David M. Laney
David M. Laney (Stanford ’71, SMU Law ’77) was appointed to the Texas Transportation Commission by Governor George W. Bush in 1995. He was chair of the Commission from 1995 to 2000. Laney’s accomplishments as Commissioner of Transportation included: reorganizing TxDOT management; increasing highway construction contracts from $1.9 billion to $3.1 billion annually; instituting the first private toll road in Texas; engineering legislation that created TxDOT’s statewide toll authority and re-establishing the North Texas Tollway Authority; initiating the first toll projects in Central Texas; initiating TxDOT’s shift toward innovative methods of highway finance; implementing a $2.8 billion Rio Grande border infrastructure program; and increasing the focus on aesthetics in bridge design and construction.
President George W. Bush appointed Laney to the Board of Directors of the National Rail Passenger Corporation (Amtrak), where he served as chairman from 2003 to 2007. He aggressively rebuilt the organization, reduced its debt, increased ridership and revenue, and achieved important on-time-performance targets on critical Northeast Corridor routes.
David M. Laney, a practicing Dallas attorney, is a leader in many civic and transportation-related activities. He has held numerous board positions, including the Stanford University Board of Trustees.