APTA’s Safety & Risk Management Seminar Draws Record Attendance!
12/14/2023
APTA’s 2023 Safety & Risk Management Seminar, Dec. 10-13 in Austin, TX, attracted 221 registrants, making it the largest safety or risk conference APTA has ever held!
The event began with welcome remarks from APTA COO David J. Carol. APTA Chair Michele Wong Krause welcomed attendees via video. Dottie L. Watkins, CEO, Capital Metropolitan Transportation Authority (CapMetro); and Gardner C. Tabon, systemwide accessibility & chief safety officer, CapMetro, provided the host’s welcome.
Throughout the seminar, sessions explored such topics as battery-electric bus fires, illicit drug/Fentanyl use, cybersecurity, transit worker assaults, owner-controlled insurance programs and captives, AI, collision avoidance, updates from FTA and FRA, and more.
Special keynote luncheons featured Judge Andy Brown, County of Travis, Austin, TX, who discussed transit and rail expansion, safety, and emergency management, and Thomas B. Chapman, NTSB member, who discussed NTSB priorities as well as bus and rail safety.
Seminar highlights were tours of CapMetro’s BRT routes and electric-bus charging yard, McKalla MetroRail station, and a MetroRail operations and maintenance facility.
The seminar also included meetings of APTA’s Risk Management, Rail Safety, and Bus Safety committees, and the Commuter Rail Safety & Security Subcommittee.
