A Special Edition of Eno Transportation Weekly 

For nearly six decades, the U.S. Department of Transportation has been the federal government’s central platform for shaping how Americans move, whether by road, rail, air, or increasingly, through digital systems that blur the lines between modes. Yet as congestion mounts, costs rise, technologies accelerate, and cross-sector challenges grow more intertwined, the structure created in 1967 struggles to keep pace with the realities of 2025 and beyond. 

This special edition of Eno Transportation Weekly explores that tension head-on. Five distinguished contributors and three of Eno’s own: Christopher Coes, Tyler Duvall, Rebecca Higgins, Jeff Davis, Roger Nober, Marcia Pincus, Alan Pisarski, and Grace Truslow offer bold, varied, and sometimes competing visions for what a modern USDOT must become. Their essays illuminate a simple truth: the nation’s most important transportation institution is overdue for a serious, future-facing conversation about its mission and structure. 

A Department Built for a Different Century 

USDOT was created at a time when federal responsibilities were clearer, modes were more distinct, and safety risks evolved slowly. Today’s transportation system is none of those things. Automation reshapes safety. AI reshapes operations. Housing markets reshape travel demand. Cyberattacks threaten every modal administration. And project delivery increasingly depends on coordination across housing, economic development, workforce systems, and digital infrastructure.  Today’s challenges are fundamentally cross-modal, but the Department’s structure remains rooted in the mid-20th century. 

Across the essays, there is agreement that USDOT performs admirably within the confines of its statutory boxes—but that the boxes themselves may no longer fit the mission. 

Fragmentation: USDOT’s Most Persistent Adversary 

A recurring theme is fragmentation of programs, authorities, data, congressional jurisdiction, and even physical and IT infrastructure. 

Christopher Coes argues that federal housing, economic development, and transportation programs often work at cross-purposes, producing years of delay and billions in added costs. He makes the case for restructuring federal systems around the places they are meant to serve. 

“Fragmentation pays to repair what coordination could have prevented.” 
— Coes 

Similarly, Rebecca Higgins examines how Senate committee jurisdictions divide responsibility for interconnected modes, creating inefficiencies and limiting the ability to legislate holistically. 

“A rational USDOT is nearly impossible without a rational Senate committee structure.” 
— Higgins 

These structural divides rooted in decades of political precedent shape every aspect of USDOT’s daily work. 

Reorganizing From Within: What Should a Modern USDOT Look Like? 

Several authors examine whether the Department’s internal structure itself is still fit for purpose: 

Tyler Duvall proposes a reimagined USDOT organized around core functions of project delivery, safety and innovation, finance, and technology rather than legacy modes. 

“Function must replace legacy structure if we want better outcomes.” 
— Duvall 

His vision seeks coherence: a Department that aligns expertise with the problems it must solve, not with the organizational map the federal government inherited in the 1960s. 

Jeff Davis approaches modernization through a historical lens, tracing the evolution and eventual ossification of USDOT’s Assistant Secretary roles. What was once a flexible staffing framework has become a rigid system locked into statute, limiting Secretaries’ ability to adapt to new priorities or emerging risks. 

Where Data and Evidence Fall Short 

If structure is USDOT’s skeleton, data is its nervous system and here, Alan Pisarski argues convincingly that the system is frayed. 

Federal data on highways and aviation remains relatively strong, but national insight into intercity passenger flows, multimodal travel, and freight movement is thin. The Bureau of Transportation Statistics, which was once a promising hub, now operates with less real funding than it had in the 1990s. 

“We cannot manage—or reform—what we do not measure.” 
— Pisarski 

Without stronger statistical foundations, neither Congress nor USDOT can meaningfully evaluate the effectiveness of major reforms. 

Scaling Innovation: The Missing Link in USDOT’s Future 

As new technologies proliferate, Marcia Pincus reminds us that innovation alone is not enough. The nation excels at pilots, demonstrations, and one-off deployments. What we lack is a system capable of scaling proven solutions across regions, modes, and markets. 

“The goal isn’t just to innovate—it’s to scale what works.” 
— Pincus 

For AI, connected vehicles, and digital infrastructure to deliver real value, performance assessment, interoperability, and evidence-based deployment must become federal priorities. 

The FAA: A Case Study in Integration vs. Separation 

No modal administration illustrates USDOT’s structural contradictions more clearly than the Federal Aviation Administration, as examined by Grace Truslow. With 45,000 of the Department’s 55,000 employees, FAA is simultaneously part of USDOT and apart from it. IT systems, physical offices, personnel policies, and even security protocols diverge significantly from the Department’s other modes. 

“Integration must never come at the expense of safety or workforce capacity.” 
— Truslow 

As advanced air mobility grows, the seams between FAA and the rest of USDOT will only become more visible and more consequential. 

The Federal Landscape Is Changing Too 

Finally, Roger Nober broadens the lens to examine the evolving legal and constitutional framework surrounding independent regulatory agencies. Executive Order 14215, recent litigation, and shifting judicial doctrine may redefine the boundary between independent commissions and the Executive Branch. These changes matter because any USDOT reorganization must operate within this broader federal context. 

“The question is no longer whether independent agencies will change, but how quickly.” 
— Nober 

A Moment of Serious Opportunity and Serious Stakes 

Taken together, these essays reveal a Department facing a pivotal moment. Not a crisis of performance, but a crisis of alignment: between mission and structure, between responsibilities and authorities, between modern problems and legacy systems. 

USDOT has navigated such inflection points before. It rose to meet the era of the Interstate Highway System, and later the era of aviation modernization. It can rise again, but only if policymakers are willing to grapple with the structural questions this special edition raises. 

This collection does not prescribe one path. Instead, it opens a conversation that must occur if the country hopes to build a transportation system that is safer, more integrated, more fair, more efficient, and more reflective of how people and goods move today. 

Eno is grateful to each of the eight contributors for offering candid, expert, and forward-leaning perspectives. Their work, taken together, helps chart the intellectual terrain on which the future of USDOT will be decided.