Record Review
FOIA, FOIL, and OPRA strategy; document review; chronology building; and assumption review.
Typical output: records matrix, chronology, issue map, or request strategy.Make the better option legible before decisions harden.
I help civic organizations, funders, journalists, and legal teams make major transportation and infrastructure choices actionable while there is still time to shape them.
The work connects records, operating assumptions, cost estimates, environmental review, procurement language, and visual alternatives so better options can be understood, defended, and acted on.
Over twelve years across rail and bus systems and the institutions that run them.
Clarify a Live Decision →
Outputs & Methods
Usable records and decision support.
Issue Memos
Short, usable analysis for counsel, reporters, funders, civic leaders, and public-interest organizations.
Typical output: briefing memo, source roadmap, option review, or gap analysis.Public Alternatives
Technical alternatives translated into options, visuals, briefing material, and public-facing strategy.
Typical output: public comment, op-ed frame, concept package, or campaign memo.Decision Strategy
Identifying when a project is still movable and what record must exist before decisions harden.
Typical output: decision map, stakeholder map, hearing strategy, or implementation brief.
Current Work
Alternatives that arrive early enough to matter.
A better option has to become concrete before the official path becomes the only path on the table.
Penn Station / Gateway
Penn Station and Gateway are regional capacity questions with more than one way to define the constraint. The central issue is whether future service can be delivered without treating a southward expansion as the only viable path.
- Question
- Can the region deliver the future rail program without expanding Penn Station south?
- Work
- Records, operating assumptions, operating model review, federal engagement, and public alternatives.
- Stakes
- Block 780, through-running, regional rail, and whether distant future compatibility is guiding irreversible decisions.
Brooklyn-Queens Expressway
My work with Off-Ramp NYC produced the concept renderings featured in CityNerd's BQE episode. The broader value is a concrete alternative: removal can be compared with reconstruction on cost, operations, public space, and long-term city-building.
- Question
- Should New York rebuild the corridor for another generation of highway use, or evaluate removal as a serious alternative?
- Work
- Concept renderings, financial review, public-space framing, and media translation.
- Stakes
- Whether removal can be evaluated as seriously as reconstruction.
How the Work Moves
From scattered assumptions to a usable decision record.
Major infrastructure decisions often harden before the alternatives are concrete. The work makes the record, timing, and public options legible early enough to matter.
01
Assemble the record
Agency documents, contracts, models, presentations, emails, environmental materials, and procurement language.
02
Clarify the assumptions
Cost, capacity, ridership, operations, phasing, governance, alternatives, and stated public benefits.
03
Map the decision path
The vote, approval, financing action, hearing, procurement step, or legal threshold where timing still matters.
04
Make the alternative usable
Briefing memo, press frame, public comment, implementation path, visual alternative, or decision package.
Contact
Bring a live decision.
Send the proposal, record, or decision point you’re trying to understand. I’ll help clarify what is known, what still needs to be examined, and where a better option can be made concrete.
liam.blank@gmail.com
Background
2023—Present
Chair, Transportation & Infrastructure
The City Club of New York
2022—2023
Associate Director
Permanent Citizens Advisory Committee to the MTA (PCAC)
2018—2022
Policy & Communications Manager
Tri-State Transportation Campaign
2014—2018
Transportation Analyst
ReThink Studio