There's nothing novel about hundreds of transportation researchers, practitioners, and advocates convening for a technical conference, especially during the week of the annual Transportation Research Board conference.
But Crossroads: A Transportation Equity and Justice Convening, which kicks off this Thursday in Washington, D.C., is something different, something groundbreaking, something defiant. It represents a unified and steadfast commitment to a more equitable transportation system, amidst devastating federal cuts to transportation infrastructure and research, and leadership failing to meet the moment.
A notable act at a critical moment
In the past year, the Trump administration has dismantled and disrupted many federal efforts to address longstanding injustices in our nation’s transportation investments and policies. Federal programs designed to address these challenges, like the Reconnecting Communities Program, have been gutted, with projects like street and transit improvements in the (predominantly Black) Roxbury neighborhood of Boston abruptly cancelled, among others.
Offices and bodies that provide guidance and oversight on transportation equity, like the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Equity Task Force and the Civil Rights division of the Department of Justice, have been disrupted. Recommendations from the Advisory Committee on Transportation Equity have been sidelined. And several government-wide efforts to drive progress on equity and environmental justice have been scrubbed out entirely.
Further, US DOT has been utilizing transportation spending to dig deeper divides in this country, such as by illegally linking federal infrastructure funding to states’ cooperation with immigration enforcement, and dismantling of diversity, equity, and inclusion policies. Meanwhile, Congress has been quietly negotiating the future of federal transportation policy through a bill known as surface transportation reauthorization, and we risk locking in more years of a highway-centered approach over people-oriented and science-based affordable transportation options.
The convening also matters because it will be held (physically and figuratively) alongside the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s Transportation Research Board meeting, where the nation’s transportation professionals gather annually to discuss the state of transportation research activities across government, academic, and private sectors.
Last year, in the wake of the administration’s announcements that it will snuff out any so-called “DEI” activities from the federal government, TRB announced — unprompted — that it would overhaul its longstanding committee structure. I and many others in transportation research world watched in dismay and disappointment when TRB seemingly obeyed in advance and dissolved its climate and equity-focused committees — bodies that have long served key functions for professional development and collaboration for transportation researchers in these disciplines. Crossroads stands in stark contrast to that move.
Most Important, this convening is also part of a broader movement for the preservation of science and democracy in this country. In the past year, we’ve witnessed the destruction of federal science activities by the Trump administration — such as disbanding of science advisory bodies and gutting entire programs and landmark assessments.
The targeting of experts and research is no accident, but instead part of an authoritarian playbook, by which independent voices and inconvenient facts and evidence are squashed. But we know from other countries and contexts that a key strategy to combat this assault on technical expertise is to build alternative institutions outside of the government, to ensure that the targeted activities continue, and importantly, that the public continues to have access to expertise.
The Crossroads event is part of a rapidly growing alliance of researchers and scientists choosing to launch such independent science activities, in the wake of the Trump administration’s abdication of its role to advance knowledge for the nation.
A vision disrupted, a chance to reimagine
Finally, the event matters deeply to me personally. Until a year ago this week, I was at US DOT building a climate- and equity-research program working to bridge divides between US DOT-funded research, social science insights, and policy decisions across levels of government. The vision was to design and fund research informed by community needs that would, in turn, shape the department’s policy and investment decisions, all in service of driving a more-equitable and climate-friendly transportation system.
But the new administration took a hatchet to much of the work I and others were doing to build this vision.
But this convening shows that the transportation community is saying in one loud voice: we're still here, we're still committed, and we're not going anywhere. Collectively, we still can build that vision. After all, the fight to build a more equitable transportation system must be from the ground up, and transportation decisions span levels of government so we have abundant opportunities to continue to make progress.
In my DOT role, I saw what was possible when research and policy can be applied equally towards a more equitable world. I saw shovels in the ground on new projects that would better serve local communities, and progress across the country on a safer, cleaner, and more just transportation network.
It's hard to overstate the criticality of taking action in this moment as the racism, inequities, and cruelty of our nation’s leaders are on full display in an unending stream of headlines, but that's precisely why we must.
Transportation researchers, practitioners, and advocates have a key role to play continuing this progress and building a new vision of equitable mobility and a more just world. The Crossroads event this week is an important step. Let's get to work.
