2023 40 Under 40 Winners

Emily Becker, TDM Project Manager at AECOM, currently leads two statewide TDM programs in Maine and Vermont and was previously the Statewide lead for the Massachusetts Safe Routes to Schools project. Working as an intern for MassRIDES did not sway her from TDM; in fact, she returned to it immediately upon graduation. Now working for GO MAINE, she has led the way for the state to embrace more sustainable transportation.

Zia Brucaya, RoundTrip/TDM Program Manager for the Greater Madison MPO, is an urban planner with over 13 years of experience with planning and public engagement in Alaska, Indiana, and Wisconsin.  Currently she supports the TDM needs of the fastest-growing region in Wisconsin, including the development of TDM program resources for under-represented, marginalized, and BIPOC communities in Dane County, Wisconsin.

Sydney Cape, Program Specialist for Alta Planning & Design, successfully leads many projects in Oregon, including Let’s Go/Vámonos with Oregon Metro, for which she developed training and outreach materials in 7 languages. She also works with ODOT to implement the state’s Go Vets Oregon program, a transportation program designed for and by veterans.

Chris Clark, Senior Graphic Designer for GoTriangle, has been a proactive member of the GoTriangle TDM team, developing campaigns and supporting materials for a range of programs. One of his highlights is surely the Mission ImPOSSUMble educational campaign, featuring possums as carpoolers!

Hector Colón, Legislative Director for Congresswoman Marilyn Strickland (WA) has been instrumental in getting the TDM definition into drafts of federal legislation. Hector has been proactive in reaching out to ACT members about opportunities to work TDM into different pieces of legislation and continues to be a great partner in promoting TDM. From initial outreach to Congresswoman Strickland’s office, Hector immediately understood what a great tool TDM is and how elevating it on the federal level is essential.

Erica Condon, a Marketing and Communications Coordinator for AECOM, supports the Connecticut Department of Transportation’s CTRides program, and efficiently served as an assistant project lead for their state-wide campaign to promote a “return to Transit” initiative. She also launched an outreach initiative targeting “Rail Fans,” sourcing authentic content and diverse images to enhance marketing efforts.

Cheryl Croshere is Executive Director at both the 50 Corridor TMA & Sacramento TMA. Under her leadership, the 50 TMA was recently awarded a grant to implement an individualize marketing pilot in Rosemont and Rancho Cordova, diverse communities that historically do not have the same level of active transportation and transit investments of the rest of the county. She was also part of a team that helped Metro develop their “Understanding How Women Travel” report, findings of which are being used to create a Gender Action Plan and improve the experience of women traveling on Metro’s system.

Jacqueline Del Pozo is the Club Ride Outreach Coordinator for AECOM/Club Ride in Southern Nevada. She fully understands the unique market in the Las Vegas area, with its large population of service-industry and blue-collar workers with no hybrid or work from home capabilities and manages over 100 employer partnerships with key accounts ranging from large casinos, to warehouse facilities, and the City of Henderson.

Billy Duss, TDM-CP, Customer Success Manager at TripShot, has a background in data analysis, public policy, and advocacy, which he uses in projects including working with the City of Seattle to redesign a dangerous 3-block stretch into space that works best for all road users, complete with a protected bike lane for cyclists.

Nikolas Eristavi has worked as Marketing and Creative Lead for Meta for five years, spearheading the annual Bike to Work Day event while managing marketing campaigns that encourage commute behaviour change. His marketing strategies include highlighting the cost of driving alone both in dollar amounts and the number of trees you would need to plant to offset the CO2 emissions.

Michael Fera, Senior Sustainable Mobility Specialist at ICF, brings people together to make innovative transportation a reality. He leads several committees throughout the New York area, including the United States Green Building Council’s Sustainable Transportation Committee, and a monthly innovation workshop that examines traveler problems and develops frameworks for new mobility programs and operational improvements.

You may recognize Lyndel Fusello as one of this year’s ImpACT! Leadership class participants. In her day job as Transportation Program Manager at Google, she has developed tools and processes that have allowed Google to streamline their global shuttle programs as well as launching several new commuter and last mile programs.

Parama Ghosh Roy is now a Senior Consultant for Steer but started her career as an intern with the Go Glendale TMA, in Glendale, CA. After dabbling outside of TDM, she returned to the industry as Executive Director for both the Go Glendale TMA and the GoSaMo TMO (in Santa Monica, CA), leading both through complicated changes during the COVID-19 pandemic. Recently, she has been acting as Deputy Project Manager for the City of Seattle’s Strategic TDM Plan, leading efforts to engage under-represented groups to ensure their inclusion in the plan.

Lessie Henderson, Residential and Hospitality Outreach Coordinator at Foursquare ITP, oversees goDCgo’s residential program, one of few residential TDM programs in the US. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she supported existing employer and school teams at goDCgo to provide a foundational TDM program that focused on teleworking residents in Washington, DC, as well as supporting residents working non-traditional hours in non-traditional settings – namely low-income, transit-dependent Black and Indigenous People of Color. She has also developed partnerships with low income housing partners and the DC Housing Authority.

Jenny Hong, Principal Consultant with Steer, has developed and managed TDM programs up and down the west coast, from Glendale, CA, to Seattle. The Napa Valley Forward program that she developed in 2019 aims to provide increased access and incentives for Napa area employees, many of who are lower wage workers in agriculture and hospitality.

Samantha Huff is the TDM Marketing Manager for Foursquare ITP’s largest contract, the District of Columbia’s (DDOT)’s TDM program, goDCgo. She creates marketing campaigns that leverage behavior change tactics to increase participation in commuting, from bike commuters to under-represented, marginalized, and BIPOC communities. Her efforts have been featured in ACT webinars and won awards from both ACT and the Chesapeake Chapter.

Sharareh (Sherri) Kermanshachi, Ph.D., Associate Vice Chancellor for Research and Associate Dean of Research, Penn State University, is an expert in the integration of Autonomous Vehicles into existing transit services, including the Arlington Rideshare, Automation, and Payment Integration Demonstration (RAPID) project in Arlington, Texas, which integrated autonomous vehicles into existing transit services for the first time in the United States. She has published more than 300 books, scholarly articles, and reports and won numerous awards for her work.

Luca Kern, Co-Founder and Chair of The Codos Foundation, has worked to develop beta versions of the Codos App, which rewards commuters for using sustainable commute options, are being tested in 14 countries around the world. The company has been finalists in several prestigious international start up competitions around Europe.

Tai Mooney, a Business Operations Specialist at Destination Sales & Marketing Group, is a behind-the-scenes leader. Tai’s support allows the DS&MG programs to function more efficiently. He recently lead a data based migration project that involved data for 2,000 active accounts, 4,000 company contacts, and a decade’s worth of captured activity, coming in ahead of schedule, saving time and money.

As a Management Analyst, Yvonne Ohara has been at the forefront of the Los Angeles World Airports’ new commuteLAX Transit Pass Program. The program for the commuteLAX Transportation Management Organization has improved TDM access for companies operating at LAX that currently don’t offer subsidies for sustainable commuting. This has dropped participants’ commute trips from over $100 a month to just $20 a month.

Shraddha Praharaj, Traffic Engineer I/II at the City of Frederick, MD, is relatively new to TDM, having completed her PhD in Civil Engineering/Transportation in 2021. She strives for ways to bring groups together to work more inclusively and effectively, including having traffic complaints in underrepresented areas taken into consideration more proactively – which remains an ongoing process. 

Nicholas Quint, Virginia Tech’s Transportation Network Manager, has been bike commuting since 2012, and has spent the last four years educating the Virginia Tech community about sustainable transportation options. In 2020, he presided over a committee that developed goals to reduce SOV commuting by 20% by 2025 and reduce transportation-related greenhouse gas emissions by 40% by 2030.

Ryan Reeves, Principal Planner at BART, currently manages the Clipper BayPass Program, designing and managing the development of the Bay Area’s first regional and unlimited transit pass for rides on more than 20 transit operators across the Bay Area. This pilot is one of the first projects implemented as part of the Bay Area’s Transit Transformation Action Plan. Since the fall of 2022, more than 2 million trips have been taken with the Clipper BayPass.

Sofie Rhoads, AICP, is experienced in many aspects of TDM, including policy development, strategic and regional TDM plans, and employer transportation plans. Although she is currently a Transportation Industry Analyst at the Fdederal Railroad Administration, she has managed projects in Westchester County, New York; the District of Columbia Department of Transportation; and Downtown Columbia, Maryland.

Shontay Rose-Bell is a Project Manager Odonnell Company, where she is project lead on a multi-million-dollar account, organizing numerous campaigns, reports, and projects, as well as team members, while acting as brand champion to finalize deliverables before sending them to the client. Shontay is engaged in ACT, presenting at conferences and currently as the SEACT Chapter Secretary, and is pursuing her Project Management Professional Certification.

Sam Ryan is the Co-Founder & CEO of Zeelo, a smart bus platform that provides buses and shuttles that fill gaps in transit deserts. Sam’s transportation technology journey has led Zeelo across three countries and resulted (so far) to a staggering 400% increase in the number of electric vehicles on the roads, reflecting his commitment to sustainable transportation solutions.

Shaurya Saluja, the CEO and Co-Founder of Fleet Labs, started the company with a vision to bring bit company commuting superpowers to everyone. Prior to Fleet, introduced the concept of peer-to-peer carsharing to Eastern Europe. In the US, he successfully launched demand-responsive carpooling service in the San Francisco Bay Area, and recently launched a Mobility-as-a-Benefit program with the Denver South TMA.

Magali Seymour, an Outreach and Engagement Specialist at AECOM, is located in New Haven, CT, where she created an educational initiative for K-8 students called All About Trains, focused on rail safety. On the other end of the transportation spectrum, she works with the Naval Submarine Base in New London.

David Sorrell, TDM-CP  As Transportation Demand Management Administrator & Transportation Network Manager at UC Berkeley, he engages the campus community to make transportation more affordable and integrated for students. One of his many successes was developing a campus program that distributes pre-loaded Clipper cards to low-income students on an at-need basis. Dave constantly looks towards the future of TDM by providing his interns with ACT student memberships.

His personal interest in transit led Jeff Stade, the CEO of jawnt, to pursue a Master’s in Urban Spatial Analytics at the University of Pennsylvania, where he quickly became one of Philadelphia’s leading advocates for safe, clean, and efficient public transportation. He places great value on working with commuters from marginalized communities, the elderly, and those living at or below the poverty line.

At Meta, Transportation Planning Analyst Matthew Stafford has been instrumental in helping the company plan and adapt commuter shuttle operations as they scale up and down based on demand, utilizing ArcGIS and examining travel patterns, as well as Title VI analysis. Moving beyond the San Francisco Bay Area, he will focus on improving Meta’s Seattle Commuter program as well.

Stefan Walz is GoTriangle’s Videographer & Multimedia Producer. As a one-person production team, he has written, directed, filmed, and edited content to cover a variety of TDM services and supporting programs. Stefan’s TDM knowledge and background enables GoTriangle’s TDM team to better communicate and connect with the communities they serve. His work is nationally recognized in the marketing and film industry, and we are proud to recognize him now in the TDM community.

Kristen Weston-Smith, Travel Reduction Program Supervisor for Maricopa County, in Phoenix, Arizona, the fourth most populated county in the US. She has overseen the reduction of almost 6 billion commute miles driven and prevented almost 30,000 tons of pollution from being created in single occupancy vehicles. Kristen works with over 1,100 Maricopa County businesses and local municipalities to incentivize employees to use alternative modes of transportation. She is also on the Valley of the Sun chapter leadership team.

Barney Williams, the CCO & Co-Founder of Zeelo, has been instrumental in Zeelo’s rapid growth, resulting in a 50% increase in global clients. His leadership has pushed the company to positively impact the environment and communities. Under Barney’s direction, Zeelo has integrated environmental initiatives into the company’s operations, including the offset of a remarkable 2,606.59 tons of carbon emissions through its rides in 2022.

Catherine Windyk, Outreach Specialist – Individual Solutions, Move Minneapolis – her TDM path started with her personal story of needing to bike as a commute option. From there, she discovered the joy of helping others discover sustainable commuting. Currently, she is working on an individual insights pilot program aimed at putting stories and faces to data points to remind service providers and partners that the work is about people.

Amanda Wyma-Bradley, Senior Policy Advisor-Transportation, Senator Patty Murray (WA) has been a steadfast partner in efforts to include the TDM definition into federal law. In her work with Sen. Patty Murray’s office, she has constantly communicated with ACT members on how to reduce barriers to using federal funding for TDM. Amanda was a crucial player in getting TDM report language in the current Senate Appropriations bill, that hopefully will pass in late 2023.

Melodi Yanik, Sustainable Transportation Coordinator, Pierce County, took over as chapter president of the Cascade chapter at the beginning of this year, and threw herself into assisting with the International Conference in Seattle. In her role with Pierce County, one of her many successes includes working on a community engagement equity work group to ensure that her team and department approach all marketing and outreach with an equitable lens.

As Regional Vice President, Campus Mobility, for Propark Mobility, Christiansen Zamora’s superpower is his collaborative leadership style, successfully engaging government entities, private organizations, and community groups, creating alliances that have resulted in the seamless implementation of TDM strategies.

One of Cecily Zhu’s many success stories as Sustainable Transportation Program Manager at Penn State University Transportation Services was taking the university from a Bronze Level Bicycle Friendly University to Gold, by instituting many programs, initiatives, and partnerships. Her commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion shows in many ways, such as hosting a wheelchair repair seminar for local bike shops, so they can support such repairs in their operations.

2023 40 Under 40 Awards sponsored by