A Conversation with IBTTA President, Andrew Fremier, About “Bridging the Gap”

Tolling Points and Café IBTTA had the pleasure of sitting down to talk with Andrew Fremier, the 2023 IBTTA President and Deputy Executive Director of the Bay Area Toll Authority (BATA) and Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) in San Francisco, CA. We talked about the theme of his presidency—Bridging the Gap—and what he plans to focus on throughout the year. Below are edited excerpts from the conversations.

 To watch the video with Andy, head on over to our YouTube Channel!

What are you looking forward to in 2023 as the IBTTA President?

I’m looking forward to serving as the IBTTA President, and I'm really excited about the opportunity to reinforce the good work that's been done by all of my predecessors to keep IBTTA effective and relevant into the future.

What is the focus and theme of your presidency?

My theme for 2023 is “Bridging the Gap.”

My theme is built on the shoulders of the past. Bridging the gap to me represents multiple things. One, the word “bridging” was purposeful. I think that still at my core I’m a bridge engineer, even though I’ve sort of turned into a planner and a toll guy. I think the core of my relationship with civil engineering has to do with my appreciation of these large structures.

Bridging the gap is also an homage to the industry itself and how important bridges are. It also represents so much more. How do you look back from the past and learn from both the positive and the negative and then apply new solutions that take advantage of work that was done before?

In fact, bridging the gap is sort of a retread. My memory is that an IBTTA annual report from 20 years ago used the theme bridging the gap. Adaptive reuse is not a bad thing.

Bridging the gap is really about figuring out how you can adapt into the future and find alternatives that don’t continue to take away from this wonderful world we live in—this very limited ship we’re on.

So, from my perspective, it really represents that crux of what it takes to cross the divide, what it takes to remember and respect the past but then try to make modifications in the future that work well and then pass that on to the next generation.

I really have an opportunity now, at this stage of my career, to reflect on the next generation and what we can do to support them. In a nutshell, I think that’s what it represents to me: a continuation of the continuum of history and making sure that we have an opportunity to do our fair share and pass it on and leave things in a little bit better shape than we found them.

What would you like to accomplish this year as the IBTTA President?

I really am focusing on three areas. The first area is the clear recognition that climate change is a problem, and we have an obligation to do something about it. I think it's more than just making sure our facilities are green. It's really trying to make an effective change in behaviors so that we have an opportunity to reverse a very terrible thing that we're all watching, in very different ways, across all different states and countries.

My second focus is to look at all the good work my predecessors have done in setting out some real effective committees and perhaps strengthen them by consolidating some of the overlap in effort so that we’re not working in silos.

What I mean by that is we focused in the last couple of years on workforce development. All of us are facing challenges around bringing employees into the workforce that can handle all of our needs in this very broad spectrum of work.

I’m also interested in finding more ways to reach out to communities of concern. We should find ways to reach into those communities and develop a real interest in workforce opportunities. We need folks in the trades, as well as folks in the engineering and planning fields and financial areas. I want to capitalize on the needs we have as a society and support the industry in a positive, effective way.

The third focus is to really take a look at what pricing means in the future. The words that we're talking about now across the nation are pricing the entire system. Part of that relates to climate goals. By pricing the system, you can incentivize folks to change their behavior. We are also looking at ways to replace the gas tax across the nation, so the road user charging work has started. Well, I can't think of a better industry than the tolling industry to find a real positive place in that environment. This is because we understand the technology, we're always evolving to the next technology, and we have customer relations with almost all the drivers in the United States. At some point it seems like everybody has driven through a toll facility, so I think we can apply that historical knowledge to really help solve some of the bigger problems that the nation and the world have to both maintain our transportation infrastructure and protect the climate in the long run.

What are you looking forward to in 2023?

Coming in as the next IBTTA President, I realize that I've got a lot of support from the folks that have done it before, and I'm extremely honored to work with and learn from all my predecessors who bring a wealth of knowledge and experience to the industry every single day.

What would you want members to gain this year?

I think the fact that all of these agencies are investing their resources into the work we do is a commitment. I want to make sure that we continue, and the association stays strong for the next 90 years.

I want to ensure that it continues to provide resources to the industry that make it relevant and keep it as an effective organization, as it has been for such a long time.

To learn more about Andrew Fremier and his work at IBTTA, watch his video interview.