District Six Appoints New TSM&O Engineer – Freeways
FDOT District Six has appointed Ms. Yamilet Diaz, P.E. as the new Transportation Systems Management & Operations (TSM&O) Engineer for the Freeways division. The position manages the Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) operations and maintenance contracts for the District. In her new role, she will be charged with the unique challenge of managing one of the most congested regions in the world. Ms. Diaz will oversee over 100 employees and consultants to manage all aspects of freeway operations that includes incident management, traveler information, managed lanes, device maintenance, and other supporting services. She will work with TSM&O staff and partner agencies to implement innovative solutions to meet the regional travel needs of Miami-Dade and Monroe Counties.
Ms. Diaz is well poised for this position as she has been supporting the District Six TSM&O Office for over 11 years. She began her career as an engineering intern and worked through various consultant positions, eventually joining FDOT as the TSM&O Engineer for the emerging arterials divisions in 2017. Ms. Diaz played a pivotal role in growing that division from the ground up. She implemented the infrastructure and resources to build the burgeoning department into a successful arterial program for the state of Florida. She identified ways to improve arterial operations and partnered with local agencies to implement multi-modal transportation projects that improved the safety and mobility of local roadways.
Ms. Diaz paved the way for several projects that were the first of their kind for the District. She launched the District’s first Adaptive Signal Control Technology (ASCT) project along SW 8 Street which reduced congestion in this high traffic east-west corridor in Miami-Dade County. She was also responsible for improving the Traffic Signal Maintenance and Compensation Agreement process with maintaining agencies which led to better accountability and maintenance efforts. Ms. Diaz is credited with leading the District’s traffic signal system expansion in Monroe County. She successfully spearheaded the District’s plan to assume the operations and maintenance of the county’s traffic signals from the local municipalities in the area. The project spanned over 100 miles along US 1 and took several years to complete this led to the establishment of the Monroe County Traffic Signal System we see today. Most recently, Ms. Diaz served as the Project Manager for the Florida Keys Connecting Overseas to Advance Safe Travel (Keys COAST) project, which is the first connected and automated vehicle project in the District. She administered all aspects of the project, including planning, design, and the early stages of construction.
Ms. Diaz has been recognized with numerous industry awards and regularly speaks at transportation conferences to share her knowledge and lessons learned about arterial management. She is a professional engineer and a graduate from Johns Hopkins University (Bachelor of Science in Mathematical Sciences) and Florida International University (Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering). The TSM&O Office looks forward to working with Ms. Diaz in her new role.