18 | Mass Transit | MassTransitmag.com | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2017
Fact:
Bennett is
chairman of the
American Public
Transportation
Association
(APTA) PRESS
Passenger
Systems
Committee
MassTransitmag.
com/12343975
Fact
As national
streetcar
management
leader for
HNTB, Booth is
responsible for
coordinating 60
offices, delivering
streetcar projects
for clients.
MassTransitmag.
com/12356547
“I enjoy working in transit projects that at the end of the
day are helping clients implement complicated and complex
projects that alternately will help improve a community and
a region. Mobility is such a critical aspect to quality of life …”
SINCE JOINING HNTB IN 2007,
Ashley Booth has set himself apart by
becoming a go-to thought leader and
trusted adviser for some of the fi rm’s
most important clients. As national
streetcar practice leader and planning
and technical services director, he leads
a group of nearly 30 employees who
support transit and other infrastructure
projects nationwide. Th roughout
his career, Booth has been intimately
involved in the successful completion
and planning for transit projects
around the country.
He served as project manager responsible
for leading the fi nal design
team on the $100 million, 2.1-mile
modern streetcar in downtown Milwaukee
and the $30 million Milwaukee
Streetcar Lakefront Line project, which
are under construction and expected to
open in 2018.
Booth also played integral roles in
other high-profi le projects, such as the
QLINE in Detroit, which opened for
revenue service on May 12, 2017 and
is the project manager for the 3.3-mile
TramLinkBR streetcar in Baton Rouge,
Louisiana, and the deputy project manager
for the East-West bus rapid transit
in Milwaukee County.
His commitment to transit planning
in urban environments comes through
in his active involvement in a variety of
professional and civic organizations,
including the Community Streetcar
Coalition, the national and Wisconsin
chapters of the American Planning Association,
serving as vice chairman for
the Martin Luther King Jr. Drive-Business
Improvement District, and sitting
on the board of the local Historic Brewers
Hill Neighborhood Association.
Booth credits his success to having
a passion for his career. As he puts it,
it allows him to focus and spend more
time on the job, because it’s something
he truly loves to do. He also strives to
listen and learn from his peers.
Ashley Frederick
Booth
National Streetcar
Practice Leader,
Associate Vice
President, Planning
and Technical
Services Director
HNTB Corp.
“Transit allows me to interact with the
customers directly. I see it helps them get to work,
to where they need to go. For the future, my wish list
would be if each city could have a commuter line and
to have high-speed rail, for people to see it …”
JEFFREY BENNETT WAS INTRODUCED
to transportation by a recruiter from Norfolk
Southern while he was in college.
While at Norfolk Southern, there was a
lot in the news about high-speed rail that
caught his interest and he decided to go
into passenger rail.
Bennett was hired by the Denton
County Transportation Authority in 2013
as assistant vice president of rail operations.
Since that time, he has spearheaded
signifi cant rail operations innovation and
changes and the DCTA has experienced
many A-train commuter rail successes
managed and led by Bennett.
He led DCTA’s new rail contract worth
nearly $200 million with First Transit to
provide operations and maintenance services
for the A-train. He managed the entire
process and the 9-year contract with
an additional 5-year option went into
eff ect October 1, 2016 — the largest contract
in DCTA history and the fi rst time
for the agency to operate rail service with
a rail provider without regional resources
from other local transit agencies. DCTA
will see a nearly $12 million dollar savings
from the implementation of this contract.
Bennett serves as DCTA’s project
manager for positive train control and
in November 2015, DCTA awarded
a contract to GE Transportation Systems/
Alstom for implementation of
an enhanced automatic train control
system system. Th e $16 million project
is estimated to save DCTA $7 million
and DCTA will be the fi rst public transit
agency in Texas to implement PTC, due
to his leadership of this project.
Since DCTA’s A-train launch, the
agency has operated all trains with two
cars. Aft er analyzing ridership trends,
the agency switched to operate single
cars on a more frequent schedule. To
move toward single-car operations,
Bennett led the installation of a real-time
reporting system by CTC Inc. to successJeffrey
Bennett fully implement this.
Assistant
Vice President,
Rail Operations
Denton County
Transportation
Authority