In+Motion_Summer 2022

2505 N. State HWY 360, Suite 750 | Grand Prairie, Texas 75050

Editor:

Crystal Oczkowski Dallas/Fort Worth | 972.890.9800 Steve Perliss San Francisco | 415.908.6450 Daniel McFadden Miami | 305.500.9390 David Little Washington, D.C. | 703.968.7883

Advisors:

About Lea+Elliott Lea+Elliott is a transportation consulting firm offering a broad range of planning, engineering, program management, and construction management services for clients worldwide. These services are provided to public transit authorities, airports and private sector owners for new transit systems and the refurbishment of existing systems. We have expertise in all modes of transit, including high-speed and intercity rail, rapid transit, commuter rail, light rail, automated guideway transit, personal rapid transit, autonomous vehicles, and conventional and advanced technology buses. The firm is especially well known for its creative structuring of procurements for a wide range of delivery options that include DBOM and P3.

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Meet Larry Miller

Larry Miller is a problem solver. As a matter-of-fact, that’s the favorite part of his job. Tackling a problem or issue and finding root causes and workable solutions—those are the brain teasers that make him excited about work every day. “Breaking problems down for a client and putting them in relatable terms; being able to summarize problems and solutions. Those are as important as finding a problem in the first place,” he says. “I enjoy the back-and-forth with clients,” he adds. “It’s so important to understand their priorities and find out what’s meaningful for them.” One of the highlights of his 20 years with Lea+Elliott is the 13 years he spent providing guidance on the Dulles Corridor Metrorail Project, a 23-mile extension of Washington’s Metrorail system, involving 11 new stations through the heart of northern Virginia and implemented in two phases. As a native of the area, he says it was exciting to work on a project in his own backyard. “ It’s meaningful to contribute on a major resource in an area you know well—a place where you grew up.” With a master’s degree in civil engineering and a minor in city and regional planning, he feels that the understanding of

both disciplines helped make his work on this project particularly successful. “I’m an engineer who can do planning,” he says. “I can do numbers and big picture.” Recently, Larry was engrossed in his work on the Boston Logan International Airport APM project, analyzing solutions to reduce landside traffic challenges. “Besides having great people to work with at our prime, AECOM, and at Massport, it is a challenging problem to solve given the physical constraints and the magnitude of the traffic issues,” he says. “Massport is a leader in addressing issues of airport mobility including encouragement of HOV access and managing transport network companies such as Uber and Lyft. The dynamics associated with that mode of access are complex, especially pre-pandemic.” Massport has been looking at a comprehensive solution to prioritize the use of curbside roadways through the introduction of an APM. Larry is also the project manager for the General Engineering Capital Programs contract for the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA). He led an independent design review for a commuter rail fiber optic resiliency project that led to further work to procure design-build services for implementation of the first package to install a reliable underground fiber optic communications network on 75 miles of commuter rail lines. This systemwill support the Positive Train Control and Automatic Train Control systems along those lines. Throughout his commutes from Virginia to Massachusetts, Larry and his wife Denise could envision a life in Boston and made the commitment to move to the area. Now settled into a New England lifestyle, they spend their free time in what Larry calls “active relaxation”—kayaking, biking, golfing, hiking, visiting interesting places and simply relaxing at the beach. Larry believes his success is founded on his ability to apply a holistic approach to his work. “It’s important to understand context and the potential ripple effects of solving even the smallest of problems,” he says. “Engineering is a whole lot more than addressing numbers. It’s important to communicate and understand technical issues; to develop good reports and presentations; to put your work inside the big picture. I bring objectivity to everything I do; I’m objective to a fault and that helps me every day.”

In Motion

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Vol. 29 No 1