As the Eno team closes in on the 2025 Leaders Development Conference (LDC), this week we are highlighting an impressive alum who is working in the intersection of transportation and public health. David Ederer joined LDC, along with his 2018 cohort, for the same week-long, immersive experience into the world of federal transportation policy.

Today, Ederer is an epidemiologist with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and a part-time instructor in civil and environmental engineering with the alma mater that first connected him with Eno – the Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech). He credits Georgia Tech’s historically strong relationship with Eno for connecting him to the program, and he is adamant that the program has significantly enhanced his federal career.

Though a trained epidemiologist by profession, Ederer entered the LDC program as a PhD student in Transportation Systems Engineering. Prior to his doctoral studies, Ederer was with the CDC for four years working in transportation safety, contributing to the agency’s “winnable battles” – or public health challenges they believed were solvable with focused effort. Given the global interest in enhancing transportation safety during that period, Ederer had the unique experience of working in partnership with countries and communities around the world. He conducted a great amount of coordination with the World Health Organization (WHO) and United Nations (UN) and frequently hosted and partnered with other ministries of health.

After his first stint with the CDC, Ederer returned to his transportation interest and began his PhD program, which eventually gave our team the opportunity to meet him. During the 2018 program, Ederer took part in the same in-depth experience Eno carefully curates each year. He was able to meet and interact with key transportation professionals and decisionmakers around DC, including individuals from the United States Department of Transportation (USDOT), the American Association of State Highway Transportation Officials (AASHTO), Amtrak, Congress, various advocacy and lobbying groups, and numerous others. The star-studded (in a transportation way) lineup gave Ederer a lot to talk about then, and he continues to talk about the LDC program today.

While he initially planned to stay in transportation, when the COVID pandemic hit, Ederer – like a true public servant – knew he could not sit on the sidelines any longer. He rejoined the CDC during this critical period, entering the Agency’s Epidemic Intelligence Service, or what he describes as the CDC’s “disease detectives.” This relaunched his career in public health, but Ederer continues to work in the intersection of health and transportation.

When asked about his current role with the CDC, Ederer emphasizes that transportation and public health are deeply connected – noting how each impacts the other. He explained that the closest thing we have to a miracle drug is having people get 150 minutes of physical activity each week. He followed up by asking, rhetorically, the easiest way for people to do that, which many know is by simply going out for a walk. He explains that by designing communities where walking, biking, and other forms of active transportation are a safe and easy choice, transportation professionals can help drive better public health outcomes. “A big part of my work is helping transportation engineers understand that they are part of the public health workforce,” he says.

Ederer remains engaged with many LDC panelists and maintains close ties with several peers from his cohort, connecting regularly, including at events like the Transportation Research Board (TRB) Annual Meeting. However, the greatest impact LDC has had on Ederer is enabling him to be “the person in public health that understands transportation policy,” and he credits the Eno program pretty specifically for that.

“Transportation policy and funding at the federal level is very complex and very different from every other part of the federal government,” Ederer explained. “It got me started and made me realize what I didn’t know.”

Today, Ederer continues to leverage his understanding the complexity of transportation policy and funding to better serve client organizations at the CDC. One of his primary roles is advising grantees on funding pathways, including opportunities through USDOT grants, that complement the CDC’s own grant resources. While typical CDC grants may range from $100K to $200K, Ederer’s grantees secured $30 million in transportation-related funding last year alone.

“For them to get these larger amounts is a pretty big deal, and there’s kind of a direct line to LDC there.”