Department of Transportation essays

Department of Transportation essays The Department of Transportation was created in 1967. It is responsible for overseeing over 100,000 employees and using its $58.7 billion budget to it best possible ways. The United States transportation system includes around 3.9 million miles of public roads along with 2 million miles of oil and natural gas pipelines. There are 120,000 miles of major railroads, over 25,000 miles of used waterways as well as more than 5,000 public-use airports. This department also includes more than 500 major urban public transit operators and more than 300 ports on the coasts. It is for this reason that the Department of Transportation has such a great responsibility, so many workers, and large budget that probably doesnt go as far as it looks. These are all very expensive areas to maintain. The person at the top of the Department of Transportation is the Secretary of Transportation, Norman Mineta. He is the first Asian American to serve as a member of the cabinet. He and his family were forced into internment camps during World War II. He graduated from the University of California at Berkeley. After his graduation from college he served in the military as an intelligence officer in Japan and Korea. He then worked for his fathers insurance company before he entered politics in 1967 when he was elected to city council. Only four years later he became the first Asian American mayor of a major city, San Jose. By this point he was already taking interest in transportation decisions in his city. After his term as mayor was up, he ran for a seat in the United States House of Representatives. Here Mineta served as an active member of congress from 1975 to 1995. He loyally represented Californias Silicon Valley. He had a varied agenda that consisted of legislation ranging from science and technology, economic growth, and transportation issues. In the house, he was chairman of transportations committees. As well as this, he was a c...