Sam Schwartz

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Sam Schwartz is the founder of Sam Schwartz Engineering and Chair of the Sam Schwartz Transportation Research Program at Hunter College in New York City. He also wrote a column on traffic for the New York Daily News for over 30 years Previously, Schwartz was New York City’s Traffic Commissioner and Chief Engineer of the NYC Department of Transportation. He was a cabbie in the late 1960s and joined the Traffic Department as a junior engineer in 1971.Mr. Schwartz’s most recent books, No One at the Wheel: Driverless Cars and the Road of the Future (2018) and Street Smart: The Rise of Cities and The Fall of Cars (2015) lay out a recipe for cities faced with rapid changes in modes, automation, demographic shifts and travelers’ preferences. He obtained his Bachelor of Science degree in Physics at Brooklyn College and received a Master of Science degree in Civil Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania. He is a licensed Professional Engineer.Schwartz, often referred to by his nom de plume “Gridlock Sam,” released the word “gridlock” into the lexicon during the 1980 NYC Transit strike.