Mass Transit, Seizing Opportunities, and Teaching Sustainability with Thomas Abdallah

Welcome back to Environmental Professionals Radio, Connecting the Environmental Professionals Community Through Conversation, with your hosts Laura Thorne and Nic Frederick! 

On today’s episode, we talk with Thomas Abdallah Assistant Vice President and Chief Environmental Engineer for the MTA’s Construction and Development (MTA C&D) agency about Mass Transit, Seizing Opportunities, and Teaching Sustainability.   Read his full bio below.

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Showtimes: 

1:22   Nic & Laura talk about career strategies
8:35  Interview with Thomas Abdallah starts
15:03  Teaching Sustainability
26:36  Mass Transit
35:05  Seizing Opportunities

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This podcast is produced by the National Association of Environmental Professions (NAEP). Check out all the NAEP has to offer at NAEP.org.

Connect with Thomas Abdallah at https://www.linkedin.com/in/thomas-abdallah-p-e-leed-ap-77b59718/

Guest Bio:

Thomas Abdallah, P.E. LEED AP, ENV SP is the Assistant Vice President and Chief Environmental Engineer for the MTA’s Construction and Development (MTA C&D) agency. Thomas holds a B.S. in Chemical Engineering from Rutgers University. He is responsible to provide expert environmental engineering services for all MTA capital projects, and ensures that all design and construction projects meet environmental requirements including the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and the NY State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA). He is also a fierce champion of environmental sustainability issues and is responsible for MTA C&D’s certified ISO 14001 Environmental Management System (EMS).

Thomas is also an Adjunct Professor in Columbia University’s Sustainability Management (SUMA) program in the School of Professional Studies. He is the proud author of the book Sustainable Mass Transit: Challenges and Opportunities in Urban Public Transportation (2017 Elsevier) and recently appeared in an episode of History Channel’s Modern Marvels – Moving America.

Music Credits

Intro: Givin Me Eyes by Grace Mesa

Outro: Never Ending Soul Groove by Mattijs Muller

Chapters

• 1:22 Nic & Laura talk about career strategies
• 8:35 Interview with Thomas Abdallah starts
• 15:03 Teaching Sustainability
• 26:36 Mass Transit
• 35:05 Seizing Opportunities

Transcript

Transcripts are auto transcribed

[Intro]

Laura 
Hello and welcome to EPR with your favorite environmental nerds Nic and Laura. On today's episode, Nic and I discuss career strategies. I talked with Tom Abdallah about mass transit seizing opportunities and teaching sustainability. And finally, oh dear Nic, thanks. Cockroaches are not resistant to radiation but could survive without their heads for a week. Sorry if you just ate  something. So I thought they couldn't get any weirder. There you go. Hit that music


[Shout outs]

Nic 
On January 26, 2022 to 9am Pacific noon, Eastern NAEP will host its next great webinar titled "An Environmental Planners Guide to Recent Infrastructure Legislation" led by our very own Fred Wagner. And Chuck Nicholson. This has been a big part of our show, so it's going to be a really great listen. Please register for the webinar at www.naep.org. Laura and I love doing the show. If you love it too, and would like us to keep doing it. We need your help. We can't do it without our awesome sponsors. So please head on over to www.environmentalprofessionalsradio.com And check out our sponsor form for details. Let's get to our segment.

Laura  
Nic, so I had the interview with Tom which you unfortunately we're not able to make it to and he had so much good advice. So I was kind of just it made me think like, What's the best advice you've ever received?

Nic 
Oh, gosh, there's you know, I've had I've had my fair share one of my favorites, was it there's no such thing as life and death in NEPA. You know, which was a way to tell me that you know, yes, you need to worry about it. But remember that it's not the end of the world but I don't know I think one of my other the one that kind of sticks with me all the time. It's very simple. It's just don't worry.  And the context of that was trying to plan your career and work through where you're going to be a lot of times where you are and where you're going to be have so many steps in front of you. You don't even know you're going to take, right like there's opportunities that fall into your lap. There's opportunities you find as you get to know people that opportunities that you just find through your standard doing your job when a new project is long and you meet somebody that you get along with really well. Maybe that's your next that becomes your next opportunity. It's one thing to plan and have an idea and you should do that. But a lot of what happens with your career is not necessarily related to perfect planning. It's more of taking an opportunity and running with it. When you get that door open. Go through it and that's been really great advice for me. It's gotten me to where I am now. And I'm very, very happy with that. And I think that was much more impactful to me and my career than anything else. That's probably the best advice I ever got. But

Laura 
That's great. That relates really well to the things that Tom talks about.

Nic
Yeah,

Laura
He's Yeah, I think you can tell from his career path and some of the examples that he'll talk about that that's some advice he would also agree to.

Nic  
Well, I mean, you're somebody who I mean, you kind of give advice to people for a living so what I mean you have to have like a couple of really good pieces of advice yourself.

Laura 
Yeah, and that's really kind of, you know, I am in my book club, we just read Strategic Intuition and it wasn't the greatest book the world but the there were two chapters that were about strategy like hard and heavy about strategy and I was really into it. And so I am always trying to help preaching but I'm the strategy person, like, You got to have a strategy you have to, but people just misunderstand that. That doesn't mean that you can't be flexible. You have like being flexible enough. I mean, but not worrying is part of the strategy, you know. Yeah, absolutely. strategy doesn't mean that like I have to do these points, I have to go through these checkpoints. It's my goal is to get to this checkpoint, and if I make it, this is what I'm doing next. If I don't make it, this is what I'm doing, you know, and even open, other opportunities for coming across open doors, and I think the best ways you know balance so I have a strategy but I'm open to certain things, you know, and helping you understand what you want to say yes to or no to is really helpful. And that's all part of in I guess if we're talking about advice, like having no strategy is a strategy. You know what I mean? Like? So I'd rather take the road where I have some sort of strategy, and I can chuck, it change it, whatever. Yeah, I'm the strategy. Personnel like to read Art of War, you know? Yeah, like that. Great.

Nic 
Yes. I must crush my enemies, That makes sense. Yeah. Yeah.

Laura 
And then you can see like, where you where you've come and gone. It's like documenting this stuff. And you're like, Oh, this is where I thought I was gonna be this right now. And you know, it's really fun to do also.

Nic 
I love that. I love the idea of that because I think a lot of times people get really wrapped up in what I have to say yes to everything, you know, and we've even talked about on the show to say yes, you know, and there's a strategy to yeses you know, it should be something that you're interested in. It should be something that it doesn't even have to be something you know about if it's something that piques your interest and something that engages your curiosity. Maybe this would be a really interesting thing. somebody's telling me, you know, go and live for three months in middle of nowhere Alabama is kind of, you know, surprising and a little daunting, you know, but if somebody tells you that's for disaster relief, and then you're like, Okay, I'm really interested in this and I want to know, and you get to learn a whole lot of things, you get to meet a whole lot of different people. And that's a whole avenue of opportunity that opens up for you from just one word, but if it's like, you know, I want you to camp outside and not talk to anyone. That's a little different, you know, and so I had a job offer one time, where they would offer me it would be basically an on site position. I would have a team but I would be basically a contract person, right? So I would be working year to year based on whether or not this contract worked. And it's you know, was it a good opportunity, I'm sure, but for what I wanted to do, and the stability of working to get those contracts is a much better place for me to be and you learn that stuff as you go through your career. But sometimes you choose security over risk, and sometimes you don't.

Laura 
Yeah, that's great. And I think too, for like you know for acquainting that to career strategy or something, you don't have to say yes to everything you can apply for jobs that you don't want to say yes to you can go through the interview and be like, these people were weird. I didn't like this. I don't like how they answered their diversity policy questions, you know that I asked them and you can have like, I'm gonna say yes to this opportunity if if it's enough money, or if it's the right circumstance, or if it's remote or whatever those things are that you want, but if you don't know what those things are, or haven't thought about them, or you're just randomly saying yes to everything, now you may not I don't know, but you might, I don't know there's again no strategy is a strategy. And he might just, you know, if you wanted to see where the universe takes you, I'm sure there's people with examples that have had amazing things happen just from saying yes, so the weirdest things.

Nic 
All right. Yeah, that's totally true. You have to know yourself. You know, some people love that. And some people don't and you know, you have to know who you are a little bit.

Laura 
You'd have to be okay with, well maybe that didn't work.

Nic 
Yeah, And maybe restarting. You know, like I say, people talk about, like, Oh, I'd love to work in the film industry, for example, but like the film industry is a contract business. So it is based on what you're doing right now. And that can come and go in an instant. So you have a movie, and the movie takes nine months to film. Okay, you have to line up the thing that you're doing your next thing you're doing before your movie ends, otherwise you're making nothing, no dollars  you go from making a ton of money to make nothing? And so there's a lot of whirlwind in that's really hard on people, and they don't realize that it's an Oh, it's great. I'm, you know, making props for a movie, but that's not for everybody.

Laura 
Yeah, but if you love it, and you want to take on that risk, then hey go for it.

Nic 
Yeah, absolutely. So that's so we're good at wrapping things up today. But you know, if it gets really sound advice, we could probably talk about that again. And we I'm sure we will. I'm sure we'll bring this back up again at some point but yeah, let's get to the interview and take a listen.

Laura 
Alright, sounds good.

[Interview with Thomas Abdallah starts]

Laura
Welcome back to EPR. today we have Thomas Abdallah engineer, professor and author on the show. I met Tom through a group that is forming the New York State Chapter of environmental professionals. And I'm excited to announce that Tom is going to be our first chapter president. Welcome, Tom.

Thomas Abdallah 
Thank you very much. Thank you for having me.

Laura 
Awesome. So let's start off there. Let's talk about you know why you joined NAEP How long have you been a member? I think you're pretty pretty new which is very exciting. How did you hear about it?

Thomas Abdallah 
Well, I was informed a colleague Josh Gillespie from HDR. I have been involved with, you know, numerous over my 37 year career with many of conferences, seminars, associations. I'm also in transportation so I've been part of Transportation Research Board and American Public Transportation Administration, APTA, SSPC Green Build. I've done a lot of those associations. It's kind of the also columns of everything. But what I found with the environmental professionals, the National Association of environmental professionals, it's kind of what I've been my career. I am an engineer, college professor and an author but I am in reality and environmental professional first and foremost. So when I learned about it, I started off as an environmental technician in 1985 when it right after I graduated from Rutgers University as a chemical engineer, it's interesting, I didn't get a job as a chemical engineer, I got a job as an environmental technician. And thankfully, I did because I have really enjoyed this career as an environmental professional. So when I when I looked at that in totality, it was kind of like everything you could be a, you know, an environmental professional that that was hazardous materials and industrial hygiene and NEPA, National Environmental Policy Act and issues with historic in archaeology and sustainability. To me, that was my favorite part. It's sort of encompasses all environmental professionals, which, you know, goes back didn't just start. Recently, environmental professionals have been in business as far as my whole entire career. So I really enjoyed that aspect that could really reach out to almost all of my colleagues in the industry. And in academia, I'm a professor at Columbia University, in the sustainability management graduate program. So I really liked that aspect of it. And also, I think these are kind of these associations really help accelerate development for young people. And as I get older, more experienced people, so you get to meet other professionals, and it's something that you can control. We all have a job, we all report to somebody, but these types of associations this is pro bono work for everybody. So it's kind of you can put in a little bit you can put in a lot of it, you could be well involved on committees, Chapter presidents and, and so, you know, Josh discussed with us as a group of people in New York State about forming a New York State chapter, which was interesting because you know, you think we think in New York that we can be about everything. But there wasn't a chapter in New York State, and we have a great state and a great professional. The regulatory agencies are fantastic and the state is very progressive. And so it was kind of like we don't have a chapter and, and so it's, we're putting it together.

Laura 
Awesome. Yeah, you know, we've been kicking the idea round, and I've heard of other people kicking it around in New York for a long time. So I think it is surprising to a lot of people that there isn't a chapter in this area in the region. So it's very exciting that it's actually happening this time, people are volunteering for the board positions and all that stuff. So we're really excited to see where it goes and appreciate you stepping in and take the lead as president. So good luck in 2022.

Thomas Abdallah 
Thank you, you know, I think mostly it's about communication, whether it's on Zoom or in person or it's really about connecting even through social media platforms. It's really a way to network tremendously. And also, it's something near and dear to me. It's it's an opportunity for me now at this stage of my career that I can mentor and meet young people and meet people in college graduate school, entry levels, give them an idea about what to expect. I really enjoy your role model way. And I think that's something that that you know, I had thought about I always kind of in my career I did these when I call guest lecturing at colleges and universities, professors would contact me with depending on whether we're in an engineering class or a sustainability class, or could you come and talk about what's going on with mass transit and or sustainability and I was happy to work for, you know, as a sort of a guest at places like my alma mater, Rutgers University, NYU, Columbia University, I did a thing with Harvard. I've entertained students from Cornell. This was kind of something I always did and then I became a professor at Columbia. So I was able to reach out to pass on my experiences was nothing better than to hear how it's done. And as I was mentioning, it's never one way it's not this isn't there isn't any just you know, Tom's way all or Laura's, it's so many different ways. It's one of the things I you know, I thought about as a follow up to my first book, Sustainable Mass Transit was to capture this, you know, sustainability professionals but you're doing it so I figured I could just be part of that endeavor, because I think it's really important to pass along what we know. No one starts off as, you know, as a full fledged professional when they when they leave, you know, the college right? So, we've all been mentored. We've all learned from people. One thing I always tell young men all the like, you know, be a sponge, learn everything you can learn from everybody. And I think that's one of the things I often advise my younger people, and even my age, still I get people. I'm going to be 60 next year. So, you know, I still, you know, feel like I'm in the middle of my career. So it's important to network and share knowledge. So it's really what it's all about

Laura 
Yeah, absolutely. So you answered all my question. So we're done. Just kidding.  You have 37 years of experience to talk about we have so much more to go. Let's talk though about the experience you have at the university because I know that we want to touch on your interaction with the students and the experience that you're passing on there. So how did you get into that?

Thomas Abdallah  
Well, you know, I have sort of a little bit of a motto, do the right thing. Somebody will see it at some point and you'll be rewarded. It may not always be the case. So I just always worked hard. I wrote papers did presentations, you know  all those agencies that the conferences and seminars. You know, I spoke about, I worked for the New York MTA for 35 years. And one of the ways to be able to travel to different cities would be to write about your projects, and then present then they would give you the okay to travel to different cities. And in fact, I even traveled to Europe to talk about projects that I that I was on, so I kind of always did those things and you know out of the blue. I know this is gonna sound strange, but out of the blue, I got an email from Columbia University. Would I be interested in being an adjunct professor in the sustainability management program and come for an interview? And the interesting part was, I had always been a fan. Columbia University has many schools. Just tremendous amount of schools. I'm still learning after eight years, but they had the Earth Institute and I was a big fan of that was a big fan of the the idea of worrying about climate change and sustainability management, which sort of, it's not just hugging trees, you know, which which is fabulous, but it still is also about practicality. And economy. It isn't a just  bunches of them all together. And I was I was really big fan. So I got an email. And I was like, I never thought I thought maybe after I retired from MTA that I would become a professor but when you're sort of what what you're actually looking at comes a callin' you know, you know, wait, and so I interviewed and my really, Professor Steve Cohen, who was head of the sustainability management program at Columbia from since its beginning. I always been a fan of his I read this book he wrote a book called Sustainable Management. And they interviewed with him. And it was like, it was like, it was amazing. I kind of equated and then they offered me the job. I just tell him so it's almost like you know, if you're watching your favorite television program, and then you get a phone call. Hey, would you like to appear in Seinfeld? Or Curb Your Enthusiasm. So it's kind of like that for me. I got very lucky. And again, I did. I didn't go out solicit it. I found that I knew numerous colleagues in the program as well and already, so it's really great to join that. So it's kind of serendipity. But again, just sort of whatever you do, do the right thing. Do it fully do it with conviction, don't have any regrets and just move on and sometimes somebody influential will be watching and you know they'll say, you know, something that you did really well, and then you'll get rewarded from it. So that's what I think happens almost all the time.

Laura  
Yeah, that's a great example and story and I think that's a great message for especially emerging professionals or just somebody there's so many people changing careers too just go at it and do your best and you know, and I think too, people don't realize how much low hanging fruit there is. There's just so much mediocrity. Like, if you can just rise above and do your best someone will notice.

Thomas Abdallah 
Yeah, you know, it's kind of cliche, but you can control your own destiny with your effort. You're put in your full effort, you will be rewarded and I think you're you're absolutely right, in a kind of weird way. There is a lot of mediocrity, but there's also a lot of people who don't have courage. You also have to have courage and you have to be able to say okay, you know what, I'm gonna go for this and hey, listen, if it fails, you fail. You just pick up you know, get up and do it. Start all over again. So, I think also you just have to have the courage and the courage to be yourself. One thing. I'm very fortunate, I've had an amazing career. Somewhere you know, I started off working for somebody and with people and just as I listened learned and as much information as I possibly could, and then just out of the blue all of a sudden I realized I was I was becoming a leader that just sort of just sort of popped in and half of it was me and the other half is there's a lot of people who don't want to be a leader. And so you kind of have the competition is not even interested  and one of the things that I like to do when you know when I hire people are trying to move those people out. Try to get people who are a little bit of in a shell. You come out of the shell people aren't don't think they are as smart as they really are. And I realized that from talking to them, there's a lot more going on. I think you got to give them confidence. And that's one of the things you know, I got a lot of, and I try to pass that along to whoever is just, you know, be confident, but you have to prepare. I mean, it doesn't just come overnight. It's no you have to do your homework. It's another thing I tell you, especially the entry levels that come out of school, school is not over getting a degree you're doing home or having a you know, a semester that might be over but you're learning you're schooling, you're training. That's another thing that sort of helped me along when I was younger, I did tend to do training for staff for issues related to asbestos and lead paint and hazardous waste and though that industry and so I had to kind of learn that so that I could actually help people in our organization. So I did that three or four years into the job also and I was in front of 30 or 40 people they were all you know, I was like 28/29 Everyone was much older than I was and I am you know telling them how to remove asbestos properly. And, you know, you have to be an expert when you come in front of a classroom, especially, you know, older people who aren't as maybe half don't have them don't want to be there. And so you really have to learn your craft. You have to be informative. You have to be someone entertaining as well or they're not going to listen to you. So that's another thing I did when I was younger, I sort of took a mentor or a  trainer and getting in front of people and again, this was not the days of Zoom or anything this was classroom or conference room settings, where you speak to people. So I always again, another thing that I always mentioned as a positive thing, get out in front of an audience. And that's the scariest thing for some people. And there's only one way to get over it. And that's to do it. That's to get up in front of a room, get in front of a podium, do your PowerPoints or whatever, but I did that and it's sort of then I started doing projects, lead projects. buildings with energy efficiency, solar panels and green roofs. And I started going around, not only in the city, but around the country just talking about environmental sustainability. Why, why do we have to do it? I think we've come a long way. Since I started it's kind of more of in everyone's DNA now or we're still trying but I think it's very important to reduce emissions, reduce greenhouse gases, reduce toxic pollution, you know, that's really where I come from. I come from that and but I've morphed into somebody who now worries about when we construct our projects buildings, make them energy efficient, collecting rainwater, doing all kinds of sustainability things for future added so that we have less emissions going going forward. Not so important.

So I started doing that. And at some point, somebody saw that and must have mentioned to Columbia University it's that might be good for being a professor. And I was overjoyed. I joined in 2013. Teach every fall and spring. And another interesting part in I had interviewed with Professor Cohen and I said, you know, I know this. I know about green roofs. I know about admissions. I know about energy. I know about fossil fuels. He says, Well, that's great. But actually what we want you to do is be a professor for the capstone. I was like, Okay, what's that? And so the capstone is a sort of a group thesis that students do, and I would be the advisor. I would also you know, find the right projects and at Columbia, we Capstone or at least the sustainability management program, we do capstone for nonprofit or government agencies, you know, organizations that don't have money. And so graduate students is sort of at the tail end of their graduate career, are doing their sort of group thesis because I think our thought is you learn by doing and you've got to work as a team. Sustainability challenges cannot be solved by one person alone. You need a team of professionals in different disciplines and different organizations and utilities and all that kind of stuff. So nothing is ever a single, you know, one person handles that. So that's why I think it's a great idea to have the students instead of doing a singular thesis, do a group Capstone and so that's what I've been doing each semester I, I generate the projects I have a network of government agency colleagues and also nonprofits. So the students do pro bono work. And so I've kind of been able to do or be part of projects that have, don't give me my enjoy mass transit and MTA and those projects they do with the trains and the buses here in New York City. But then I was able to do work for nonprofits who are advocates for looking to ensure that New York State in our country are looking at goals to reduce greenhouse gases worrying about climate change, so they were able to do other projects in other industries, looking at electric cars. Looking at sustainability plans for steadies, looking at climate adaptation measures. So I got really fortunate that I was also able to now be able to take my craft that I've learned over whatever years at the MTA and then sort of apply it and work with young students to do projects with them and that's kind of what I do as a professor which is really great because I didn't know that I would be able to you know, do a pop quizzes and term papers. This was kind of like more of a much more for me, and I could actually work with students on actually a real project. When we say real project. We mean it.  It's a pro bono work, and it's for a client that doesn't have necessarily funding to hire Environmental Consultants. It's kind of I just was really fortunate to be able to branch into not only for mass transit, but also to other elements that could be helpful for environmental sustainability.

Laura 
Yeah, that's awesome. Sounds like really great programs. I love what you said about being yourself. I still struggle with that. And I know Nic and I, we invite people to come on this on this podcast that we think would be great guests, and they're like, oh, I don't know if I have anything to share. You know? Like, don't do that. You have stuff to share. And then you know, getting out there and presenting yourself and you are obviously a great presenter because you tied all of that back together with my original question. Usually, by the time I get halfway through, I'm like, What did you ask me? And let's move on though, to your you know, you talk about Steve Cohen and meeting an author that you were inspired by, but you too, are an author now. So let's talk about your book.

Thomas Abdallah 
So as I mentioned, I wrote papers about all of my projects, as a way to get me to go on traveling to different cities, but I actually wrote papers on projects and it was kind of in the back of my mind. After 30 years of work. I said, you know, I could probably write a book. And I had read that from Professor Cohen's book, sustainable management, and I read it in one day. And I loved it. And I actually said, I could do that. But anyway, once again, out of the blue, I get an email from Elsevier publishing. Now, what happened was I mentioned I go to all these or had gone to all these different conferences and you know, definitely if you go into a setting or a committee, you write your name and you become on a friends list, right? So it's even like same thing with the National Association of Environmental Professionals. You know, not everyone's involved. But if you you know, if you attend the meeting, you get on a list and you start getting emails and information, but I think the Elsevier you know, got hold of a list of the friends list that I had been on a Transportation Research Board, and so they got an email. It's absolutely true. They want to know if I knew any environmental experts, and I actually wrote back like 30 seconds later, yes, me. And they were came back and they will. Would you have an idea for a chapter I said, I have an idea for whole book and it really was kind of coming full circle. One of the things that obviously I've learned is that mass transit is the most sustainable solution a city can include in its city or town or whatever, to reduce greenhouse gases, you know, get people out of single driven cars. It's a multi passenger vehicles. So kind of a sustained

Laura
For mental health too.

Thomas Abdallah
Its kind of sustainable mass transit and then what I did for a living, was make mass transit. Now again, I started in mostly in construction projects, still, I'm actually doing NEPA evaluations and getting reviewing all of our projects for environmental impacts and mitigating them eliminating and where we could in during construction, you know, ensuring noise barriers and all things that go with environmental mitigations during construction, that's what I did. So it kind of but sustainable transit. It's kind of like double meaning mass transit is sustainable, and what I do make it more sustainable. So I kind of had this idea of writing a book from start to finish talking about that first part about it being the benefits of mass transit, and kind of what's made New York what New York is without the subway system, we wouldn't be where we are today. Half the people in New York City don't even own a car. So they must rely on mass transit in the city and you can't you can do anything you want. I mean, well, full disclosure, I have a car, but I really don't need one if you really didn't want to use it as mass transit, but so I had this idea and I wanted to put everything that I did from understanding. If you're going to talk about environmental impacts, you got to know your activity. You got to know your entity, you have to know your system.

So I kind of wrote it, you know, I'll start off with sort of an introduction first chapter, talk about what mass transit is. Talk about, what are the impacts of mass transit. Now mass transit obviously uses a lot of energy, fossil fuels, you know, whether it's diesel fuel for buses, or electricity developed by fossil fuels and trains. So there is an energy component, and it's a big, big part of mass transit, the energy and also the environmental impacts, you know, that noise vibrations and all kinds of things that wreak havoc on cities, but it also in construction, but then I talk about what are the solution so the middle part of the book is about sustainability. It's about including sustainable elements in mass transit projects, and the, I'll give a big plug here for the mass transit industry, not only in this country, but around the world. Mass Transit has, I think pound for pound over the last two decades reduce their fossil fuel usages from way back to now. Hybrid buses, electric buses, regenerative braking, and subway systems that sort of put energy back into the third rails that she's sort of using instead of wasting energy. It's all detailed in my book and, and then, you know, started doing some research around the world in Asia and Europe and they're doing all kinds of amazing things. So I included 20 case studies on some previous books that I had read, you know, they use two or three case studies. You know, I had so many examples of which to choose from, not only in this country, but from around the world. So I said, You know what, I'll do 20 Look many case studies and I talk about what they do in California, Los Angeles, Metro Philadelphia, these cities in Chicago and Washington that have, you know, traditional rail systems and everyone has a bus system, almost everybody has a bus. In fact, buses are the leading commuters for public transit in the country are buses. So what I found is an amazing amount of things. And you know, MTA New York City Transit was also part of that, but the whole industry itself was really doing a fantastic thing. So my so my book is a lot about sustainable mass transit the why what we can do to make it more sustainable. It's also again, it's sort of an homage to the industry about how much over the last two decades that we've moved the needle on being more sustainable. And then finally a kind of wrap it up into an environmental management system approach, which kind of looks at everything. When you do anything. You look at okay, well, how's that gonna affect the environment? I'm doing a construction project on one of the stations or if I'm doing a rehabilitation of a bus depot, what can we do? Okay, well, you know what, we can create rainwater collection, we could put a green roof on it, what can we do to make the project more sustainable? And I have a whole chapter on that. So that was kind of I had that idea what I just told you that I wrote that in the scope of work, and I sent it to the publisher. A couple of weeks later, they said, Well, how long will it take you? Well, you know, I never wrote a book before. So I just sort of a year and they Okay, so we wrote a scope, contract and agreement. And I actually kind of you know, with a deadline and never had a deadline like this before.

So I actually worked every night, every day every you know, Saturdays, Sundays wherever I can get some free time I actually sat and wrote about my road book. I wrote it literally I wrote it from chapter one all the way to the end. But I would go a couple of chapters, and then go back and redo and then sort of kind of go back and forth. And finally after seven months, I had a book done, and it was published in May of 2017. So, you know, it was amazing. I you know, check Amazon, where's my my book? Number 11. This week, great. You know, I dropped down to number 36. So, something I was really proud of, I had always wanted to do that I was influenced by it, and it's hard by the way, it was an achievement and something that you know, when you do something that's really hard, you really do even more proud of it. And I've had students use my book as the back up for their research papers. And when you have someone call you or email you, hey, I read your book and we want to use your book as a backdrop to a paper I'm writing that's priceless. That is something that is something I really enjoy. It makes me feel really great. And every time I get a chance I try to mention it's a, because ultimately, even though it's a mass transit book, and I am in addition to an environmental professional, I'm a transportation professional. It's a sustainability book. I put everything in there. I talk about wetlands, I talk about coastal issues. I talk about recycling and you know, getting New York City is the greatest city in the world. We're not the cleanest and we need to we need to be able to put our waste properly. Where it's supposed to go around in the streets wherever because, you know, a waste on the street winds up in the river somewhere. So it's kind of like has every thing that I ever talked about from an environmental point of view. So it's it's really a book for environmental professionals. I'll never say a bad word about my publisher because I love them. They picked me up, but it's should have been marketed as a sustainability book as opposed to a transportation. I guess it would be a little quibbling.

But I think it's something when I mentioned sitting down to maybe writing a second book, I realized I emptied the tank. I put everything I put everything into that, that book and then again, I think I think what you're doing Laura talking about environmental professionals and differences and who you know, you have people on this program, and they're all different and we've all we all have a different path and we all have a different mentality. And I think that's the one thing I always tell people, you want to be a sustainability professional you can you don't have to be an engineer. You don't have to be an architect, to be an environmental planner. You can be anything. Anybody in any profession anywhere, because everything has an environmental element to it. Mass Transit, restaurants, schools, universities, wastewater, everything has an environmental element to it. So no matter what, if you want to be the one that proposes you know, gets sustainability elements in your projects or build things that are more sustainable for the future. You can do that you can be in this business. Your background does not have to be engineer or architect or any of the, it's good to have a science background. It's good to have you know, maybe an understanding of STEM and that background but again, still, you know, you can even be a carpenter or you can be you could be a bus driver. You know, we actually have a training for bus drivers make it more sustainable. bus driving. So as soon as you walk into a mass transit, you are sustainable professional. So this is something that I really admired about what you're doing here is you know, this is doesn't really matter what your background is you can if your mentality is you know, you want to save this planet you want to leave a better planet. Then we've got to get disciplined to be better for the future. And I think we've been doing that I think, you know, my, all my career, and we can do more and I think one of the ways is to encourage young people that if this is what you want to do, if you want to be a sustainability professional, there are many different pathways. There isn't just one.

Laura 
Yeah, that is so true. And there's so many options. Usually when I'm talking to somebody who's trying to change careers, the first thing we talk about is go to your boss, your manager or or someone who's doing continuous improvement and ask them if you can start a sustainability committee, you know, start a recycling Can you just get started in it? Volunteer? Like you said, the trash problem the trash problem here in Syracuse, is horrible. Start there, you know, like Yeah, find a problem and start tackling it and find other people who want to do it with him.

Thomas Abdallah 
There are a numerous amount of improvements we could make just Yeah, give me a couple of well, one big example. We had. Hurricane Ida came here in New York City and dump three inches of water on us in an hour. Rain the whole day, and we were completely flooded. The subway was flooded, everything was flooded. And the idea was okay, how can we prevent it? So we got to expand the sewer system. So why don't we clean it out first. I can honestly say I've never been in a sewer, but I can tell you over over my lifetime. They're clogged. And if you do more cleaning, get out the you know the leaves and the plastics and all that kind of stuff. First and foremost before you do anything the same thing with like electrical grid, you know, we got to, you know, got to create more renewable energy, which is fantastic. We need to do that. Solar and wind energy storage, but we also have to make our antiquated power transmission system more reliable and more efficient. And a lot of infrastructure is ancient so we have to fix what we have first. Now we can start expanding and then we can start adding to that. But the main thing is first and foremost, what can we do right now, like you said, a lot of low hanging fruit that can make our lives much more sustainable.

Laura 
Yeah. And so I'm going to interject with a question from Nic. So you know, I fail to mention Nic is not here today. So I'm asking all the questions, but he's allowed a day off. So I've had this conversation with my own mother telling her that the future of infrastructure for young people is a priority, right. When roads were started being built in the 50s. They weren't really thinking about like, what's the lifespan of this and who's gonna fix it later. And so now you're getting to that a lot of the original infrastructure is crumbling. And so and she's just like, No, it's fine. The government will take care of it and I'm like, well, there's those are people and real money in the government. And then so my next question is about the, the frustration with transportation projects, especially in large metropolitan areas. You know, a lot of the mentality like my mother probably falls into is like, it's already bad. So what are you going to do to make it better? We can't make it worse. So why should we spend our money here and all that like how, what do you see as the solution to that or Yeah, we advocate people one

Thomas Abdallah 
one thing I can say is it can get worse. And I think being in the infrastructure business and doing you know, state of good repair projects, something what happens is, you know, usually it's, it's sort of, something's about to break. Like one of our I use a bridge, for instance, I you know, people inspect bridges as a crack here. There's a crack there, and I was still standing but what happens is that that kind of rolls along on a flat, maybe slightly inclined, and then what happens if they break, boom, now all of a sudden, you have disaster. You have potential safety issues, and you have a bigger problem than you had. And I think we see that everywhere. Especially you know, if God forbid, you get really serious demolition issues where you know, bridge falls down or something mudslide wherever you have the more of a catastrophic thing. Almost always somebody from five years ago said, you know, I told them that that was gonna was gonna break. So I think, you know, you always have to have a maintenance and activities to ensure a looking ahead, you've got to look ahead 20 years from now, I'm actually at MTA now almost 35 years. So I've seen projects that I started when I was young. I was involved with the design, I was involved in construction, you know, had some issues in the maintenance areas. Now I see them need to be real, rehabilitated over a long period of time. So nothing lasts forever. And you always have to put in a thought process about how are these things going to be maintained, workforce. That's one of the things going back to my example of the sores that the New York City DEP commissioner was, you know, was in front of this city council like the next day, what happened? You know, listen and I need about $100 billion to to fix what I've there. But more importantly, I think, where people try to save and scrimp because it's probably the biggest issue when it comes to infrastructure, its workforce. You need the people you need. The Department of Sanitation needs people, the transit needs people, you need a workforce and you need for it to grow. And to me, there should never be anybody unemployed ever because there's so many jobs that still need to be done, and I think again, this is where you get pushback from the bean counters where now you know, if you hire X amount of people, it's gonna cost  this healthcare, that pension and that's where it really so much. Again, go back to the low hanging fruit. A lot of the things can be solved. If you have more staff if you have more people who are selections, people more reviewing what's going on. And I think that's not a failure. It's not just it's a workforce, you have to hire the people. You have to train them. Life is all about jobs, careers, and stuff like that. We, you know, this whole idea of mentoring young people and it's so important to society is that, you know, we have a younger generation that is going to have a great work ethic, and I see it I see at Columbia, I see the students that this great work ethic, people who work for me, and I also can tell who doesn't have a good work ethic. And I try, I try to influence them by you know, hey, look, here I am working as an engineer and all of a sudden, you know, people see me on television and they see me on the you know, I did a little list people mind me, I was on the Sundance Channel. I was on the Discovery Channel, Science Network. I'm on a Public Broadcasting Program. Here. NPR, National Public Radio. I was in an article at Scientific American magazine. I was featured in The Epic Times interview. I was in a short documentary film called Postcards from the Future. I did a podcast for you know, somebody from Amsterdam. That was really cool, actually. But they didn't show my face like this one. So this is my first. My first visual podcast.

Laura 
Well, actually this one doesn't show face either.

Thomas Abdallah 
Oh, okay. Well, next time. Show my picture.

Laura 
Only if there's some outtakes. We could have an outtake.

Thomas Abdallah 
So there's an outtake we need the. That was just recently I was in on the History Channel's modern marvels program.

Laura 
And so that's one of the things I think, you know, we're we're getting a little bit over our time. So I do want to touch on that. So I'm glad to put that list together. I didn't know about all this sort of things. That's really cool. And I think I still think also, it's good for people that hear because getting into a career for as an environmental professional or an engineer doesn't mean you can't be creative doesn't mean you can't have some fun, you know, like, you can still do this stuff. So yeah, the Modern Marvels How did that come about?

Thomas Abdallah  
Well, same, same story. I will say. I will say this I you know, do a lot of stuff on LinkedIn. I write articles. I promote myself wherever I do presentation I talk about on LinkedIn, and they were, you know, scouring my profile on LinkedIn. They were looking for a transportation expert from New York City, so I got an email from a producer at Modern Marvels this was like on a Monday, and they said, you know, we're filming on Friday. Are you free? And I was like, Yeah, sure. And then after I hung up, I realized I had like, eight meetings on Friday. I had to spend the next two days rearranging my schedule so that I could actually get there. So I went. I went on a Friday morning. Went a little early, I was always too early. So I got to the. I'm like, I'm thinking, I'm looking for a studio I'm looking for like, someplace where they do filming. And here I am in this like sort of warehouse district. So but I see the address, and the door was just a jar. It's like kind of like, okay, this could be the end. But let's see what's happened. I figured I always wanted to be on this program. So I pushed the door open and also I walked in and there's a there's lights, there's sound equipment. There's people running around. They're actually filmed in the interview for me in this warehouse. And they set up with Lights Camera Action. I'm sorry, I'm here an hour early. That's great. Come on, we're ready. And they talked to me and as a transportation professional, and they asked me a lot of stuff about mass transit, but right the night before actually, they said we have a couple other topics you know, you may be familiar with, can you talk about? And so one of those topics was about the Jeepneys in the Philippines. And the other topic was about the Iditarod race that I was familiar with, but I learned in their. We're in the middle of a pandemic here. And they had a pandemic in Alaska. And the only way to get medicine to was a 700 mile dog sled relay. And the dog sled relay got medicine to people and saved, you know, a lot of people's lives. And then another topic was about the hovercraft that goes over the Solent between the Isle of Wight, England, so they kind of gave me those topics that night before that it was kind of like going back to college. Okay, I have now had to study and I read up about all those three issues so the next day they asked me questions and then a couple weeks later, the episode came out the only three they use but those three they didn't use anything. I talked about with mass transit, but they had so the episode is called Moving America. It was about the trucking industry but they have little individual you know educational vignettes. It's all I talked about those three things and about two minutes, but it was really cool and I the program was hosted by Adam Richmond. Who I love for Man Versus Food from the Food Network. We never met each other because it's sort of different times. But it was really exciting. These types of things. You know, this is what working hard and doing the best you can will lead to and being yourself and just being passionate enjoying what you do  i feel horrible. But I really feel bad that you know, I you know, get on the train in the morning and go to work and I see the sad faces and like, I feel bad for them because I really enjoy getting up and going to work and accomplishing things and and I think that's what I always also like to pass along is you know, gotta find it, you know, career that you enjoy. Because you know, once you do that, that's gold. And those are the things that I was very fortunate that I've been able to have different careers and be able to talk to different people and be out there. And mentor. And by the way, as you said, you know, have fun, and anyone listening again, we have to have enjoyment with what you do and if you do what you enjoy, boy, that's that's priceless.

Laura 
Yeah. Well, I think that's a great place to end today. It's very inspiring to hear from someone who loves what they do so much as it does such a great job at it. So you know, Nic and I are still waiting for someone to check out us and give us an opportunity to come on TV. So I'll let you know when that happens.

Thomas Abdallah 
I will bet that it will happen because just like I said, you know I've admired what you've been doing since I met you last year. Well, this year tomorrow. I'm sorry, we were sort of doing this on New Year's Eve. But  I really, I think what you guys do it was great and so blessed and thankful for being part of it and you keep doing what you're doing and it'll turn out right and it has already I'm sure. So just do the right thing and then good things will happen.

Laura 
Yeah, every one of these connections even connecting with you is a it's a great celebration. So where can people get in touch with you?

Thomas Abdallah 
Okay, so you can catch me on LinkedIn for sure. Thomas Abdallah, but also you can email me Thomas t-h-o-m-a-s dot Abdullah a-b-d-a-l-l-a-h@mtacd.org. And you can email me and I will respond. Absolutely. Enjoy discussing work that I do with MTA with Colombia, and all kinds of sustainability. That's my phone sorry.

Laura
Who's calling already?

Thomas Abdallah
Yeah, that was quick. You can catch me with but also I don't do any other social media that the links LinkedIn is the one it's professional. It's, you know, where I connect with a lot of professionals. A lot of students get in touch with me there. So that's, that's a great place.

Laura 
Yeah. Awesome. Well, thank you so much, Tom. This has been really fantastic. And I look forward to working with you and the New York State chapter.

Thomas Abdallah 
Thank you very much.

[Outro]

Laura 
That's our show. Thank you, Tom for joining us today. Please be sure to check us out each and every Friday. And don't forget to subscribe, rate and review. Bye

Transcribed by https://otter.ai