Highway Operations

Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments•Washington, DC

About The Position

The Department of Transportation Planning (DTP) of the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments (COG) is seeking a Transportation Engineer or Senior Transportation Engineer to assist in professional-level activities that support metropolitan transportation planning. The Transportation Engineer position, as part of the Multimodal Planning Team, will primarily play a role in facilitating regional coordination and communication of highway operations, analysis, and planning issues. The successful candidate will also have responsibilities including authoring technical and policy-oriented reports on metropolitan transportation issues; collecting and analyzing relevant data for transportation planning studies; contributing to the metropolitan transportation plan and other departmental initiatives; and presenting to the Transportation Planning Board (TPB) and COG committees and subcommittees. The position requires strong program management and analysis skills, ability to establish and maintain relationships with partners, and the candidate should be familiar with general transportation technical and planning issues, metropolitan transportation issues, and transportation performance measurement.

Requirements

Master’s degree in Transportation, Public Administration, Urban Planning, Civil Engineering, or a related field and two (2) or more years of directly applicable work experience; OR Bachelor’s degree in Transportation, Public Administration, Urban Planning, Civil Engineering, or a related field and four (4) or more years of directly applicable work experience in public policy, transportation, urban planning, civil engineering, or a related field.
Master’s degree in Transportation, Public Administration, Urban Planning, Civil Engineering, or a related field and four (4) or more years of directly applicable work experience; OR Bachelor’s degree in Transportation, Public Administration, Urban Planning, Civil Engineering, or a related field and six (6) or more years of directly applicable work experience in public policy, transportation, urban planning, civil engineering, or a related field.
An equivalent combination of experience and training which provides the required knowledge, analytical and writing skills and abilities may be considered.
Prior professional experience in transportation planning and project management, including planning for highway operations.
Ability to work cooperatively in a team environment within and between COG departments.
Passionate about learning, improving technical skills, public service, and making significant contributions that will improve the agency and the region.
Background and demonstrated experience using ArcGIS and Microsoft Office programs (Word, Excel, PowerPoint).
Ability to interpret technical findings and share them with general audiences.
Ability to respond to common inquiries or complaints from members, regulatory agencies, community leaders and citizens.
Ability to articulate intended project workflows to direct supervisors.
Ability to effectively present information to top management, public groups, and/or boards of directors.
Ability to add, subtract, multiply, and divide in all units of measure, using whole numbers, common fractions, and decimals.
Ability to compute percentages, rates, and ratios and to draw and interpret numeric charts and graphs.
Ability to define problems, collect data, establish facts, and draw valid conclusions.
Ability to evaluate technical options and implement solutions based on individual project needs.
Ability to interpret an extensive variety of instructions furnished in written, oral, diagram, or schedule form and deal with a variety of abstract and concrete variables in situations where only limited standardization may exist.

Responsibilities

Undertaking highway operations, analysis and planning activities including serving as a subject matter expert on highway operations for the region; acting as a regional resource for highway and vehicle traffic operations information.
Keeping abreast of and participate in national activities in systems management and operations, including signal systems, emergency support functions, and travel data.
Providing staff support for the Regional Transportation Systems Management and Operations (RTSMO) program, convening meetings of stakeholder agency representatives, developing agendas and facilitating meetings.
Coordinating discussion of regional issues, including Connected and Autonomous Vehicle (CAV) technical and policy issues, curbside management, traffic signal operations, and emerging technologies in transportation.
Supporting the Metropolitan Area Transportation Operations Coordination (MATOC) program, including the MATOC Steering Committee.
Attending MATOC meetings, representing COG’s interests, preparing meeting summaries and highlighting key issues for leadership.
Providing invoicing coordination and review.
Working with other DTP staff to advance regional issues and information, including the work of the Multi Modal Planning team on safety, freight, bicycle and pedestrian, resiliency and public transportation activities and with the travel data and monitoring of the Mobility Analytics Program staff and Geographic Information System staff.
Conducting regional emergency preparedness planning liaison activities, providing support and coordination in regional emergency preparedness planning in conjunction with the COG Department of Homeland Security and Public Safety (DHSPS).
Assisting with the project management and preparation of metropolitan transportation planning studies such as the Congestion Management Process Technical Report and Regional Freight Plan.
Coordinating and working with federal, state, regional and local transportation agencies and organizations, regularly interacting with and participating in other organizations’ planning activities, attending meetings, participating as needed in the highway systems planning processes of member jurisdictions, and representing the TPB’s interests and summarizing meeting discussions.
Authoring and presenting technical and policy-oriented information including major plan documents, memoranda, and technical reports for a variety of audiences including elected officials, technical experts, and the public.
Making oral and graphic presentations of metropolitan transportation data, issues, findings and recommendations to TPB and COG committees and subcommittees.
Facilitating the planning of key events such as symposiums or forums on highway operations planning topics, such as CAV and TIM workshops.
Other multimodal transportation planning duties, as assigned.