Participants

I began my career in transportation in 1994 by launching Strategic Rail Finance, a North American rail-industry consulting firm. My associates and I have been busy since then, advising private and public sector clients in 44 states and Canada. I entered the rail industry with the intention to improve how we invest capital in infrastructure and industrial systems. In addition to our client work, I have contributed considerable time and energy to educating, and learning from, government officials and staff at all levels.

I have met with the staff or leaders of 68 U.S. Senate offices and 135 U.S. House offices, speaking on behalf of policy and programmatic improvements that would benefit all, not a particular client or vested interest.

Leading up to the founding of OnTrackNorthAmerica in 2007, and in the years since, we have developed our capacity for convening stakeholders in government and industry.

• On December 8, 1998 we convened a rail transportation conference in the U.S. Capitol Building for 55 congressional staff, praised by many as the finest briefing they had ever attended.
• On December 11, 2008 we convened a five-hour summit of industry and government leaders in the U.S. Capitol Building to consider new collaborative approaches to freight transportation efficiency.

I am honored to have earned the respect and ear of Congressional leaders and staff.

• On October 19, 2005 I spoke before the Surface Transportation Board on the 25th anniversary of the Staggers Rail Act of 1980.
• On February 17, 2011 I testified before the U.S. House of Representatives Railroad Subcommittee on reforms to the Federal Railroad Administration’s Railroad Rehabilitation and Improvement Financing (RRIF) program.
• In March of 2011 I was the only private sector invitee to a U.S. House Railroad Subcommittee Staff Workshop exploring ways to explore the FRA RRIF loan program.

I have found that our common sense message, based in whole-system thinking, resonates across the political spectrum.

Some representative acknowledgments of our efforts:

• Thank you letters from Republican House Transportation Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Frank Wolf and Democratic Senator Jay Rockefeller’s Chief of Staff.
• In November of 1997 I was responsible for having freight rail projects made eligible in H.R.115 – the National Infrastructure Development Act.
• In 2003 I contributed to Washington State produce shippers by designing and writing important elements of the Washington State Produce Railcar Pool Act as passed by the 2003 state legislature.
• In 2009 I worked with the Federal Railroad Administration to eliminate audited financial statement requirements for Class II and III railroads from the Railroad Rehabilitation & Improvement Financing Act (RRIF loan program).

I am pleased to have had articles published in several transportation industry journals.

• Railway Age, December 2014, “Revitalizing Direct Rail Service”
• Progressive Railroading, June 1998, “Getting a Lender’s Attention”
• Association of Transportation Law, Logistics & Policy, Fall 2000, “Assessing the Process of Creating the RRIF Program”
• Transportation Quarterly, Fall 2002, “Regional and Short Line Railroads in the United States”
• Railway Age, September 2008, “Leveraging Capital for the Entire Industry”
• Railway Age, April 2011, “A RRIF-Centered Capitalization Growth Strategy”

Chairman/CEO, OnTrackNorthAmerica and Chairman, Strategic Rail Finance

Eugene N. (“Gene”) Cipriani is an attorney who previously worked for the United States Railway Association (U.S.R.A.) as an Attorney Advisor and for the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) as in-house corporate counsel.

At SEPTA, Gene was counsel for the Railroad Division, the Real Estate Department and the Engineering, Maintenance and Construction Division. He was also SEPTA’s counsel before the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission on railroad-highway crossing cases and worked frequently with PennDOT, the City of Philadelphia and the Counties of Bucks, Chester, Delaware and Montgomery. He served as SEPTA’s legal liaison with utilities, including PECO Energy Company, Verizon, Philadelphia Gas Works, the Philadelphia Water Department, Aqua America and various cable and fiber-optic companies. In addition, he was the in-house counsel for the Paoli Railyard and Reading Company PCB clean-ups and was the Chair of the Potentially Responsible Party Group charged with cleaning up the Lancaster Battery Superfund site in Lancaster, PA.

After SEPTA, Gene was a Right of Way Agent, first for Keystone Acquisition Services, Corp. and later for AECOM. In 2017, Gene became a Contract Administrator for the Freight Rail Department of AECOM. In 2020, Gene was made a Part Time Variable employee of AECOM and has resumed his Law Practice in the Estates Law field.

Gene obtained his Bachelor of Arts Degree from Saint Joseph’s College (now University) and his Juris Doctor Degree from Temple University Beasley School of Law. He is a member of The Engineers’ Club of Philadelphia (ECP), Chapter 9 of the International Right-of-Way Association (IRWA), the American Society of Highway Engineers (ASHE) and the Delaware Valley Goods Movement Committee of the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission (DVRPC). He implemented the “Building Bridges for STEM®” (BBTS) program as part of a Leadership Development and Outreach effort within AECOM and under the auspices of The Engineers’ Club of Philadelphia. BBTS has been warmly received within the educational community of the Philadelphia metropolitan area and has been one catalyst for helping students who are the first generation in their families to consider attending college.

Attorney; former advisor to the United States Railway Association (U.S.R.A.); former in-house corporate counsel for Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA)

Daniel R. Elliott was presidentially appointed, and Senate confirmed to terms in 2009 and 2015 on the U.S. Surface Transportation Board (STB), an independent economic regulator of the freight railroad industry. He was designated by the President to be Chairman for both of these terms through January 2017.

As Chairman, Mr. Elliott became an authority in economic regulatory matters handled before the STB, in Congress and through the courts. He was responsible for decisions at the agency regarding complex rulemakings, demurrage and rate cases, preemption issues, and major rail construction cases. Another part of his job included constant interaction with Congress, especially committees with oversight over STB activities, including testifying before the Senate Commerce Committee on several occasions.

Now Mr. Elliott mainly handles transportation regulatory matters for railroads and shippers. He brings unique insights to any issue he faces because of his understanding of how federal agencies work and his relationships throughout government and the rail industry.

Prior to assuming his leadership role in the federal government, Mr. Elliott handled rail labor matters for sixteen years. He has extensive knowledge of the unique issues that arise in the rail world.

Mr. Elliott was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and grew up in Cleveland. He graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.A. and the Ohio State College of Law with a J.D.

Transportation Attorney, Former Chairman of U.S. Surface Transportation Board

A former school teacher turned railroader, Mr. Felix began his short line railroad career on a Penn Central branch line in Indiana in 1979. He went on to be the founder or owner of 9 different short line railroads covering 7 states. In 1988, he founded Indiana Boxcar Corporation that continues to purchase, lease and sell locomotives and freight cars. He has actively participated in various railroad organizations at the national and state level. An advocate for short lines and their customers, he has visited in person over 300 North American short line operations. He holds a bachelors and masters degree from Purdue University and continues to reside in Connersville, Indiana.

Founder, Indiana Boxcar Corporation

A nationally recognized energy advisor, Jim primarily concentrates his practice on emerging markets in the wholesale electric and natural gas areas.

Inside and outside government, Jim has focused his representations on electric utilities, utility investors, transmission companies, and gas and oil pipelines on issues of infrastructure development and rate regulation, demand response and environmental law. He is also the founder and principal of Hoecker Energy Law & Policy PLLC, where he serves as outside counsel to WIRES, a national business alliance of companies advocating investment in electric transmission, including transmission-dependent wind and solar energy firms as well as transmission developers. He has advised foreign countries and utilities on energy industry reconstructing and has served as an expert witness throughout the United States and Canada. He has given testimony before committees of Congress and administrative tribunals.

Jim’s significant work on behalf of clients in the energy industry has included:

• Representing a national nonprofit trade association comprising transmission providers and customers, before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), the U.S. Department of Energy and Congress in contested and generic rulemaking matters, policy making and legislation.
• Representing a Canadian independent system operator in structuring an Order No. 888-compliant tariff for export of electric power into the U.S. wholesale power market.
• Advising an independent transmission developer seeking transmission rate incentives and rate-based treatment under the Federal Power Act for new electric transmission facilities
• Advising a developer of green-field transmission in New Mexico.

Prior to rejoining private practice, Jim was FERC chairman from 1997 to 2001. During the nearly eight years he served as FERC chairman and, before that, FERC commissioner, he was responsible for instituting regional transmission organizations to administer the wholesale electric power system and streamlining regulatory processes. In the 1980s, Jim was assistant general counsel for gas and oil litigation at FERC, as well as assistant general counsel for rulemaking and legislative analysis.

Founder, Hoecker Energy Law & Policy PLLC, former Chair of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission