Jennifer Cohan, Secretary, Delaware Department of Transportation (Chair)
Jennifer Cohan was appointed to be only the third woman to lead the Delaware Department of Transportation after serving as the Director of the Delaware Division of Motor Vehicles since 2007. Her state public service career has spanned over 25 years. Jennifer has worked in the capacity of Financial/Program Manager at the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control (DNREC) managing the state's Clean Water Program. Jennifer has also worked with the Delaware State Legislature within the Office of the Controller General.
Ms. Cohan has also held an array of leadership positions within the Delaware Department of Transportation in the areas of Planning, Finance, and Motor Carrier Safety. She is an adjunct professor at Wilmington University, teaching leadership and public policy in the Masters program. Jennifer has served as a member of the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators (AAMVA) Board of Directors, and as Interim Board President and CEO. Ms. Cohan is the president of the Greater Dover Boys and Girls Club Board of Directors. Secretary Cohan currently serves as a member of the AASHTO Board of Directors, and serves on the I-95 Corridor Coalition's Executive Board, the Diamond State Port Corporation Board of Directors, the Northeast Corridor Commission, the Northeast Association of State Transportation Officials, Transportation and Climate Initiative, and Transportation Research Board Executive Committee.
Laurie Matkowski, Director of Connected and Automated Vehicle Services, Gannett Fleming (Vice Chair)
Laurie Matkowski is the Director of Connected and Automated Vehicle (CAV) Services for the Transportation Operations Global Business Line at Gannett Fleming. She is nationally recognized for nearly two decades of transportation operations planning in the Philadelphia region and is a Subject Matter Expert on strategic planning for future technologies in the transportation industry. She is involved in partnering with new and existing clients to prepare for and implement smart cities and CAV advancements. Her work focuses on planning for operations including Transportation Systems Management and Operations (TSMO), traffic and transportation engineering, multimodal connections, transportation technology involving intelligent transportation systems (ITS) and CAV, and traffic incident management (TIM). She is highly skilled in consensus building on diverse projects with a wide variety of agencies from federal to local, both public and private, including FHWA, AASHTO, TRB, state departments of transportation, turnpike authorities, bridge commissions, planning agencies, county and local governments, law enforcement and security, first responders, and consultant teams.
Before Gannett Fleming, Laurie worked nearly twenty years at the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission as the Manager of the Office of Transportation Operations Management, responsible for developing and directing TSMO, ITS, TIM, and traffic signal optimization programs within the agency and for the region. She has expertise in marketing projects for new and continued funding while creating nontraditional partnerships. She determined program objectives, projects, methodologies, and techniques and was held accountable for program results, including working with budgetary constraints.
Laurie earned her Bachelor of Science degree in civil engineering from Clemson University and is a graduate of the Operations AcademyTM. She was named WTS Philadelphia’s 2014 Woman of the Year and is a current board member. She also serves on the Institute of Transportation Engineers (ITE) TSMO Executive Council and CV/AV Steering Committee, the Pennsylvania Infrastructure Technology Alliance Board of Directors, and continues to serves on the inaugural Board of Directors for the National Operations Center of Excellence, currently as Vice-chair.
Mark Lowe, Director, Iowa Department of Transportation
Governor Reynolds appointed Mark Lowe as director of the Iowa Department of Transportation (Iowa DOT) on May 26, 2017. Before taking this position, Mark served as the Iowa DOT’s general counsel from 2008 to 2009, and as its Motor Vehicle Division director from 2009 to 2016, and as its interim director from November 29, 2016, to the date of his appointment by Governor Reynolds.
Before entering state government, Mark was an associate and then shareholder with Hopkins & Huebner, P.C. in Des Moines. He has also served as associate general counsel for Norwest Financial in Des Moines and, prior to law school, as a planner at the Region XII Council of Governments in Carroll, Iowa.
Mark was born in Illinois in 1966 and lived for a number of years in rural Illinois and Missouri before moving to Iowa in 1977. He graduated from Carroll High School in 1984 and from Iowa State University in 1988 with a bachelor’s degree in community and regional planning. He earned his law degree from Drake University in 1993 and served there as editor-in-chief of the Drake Law Review for the 1992-1993 year.
Mark lives in West Des Moines, Iowa with his wife Linda. They have four children – Daniel (Utah State University), Mary (Iowa State University), Matt (Iowa State University) and Erin (Valley High School), where they are active in cross country, Boy Scouts, and the YMCA. Mark served on the board of the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators (AAMVA) from 2010 to 2016, serving as its chair in 2014 to 2015. In his leisure time he enjoys running, swimming, biking and playing guitar.
Roger Millar, Secretary, Washington State Department of Transportation
Roger Millar was appointed Secretary of Transportation by Governor Jay Inslee in August 2016. Millar oversees an agency that is the steward of a multimodal transportation system and responsible for ensuring that people and goods move safely and efficiently. In addition to building, maintaining, and operating the state highway system, WSDOT is responsible for the state ferry system and works in partnership with others to maintain and improve local roads, railroads and airports, as well as to support alternatives to driving, such as public transportation, bicycles and pedestrian programs.
Millar is a second generation civil engineer with 40 years of experience in the transportation arena. He has worked in construction, design, planning, research, policy development, management and administration in both the public and private sectors. Prior to joining WSDOT, Millar served as vice president of Smart Growth America, a national not-for-profit organization, providing technical assistance to state transportation agencies. He also served as director of the National Complete Streets Coalition. He is currently a member of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) Board of Direction.
A graduate of the University of Virginia, Millar is a registered engineer in Washington and five other states. He was elected a Fellow of the ASCE in 1999. He received the ASCE President’s Medal in 2016 and the ASCE Outstanding Public Official Award in 2017. He is married to Candis Millar and has two teenage children and a black lab named Ouzel.
Abbas Mohaddes, President & COO, Econolite
Mr. Mohaddes is the President & COO of Econolite and co-founder and principal of CAVita. He is a transportation executive focused on ITS. He is the former CEO of Iteris, where he led the transformation and substantial growth of Iteris into a software-based traffic management information technology organization. Abbas has over 30 years of experience in the application of technology in transportation systems. He has developed and implemented area wide traffic management and communication system plans for several small and large agencies around the country. He is a founding member and past chairman of ITS America, Current chair of the ITSA leadership Circle, member of the Transportation research Board (TRB) and past member of its executive committee, member of the board of trustees of the Mineta institute, fellow at ITE, and member of the University of California Irvine, Chancellor’s CEO roundtable.
Douglas W. Wiersig, Ph.D., P.E., Director of Transportation and Public Works, City of Fort Worth, Texas
Dr. Wiersig is Director of Transportation and Public Works for the City of Fort Worth—starting this position in April 2011. The Department is comprised of 8 major delivery divisions spanning roadway, storm water, facility, and environmental infrastructure systems. Functional activities span all elements of planning, capital delivery, operations, and maintenance.
Prior to joining the City of Fort Worth, Dr. Wiersig was Transportation Programs Manager for Jacobs Engineering in their Houston, Texas, office. In addition to this role, he had the opportunity to support various Program Management, Alternative Delivery Methods, and LEAN Program Analysis.
Harry Voccola, Management Consultant
Mr. Harry Voccola has maintained passionate support for ITS technologies and has championed the growth of the ITS industry. Currently, he is the Vice President of NAVTEQ (HERE). Mr. Voccola is a founding member of ITS America. While at ITS America, he engaged in public and private sector outreach and advocated for active American involvement in the World Congresses.
He's served as Chairman for the ITS America Board of Directors and for the 12th ITS World Congress in San Francisco, California, member of the California Alliance for Advanced Transportation Systems Board of Directors, Chairman of the Connected Vehicle Trade Association Board of Directors, and has worked as Senior Vice President of Transportation Systems and Services for Lockheed Martin. Mr. Harry Voccola has made significant contributions to the industry and is among the historic icons of ITS.
Martin Knopp, Associate Administrator for Operations, Federal Highway Administration (ex officio)
Martin C. Knopp was appointed as the Associate Administrator for Operations in January 2017. In this capacity, he provides national leadership for the management and operation of the surface transportation system, and is responsible for FHWA's efforts in the areas of congestion management, Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) Deployment, traffic operations, emergency management, and freight management and operations.
Prior to this, Martin served as the Director of Field Services (DFS) since November 2012 for the northeast region overseeing the corporate responsibilities of 13 Federal-aid Division offices in the northeast that include 264 employees and over $8 Billion in Federal-aid new funding annually. As one of four DFS leaders covering the Federal-aid across the country, the DFS supervise the Division Administrators and serve as a field deputy for the Executive Director as well as members on the agency’s Leadership Team.
Martin graduated from Pennsylvania State University in 1989 with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Civil Engineering and he is a licensed engineer in Utah.