Palo Alto -- Rod Diridon, Executive Director of the Norman Y. Mineta International Institute for Surface Transportation Policy Studies (MTI) at San Jose State University, will present the City of Palo Alto Fifth Annual Distinguished Speaker's Lecture on Sustainable Transportation. Mr. Diridon's presentation, "High Speed Rail for California", will take place from 7:00 to 8:30 PM on Thursday, October 16th at the City Council Chambers, Palo Alto City Hall, 250 Hamilton Avenue. The event is free and open to the public and sponsored by the Transportation Division of the Palo Alto Department of Planning and Community Environment.

Diridon, the son of an immigrant Italian railroad brakeman, is the "father" of modern transit service in California's Silicon Valley (Santa Clara County). He is the only person to have chaired the San Francisco Bay Area's (nine counties and 104 cities) three regional governments: the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, the Bay Area Air Quality Management District, and the Association of Bay Area Governments.

He served in 1993 as the Chair of the American Public Transit Association in Washington D. C. and more recently as the North American Vice President of the International Transit Association in Brussels. He has been an advisor to the Federal Transit Administration and in 1995 chaired the National Research Council's Transit Oversight and Project Selection Committee. Diridon currently chairs the NRC's Transportation Research Board's study panel on "Combating Global Warming Through Sustainable Transportation Policy." He is frequently asked to provide testimony to Congressional committees.

He was appointed by the Governor to the California High Speed Rail Authority Board in June 2001 and was subsequently elected as Chair.

Diridon was recently named one of the "Millennium 100" who contributed most to the success of Silicon Valley in the past millennium. Upon his retirement from elected office in 1994, the historic Amtrak/CalTrain Station in San Jose was renamed the San Jose Diridon Station in his honor.

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