Item 3675 - Beyond the Field of Dreams

G. B. Arrington is a pioneer in light rail and other transit projects. He grew up in Silverton, Oregon, a small town just east of Salem, where his father was mayor. He graduated from Lewis & Clark College, Portland, Oregon (B.A. in political science, 1972) and Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, Scotland (M.A. in town and country planning). When Arrington returned to Oregon in the mid-1970s, he found himself in the middle of what he calls a “harmonic convergence.” Portland was looking to revitalize its downtown core. He worked early in his career for Senator Packwood and Governor Goldschmidt and was also an adjunct faculty member at Lewis & Clark, teaching The Politics of Planning. He eventually landed at TriMet, where, for the next 20-plus years, he worked on a project that would become Portland’s famed MAX, a pioneering light rail system connecting Portland and its suburbs. Arrington left TriMet in 1999 after the opening of the westside MAX to join Parsons Brinckerhoff, one of the world’s preeminent international planning consultants. He has travelled the world as their vice president, consulting on projects from the swamps of Opa Locka, Florida, to the beaches of Dubai, United Arab Emirates.