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U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary Peters Tackles Tough Transportation Issues at Local WTS Dinner


February 28, 2007 — The Los Angeles area chapter of WTS — formerly Women’s Transportation Seminar — hosted a dinner for U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Mary Peters Feb. 20, 2007 at the Millennium Biltmore Hotel in downtown Los Angeles. 

L-R: Kim Chan, transportation planner at Parsons Brinckerhoff and WTS-Los Angeles Scholarship Chair; James Moore,II, chair of the USC Epstein Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering; U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary Peters; and Stephanie Taylor, MSCE transportation engineering student.                           John Livzey photo 


Secretary Peters was in town for hearings on federal funding of area transportation projects.  The audience of more than 300 guests included numerous Southern California transportation agency executives, city council members, county supervisors, mayors and transportation commissioners.

Forty USC students from the USC Viterbi School of Engineering, the USC School of Policy, Planning and Development, and California State University, Long Beach attended, sponsored by global transportation consulting firms DMJM Harris, DMJM H&N, Metcalf & Eddy, and parent company AECOM Technology Corporation. 

Following dinner, Secretary Peters presented a detailed briefing on several of the current federal administration's surface transportation plans, initiatives, and policy objectives; and then responded to questions from the floor.

USC graduate student Stephanie Taylor (standing in photo below), who is working on her MS degree in civil engineering, asked Secretary Peters about the administration's plans for strengthening public transit.

Stephanie Taylor, a master's student in civil engineering at USC, questions the secretary about public transit.             John Livzey photo