Robert W. Poole, Jr.
Director of Transportation Studies, Reason Foundation
Robert Poole created the Reason Foundation, a Los Angeles-based libertarian think tank, because he needed a perch from which to afflict the comfortable and the established – especially in aviation policy. He founded Reason in 1978, and ran it until it was well-established. In 2000, he gracefully and gratefully gave up the role of CEO and assumed his current role as Director of Transportation Studies while remaining on the board. He is nationally known as an expert on privatization and transportation policy.
Poole was among the first to propose the commercialization of the U.S. air traffic control system, and his work in this field has helped shape proposals for a U.S. ATC corporation. A version of his corporation concept was implemented north of the U.S. border in Canada in 1996, and is still on some people's agendas in the U.S.
Poole's Reason Foundation studies launched a national debate on airport privatization in the United States. He advised both the FAA and local officials during the 1989-90 controversy over the proposed privatization of the Albany, NY airport. His seven years of policy research on this issue helped inspire both the privatization of Indianapolis airport management under Mayor Steve Goldsmith and Congress's 1996 enactment of the current Airport Privatization Pilot Program.
Poole has testified on airports, aviation security, and air traffic control on a number of occasions before House and Senate aviation subcommittees, and at numerous conferences over the past decade. He has also done consulting work on several airport privatization feasibility studies.
He is the author of dozens of policy studies and journal articles on transportation issues. His popular writings have appeared in national newspapers, including The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal; he has also been a guest on such network TV programs as "Crossfire," "Good Morning America," and "The O'Reilly Factor," as well as ABC, CBS, and NBC News. He writes a monthly column on transportation policy issues for Public Works Financing.
Poole received his B.S. and M.S. in mechanical engineering at MIT and did graduate work in operations research at NYU. He has advised the Office of the Secretary of Transportation, the White House Office of Policy Development, the National Performance Review, the National Economic Council, and the National Civil Aviation Review Commission on ATC commercialization. He was a member of the Bush-Cheney transition team on transportation. He is a member of the Critical Infrastructure Council of the Los Angeles Economic Development Corporation and of the Air Traffic Control Association. He is also a member of the GAO's National Aviation Studies Advisory Panel.
