John S. Niles

Global Telematics Phone: 1-206-781-4475
4005 20th Avenue West, Suite 111 Email: niles@globaltelematics.com
Seattle, Washington 98199 Fax: 1-208-730-2420

http://www.globaltelematics.com

Objective
Contract assignments for research, analysis, and writing in the areas of transportation, telecommunications, and computer applications, with special emphasis on public policy and technology strategy.
Summary
John Niles, President of Global Telematics, is an independent researcher, trainer, and change agent based in Seattle, Washington. His specialty is research, design, planning, and implementation of improvement strategies for transportation, telecommunications, and economic development. He has worked in these fields since 1978, beginning in Washington DC and continuing in Seattle since 1982.
He is an expert on telecommunications-based mobility improvement programs and policies. He advises government and business leaders on telecom-transport interaction, including teleworking, electronic service delivery, Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS), and traffic operations management (T-Ops).
He has evaluated telecommunications applications projects, established rural telework programs, and assisted communities large and small to understand and use telecom and the Internet. He developed one of the first nationwide computer systems for knowledge management and dissemination. He is a published author, public speaker, and skilled meeting facilitator. He earned degrees at Carnegie Mellon and MIT.
Selected Project Experience
bulletDeveloped innovative procedures for increasing business effectiveness through joint consideration of travel and communications options, for the National Business Travel Association and Lehman Associates.  Available as the Travel Value Assessment.
bulletCreated the Regional Freight Logistics Profile for the Mineta Transportation Institute as a tool for metropolitan transportation planners to assess and communicate trends in local freight delivery.
bulletOrganized and directed policy research on transportation alternatives for the King County Council Transportation Committee, the Puget Sound Coalition for Effective Transportation Alternatives, Sane Transit, and the Discovery Institute.
bulletConducted pioneering research into how retail market trends and resulting consumer behavior influence nonwork trips and Transit Oriented Development. This work resulted in papers for the Transportation Research Board, the American Planning Association, and Mineta Transportation Institute. Turned into an available plannning tool, Regional Transportation Reality Check.
bulletInitiated and led the Mobility Innovations Program at Bellevue Transportation Management Association. This included development of an "instant ridesharing" project funded by the U.S. Department of Transportation.
bulletLed the development of a "Telecommunications Deployment Strategy" that contributes to traffic congestion reduction, air quality improvement, and job creation in the Los Angeles metropolitan area.
bulletPrepared a major U.S. Department of Energy research study of telecommunications impacts on transportation, titled Beyond Telecommuting, now a popular full-text research reference on the Internet, http://www.lbl.gov/ICSD/niles.
bulletConducted field research, policy analysis, and development of recommendations for separate working groups doing strategic telecommunications planning for the States of Idaho, Washington, and Montana.
bulletEvaluated and improved the Supermarket Cooperative, a U.S. Government funded telecommunications application project helping small farmer members of the Rural Coalition, headquartered in Washington DC.
bulletFacilitated United Nations workshops in Singapore and New York City, resulting in recommendations for telecom development in emerging nations.
bulletProvided leadership on business planning, service design, and marketing of a computer-based messaging and information retrieval system supporting technology transfer among hundreds of local government offices nationwide.
John Niles is a widely-read interpreter of how and why networked communications affects the need for actual travel and meeting. His views have been quoted in many publications, including Forbes, The Economist, New York Times, Christian Science Monitor, Los Angeles Times, and Washington Post. He has also appeared on PBS TV’s Nightly Business Report and on National Public Radio's Morning Edition. He has presented new ideas and research findings at the Pacific Telecommunications Conference, the World Future Society General Assembly, the Rural TeleVillage conferences, and the Rural Telecommunications Congress in Aspen.
He was the Associate Editor of New Telecom Quarterly, 1994-98. He has written many published articles and is co-author of The New Management (McGraw-Hill, 1976).
He holds appointments as Technology and Transportation Senior Fellow at the Discovery Institute in Seattle, Senior Fellow for Telecommunications and Land Use at Center for the New West in Denver, and Research Associate at the Mineta Transportation Institute, San Jose State University. He is a member of the U.S. National Research Council’s Transportation Research Board Committee on Telecommunications and Travel Behavior, and of the Transatlantic Thematic Network on Sustainable Transport in Europe and Links and Liaisons with America (STELLA) formed by National Science Foundation and the European Union.
Earlier Employment
bullet1974-78: Quantitative analyst, municipal programs, Mayor’s Office, District of Columbia Government
bullet1971-74: Aircraft maintenance control officer, Patrol Squadron 26, United States Navy (Vietnam era, honorable discharge)
Status
bulletU.S. citizen
bulletNo physical limitations
Education
bulletM.S. Industrial Administration, Carnegie Mellon University, 1970
bulletB.S. Mathematics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1968