Transportation 2024: MONICA BACKMON

This year, Backmon was on hand for the completion of two projects funded by the NVTA: the $19.6 million Boundary Channel Drive Interchange Project in Arlington, for which the agency contributed more than $4.3 million, and the $313.9 million Route 7 Corridor Improvements Project in Fairfax County that NVTA provided with more than $22 million.

Backmon was named the authority’s CEO in 2021, after having served as its executive director in 2014. Established by the state, the authority has invested more than $3 billion in 122 regional projects over the past decade, and in March, NVTA’s six-year program running through fiscal 2029 recommended $587.2 million in infrastructure in Fairfax County alone, out of the authority’s $947.1 million total funding request.

Backmon was one of 10 women recognized as 2024 Women Who Move the Nation honorees by the Conference of Minority Transportation Officials. In 2022, she received the Women’s Transportation Seminar (WTS) D.C. chapter’s Woman of the Year Award and the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments’ Ronald F. Kirby Award for Collaborative Leadership. The two-time graduate of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign serves as a mentor through WTS.