APTA President Discusses Need to Attract Talent at UITP Forum

From left: Arthur Nicolet, CEO, Transdev Canada; Paul P. Skoutelas; Marco D’Angelo, president and CEO, Canadian Urban Transit Association (CUTA); Nadine Lee, CEO, Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART), chair, UITP North America Division; Kevin Quinn, CEO, TransLink; Mohamed Mezghani, secretary general, UITP.

APTA President and CEO Paul P. Skoutelas and Chair Michele Wong Krause attended the seventh annual UITP (International Association of Public Transport) North America Forum June 23-26 in Vancouver, BC, Canada, hosted by local agency TransLink.

The forum serves to offer the North America region UITP’s worldwide resources for global connectivity and knowledge, bringing together members from around the world to discuss such topics as bus electrification, rail automation, on-demand mobility, and more.

Wong Krause delivered opening remarks. “Working together across borders allows us to maximize our impact as associations and expedite our learning on key innovations happening across the industry,” she said.

Skoutelas took part in the Driving Change into the Future: Attracting and Retaining Talent in Public Transit session, where panelists pressed the need to attract talent from different backgrounds and demographics to prepare the industry for the future.

Discussions with the panel were “a stark reminder that workforce shortages are a global issue, the labor market has changed dramatically since the pandemic, and that the transit industry needs to and is adapting,” Skoutelas said.