Meredith Richards

Meredith Richards

Association Chair

Meredith has a long history in rail advocacy and public service, including eight years on the Charlottesville City Council and over 30 years on government boards and commissions relating to transportation, urban planning, municipal government and economic development.

As President of the Virginia Transit Association and as a member of Governor Mark Warner’s Commission on Rail Enhancement for the 21st Century, Meredith began a twenty-five year career advocating for public policies to advance passenger rail in Virginia. She was the driving force behind the establishment of Virginia’s first state-supported intercity passenger train, mobilizing political jurisdictions, businesses, institutions and citizens throughout the US29 Corridor in a successful campaign to bring the Lynchburg Northeast Regional train to Central and Southwest Virginia.

Meredith has been President of the Virginia Rail Policy Institute for fifteen years and is a Past President and current Co-chair of Virginians for High Speed Rail (VHSR). Her work contributed to a series of state rail funding policies that culminated in the $4 billion Transforming Rail in Virginia initiative launched in 2019. In 2020, VHSR established a Legislative Achievement Award in Meredith’s honor and gave the first award to Virginia Secretary of Transportation, Shannon Valentine.

Meredith was elected to the Board of Directors of the Rail Passengers Association in 2020 and became Association Chair in 2022. She has traveled throughout the United States creating rail advocacy coalitions for the Association. She had the privilege of representing the Southeastern U.S. as a select member of the Federal Railroad Administration’s Long Distance Service Study, which identified fifteen future routes that will bring passenger rail to 45 million more Americans and nearly double Amtrak services across the country.

Meredith holds a Ph.D. in Psychology from the University of Illinois. She began her teaching career at the University of Virginia, retiring as Associate Professor in the Interdisciplinary Program in Linguistics at the University of Louisville to work in the new field of educational technology, where she pioneered teaching models for the classroom use of computers in the Language Arts for Scholastic Software. Her public service and professional interests merged when as a city councilor she founded Computers4Kids to bridge the digital divide with the help of a US Department of Commerce grant. The Charlottesville-based nonprofit is entering its 25th year serving youth in the community.