In a first for Los Angeles County, MTA and the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce are spearheading a summit on transportation aimed at forging consensus among leaders in the public and private sectors on workable solutions to the region’s crushing traffic congestion. The Nov. 18, 2002 gathering of elected officials, transportation providers, business, labor, academic and community leaders at downtown L.A.’s Wilshire Grand Hotel is titled Mobility 21: LA County Moving Together.
“We know all too well the source of most of our transportation problems, but, historically, reaching agreement on how best to solve these issues has not been so easy,” said Hal Bernson, Los Angeles City Councilman and MTA Board Chairman. “Our aim is to break through the barriers that have plagued us in the past and also to create a coalition that will speak with a strong unified voice when it goes to Sacramento and Washington, D.C. in search of much-needed transportation funding.”
In addition to MTA and the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce, participating agencies and companies will include the Federal Transit Administration, United Parcel Service, Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway, California Trucking Association, Surface Transit Project, Caltrans, Air Transport Association, Automobile Club of Southern California, United Western Grocers Association and others.
“We have arrived at the point where a shared vision about our future is imperative if we are to deal effectively with the projected population growth and demands on our infrastructure,” said MTA CEO Roger Snoble. “The population of Los Angeles County, alone, will grow by another 2.7 million people by 2025 which means the actions we take today are critical to sustaining a good quality of life into the future.”
The opening and closing sessions and the luncheon will include addresses by several speakers including Congresswoman Lucille Roybal-Allard, California State Assembly Speaker Emeritus Robert Hertzberg, MTA Board Chair Hal Bernson, and Thomas McKernan, president and chief executive officer of the Automobile Club of Southern California.
"The formation of a transportation-specific coalition will bring enormous value to the Los Angeles region which has suffered from a lack of consensus among our congressional delegation, resulting in Los Angeles not receiving its fair share of transportation dollars,” said Rusty Hammer, president and chief executive officer of the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce. “Business recognizes the importance of such a coalition and is investing in Mobility 21 to see to it that a working group is formed to move us toward solving our transportation issues."
Breakout sessions will cover a broad range of topics including goods movement, the role of streets and highways in mobility, freight movement, public transit, getting to and from the airport, funding transportation services and infrastructure, integrating land use and transportation, and securing transportation resources through coalition building.
Moderators for the breakout sessions will include Rusty Selix, executive director for the California Association of Councils of Governments; David Abel, editor-in-chief for Metro Investment Report; Phil Recht, a former Clinton Administration official in the U.S. Department of Transportation; Larry Jackson, president and general manager for Long Beach Transit; Steven Erie, director of urban studies an planning for the University of California at San Diego; and Doug Failing, District 7 Director for the California Department of Transportation.
Participating breakout session panelists will include Dan Beal, manager of public policy and programs for the Automobile Club of Southern California; Katherine Perez, executive director of the Southern California Transportation & Land Use Coalition; Jim Seeley, Washington, D.C., chief legislative representative for Mayor James Hahn’s Office of Intergovernmental Affairs; Mitchell Rouse, president of Taxi Systems, Inc.; Ed Merlis, senior vice president of government affairs for the Air Transport Association of America; and John Kirchner, professor at California State University, Los Angeles.
Mobility-21 executive co-chairs include Hal Bernson, L.A. City Councilmember, Chair of the MTA Board of Directors and Metrolink, and President, Southern California Association of Governments Regional Council; Congressman David Dreier; James Hahn, Los Angeles Mayor and MTA Board Member; Congresswoman Juanita Millender-McDonald; Senator Kevin Murray, Chair, California State Senate Transportation Committee; Assemblywoman Jenny Oropeza, Chair, California State Assembly Budget Committee; Frank Roberta, Mayor, City of Lancaster and MTA Board Member; Congresswoman Lucille Roybal-Allard; and Zev Yaroslavsky, Chair, Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors and First Vice-Chair, MTA Board of Directors.
Sponsors for the summit include: Automobile Club of Southern California, City Of Los Angeles, Antelope Valley Transit Authority, City Of Arcadia Transit, City Of Commerce Municipal Bus Lines, City Of Los Angeles Department Of Transportation, Culver City Bus, Foothill Transit, Gardena Municipal Bus Lines, Long Beach Transit, Montebello Bus Lines, Norwalk Transit System, Redondo Beach Wave, Santa Clarita Transit, Santa Monica Big Blue Bus, Torrance Transit System, Alameda Corridor Transportation Authority, URS Corporation, Metrolink, Fluor Corporation, Port Of Long Beach, Southwest Airlines, United Western Grocers, Inc., University Of Southern California, and MACTEC Engineering And Consulting, Inc. (formerly LAW/Crandall).
The following is the schedule for the summit:
Mobility 21: LA County Moving Together
Monday, Nov. 18, 2002, 8 a.m. – 6 p.m.
News Conference, 10 a.m. (Verdugo/Del Mar Room)
Wilshire Grand Hotel
930 Wilshire Blvd. (at Figueroa St.)
Los Angeles
Thomas Guide 634 E-4
