About Me

 Government experience   

• 2004-2016. District 1 Director, Board of Directors of the San Francisco Bay Area   Rapid Transit District (BART). Pre-pandemic BART delivered an average of 420,000 daily passenger trips to 50 stations over 104 miles in the San Francisco Bay Area. Represented BART on the Capitol Corridor Joint Powers Agency.
• 1981-1991. Mayor and City Councilmember of Walnut Creek, California, a  suburban community of 70,000. Prior to election, was Chair of both the Planning and Transportation Commissions.
• 1982-1991.Chair and member of the Board of Directors for the Central Contra  Costa Transit Authority in Northern California. Involved from  start-up of the Authority to its growth as a fixed route and paratransit  system serving 200 square miles

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Professional Experience 1977-1999

• Acting  Assistant General Manager of the Service Development and Marketing  Department at AC Transit District in Oakland, CA. Responsible for budgeting, short and long range planning activities, an on board survey,  service adjustments and scheduling, public information and marketing, paratransit, and customer services.  
• Acting  Director of Transportation at University of California at Berkeley. Responsible for the parking, shuttle and commute alternatives programs on  campus. As Project Manager of Berkeley TRiP, created the first  Commute Store in the nation and staffed a 20-member Policy Steering  Committee.
• General Manager of Bay Area Transportation Corp., a private, nonprofit paratransit  company in Hayward, CA.  Managed fleet of 35 buses serving an 11-city area.  Clients included senior citizens, people with disabilities, low-income patients, and Head Start preschoolers.  

Consulting Experience 1994-Present

Gail Murray is sole proprietor of Gail Murray Consulting. She has managed all aspects of   projects, including program design, operations, budgeting, and staffing. She is a certified Disadvantaged Business Enterprise (DBE) and a research associate with the Mineta Transportation Institute at San Jose State University.

• Principal Investigator for the National Academy of Sciences Transportation  Cooperative Research Program (TCRP) reports. Research focused on ridesharing, college and university transit systems, car-sharing,  welfare-to-work access to health care, mobility management, and coordination.
• Various consulting projects related to rural transit; human services transportation coordination plans; transportation for people who are elderly, with disabilities or low-income; dynamic ridesharing; transit financing; paratransit; parking policies; express buses, and grant writing.
• Facilitator and presenter at workshops, public outreach and training sessions, and  professional organizations.
• Developed and  taught course on Fundamentals of Transportation Planning Practice,  sponsored by the Technology Transfer Program of the Institute of Transportation Studies at the University of California, Berkeley.

Professional Memberships and Affiliations

Harvard University Alumni Association, Former Board Member
State of California Departmental Transportation Advisory Committee, Former Chair
Women’s Transportation Seminar (WTS), Member
Mineta Transportation Institute, Research Associate
California Women Lead, Member
Diablo Regional Arts Association, Trustee and Founding Member
Diablo Ballet, Advisory Committee and Former Board Member
Diablo Valley League of Women Voters, Press Releases

Publications  

“Hard to believe Israel will ever be as it was,” The Pioneer, Home/News, September 6, 2024

“Is there any going back from Putin’s Russia?” The Pioneer, Home/News, September 12, 2024

"RIP: The Indomitable Spirit of Hale Zukas," by Gail Murray, The Bay Area Monitor, March 2023 . https://bayareamonitor.org

"BART at 50: Fit for a President," by Gail Murray, The Pioneer magazine, serving Clayton, Concord and Pleasant Hill, September4, 2022.

"BART at 50: Fit for a President," by Gail Murray, Walnut Creek Magazine, August 31, 2022.

"BART is 50: The Man who saved BART," by Gail Murray,  Diablo Valley League of Women Voters, The VOTER, August 2022, lwvdv@lwvdv.org

"BART is 50: The Man who saved BART," by Gail Murray, The Pioneer magazine, serving Clayton, Concord and Pleasant Hill, July 21, 2022.

"Is BART Derailment Harbinger for Climate Change?" by Gail Murray, The Pioneer magazine serving Clayton, Concord and Pleasant Hill, July 6, 2022.

“A Look Back: Opening Night at the Lesher Center,” Gail Murray, Walnut Creek Magazine, Oct. 6, 2020.

TCRP Synthesis 98: Ridesharing as a Complement to Transit, Gail Murray and Mark Chase, Transportation Research Board, 2012. 

TCRP Synthesis 78: Transit Systems in College and University Communities, Gail Murray, Tara Krueger, and Jason Schreiber, Transportation Research Board, 2008.

TCRP Report 108: Car-Sharing: Where and How it Succeeds, Adam Millard-Ball, Gail Murray, Jessica Ter Schure and Christine Fox, Transportation Research Board, November 2005.

TCRP Report 101:Toolkit for Rural Community Coordinated Transportation Services,  Jon Burkhardt, Charles Nelson, Gail Murray and David Koffman, Transportation Research Board, December 2003.

TCRP Report 91: Economic Benefits of Coordinating Human Service Transportation and Transit Services, Jon Burkhardt, David Koffman, and Gail Murray, March 2003.

TCRP Report 49:  Using Public Transportation to Reduce the Economic, Social, and Human Costs of Personal Immobility, Gail Murray, Cliff Chambers, with Ricardo Byrd and Lou Collier, Transportation Research Board, 1999.

“A Tale of Two Counties," Gail Murray, Cliff Chambers and David Curry.  Transit California, May 1998.

“MTA and AC Transit Get Welfare-to-Work," Gail Murray, Transit California, February 1998.

TCRP Report 21:  Strategies to Assist Local Transportation Agencies in Becoming Mobility Managers, Gail Murray, David Koffman, Cliff Chambers, with Peter Webb, Transportation Research Board, 1997.

Conduct of Background Research for the Establishment of an International Surface Transportation Policy Conference in California “Global Cooperation Through Transportation: Joining Forces Across Borders," Gail Murray, Project Leader, Mineta International Institute for Surface Transportation Policy Studies, Report 96-2, June 1996.

“Promoting Commute Alternatives: Will it Work in Your City?” Gail Murray, Western City, Vol. LXII, No. 4, April 1986.BB