all in rural, suburban, and urban communities.  

Dale Neef, the host of the CAV 101 Education Seminar, is an author and strategic technology consultant who advises organizations and communities on "Smart Cities" and autonomous vehicle infrastructure, municipal broadband, and other digital economy issues. A specialist in transportation and supply chain technologies, Dale has been a technical consultant for the Asian Development Bank, has worked for IBM and Computer Sciences Corporation, and was a fellow at Ernst & Young’s Center for Business Innovation. A veteran facilitator, he has conducted executive planning workshops with corporate and municipal teams in more than a hundred organizations worldwide, and has taught at a variety of institutions, including Cornell University and at the International School of Management in Paris. A frequent contributor to journals, and a regular speaker at technology conferences, Dale earned his masters and his doctorate from Cambridge University, was a research fellow at Harvard, and has written or edited eight books on the economics of knowledge and data management and the role of technology in economic development and society. He is a member of the American Planning Association and the International City/County Management Association.