The Honorable Rod Diridon, Sr. has presented sustainable transit keynotes in over a dozen countries, three dozen states and for hundreds of California community organizations. He’s invested nearly 50 years in elected and appointed policy-level responsibilities to implement sustainable transit to combat congestion, lack of mobility for the disadvantaged, reduce urban sprawl, and most emphatically since the mid-1990s, to combat climate change.
With peer reviewed research showing over 40% of climate change gasses coming from petroleum powered transportation nationally (nearly 50% in California), converting to electric power is the universal survival imperative. While battling for this objective, Diridon has chaired dozens of major organizations with distinction, including
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American Public Transportation Association
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National Research Council’s Transit Cooperative Research Board
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National Council of University Transportation Centers
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VP for the America’s of the UITP (International Transit Association in Brussels)
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US High Speed Rail Association
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APTA High Speed InterCity Rail Committee
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National and California Counties’ Associations’ Transit Committees
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California High Speed Rail Authority
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San Francisco Bay Area Metropolitan Transportation Commission
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Santa Clara County (Silicon Valley) Board of Supervisors and Transit Board (for 20 years)
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The region’s League of Conservation Voters Board
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Nine successful Silicon Valley rail construction projects
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A statewide and the first successful county transit tax measure in California
In addition to publicly crusading to save our environment, Diridon is committed to walking his talk. He’s driven electric cars since 1996 and the 36 solar panels on his home are a net positive contributor to the grid. In 15 to 20 years, when it may be too late to avoid the climate change cataclysm, he’ll honestly tell his grandchildren he did all he could to save earth for them and other mammals.