Kaplan Kirsch & Rockwell LLP has announced that Suzanne Silverman has joined the firm as a partner. This addition will complement Kaplan Kirsch & Rockwell’s ability to provide exceptional legal services on a variety of railroad, transit, transit-oriented development, and other infrastructure projects. The Firm’s specialized practice involves the development and operation of some of the largest and most sophisticated infrastructure projects around the country including highways, urban transit systems, railroad, airports, public facilities, energy generation, and urban development.
Suzanne Silverman will be part of the Firm’s Rail, Transit, Highways, and Infrastructure practice group. She will be based in its New York office, where she will work closely with Adam Giuliano, an attorney involved in leading the Firm’s public-private partnership (P3) and alternative project delivery practice group. He established the New York location in January 2017 and was joined in late 2017 by attorney and civil engineer Emily Eads.
Prior to joining Kaplan Kirsch & Rockwell, Silverman was a senior director in New Jersey Transit Corporation’s Capital Planning and Programs department from 2011 through 2018 and represented NJ TRANSIT as a New Jersey Deputy Attorney General from 1993 through 2011. During her time with NJ TRANSIT, she worked on the Gateway Program, the Access to the Region’s Core (ARC) Tunnel Project, the Hudson Bergen Light Rail Transit System, the Newark Airport Station Project, and other matters related to the Northeast Corridor.
Her practice focuses on resolving transactional and regulatory issues related to railroad, transit, and other infrastructure projects. She also brings substantial expertise in real estate, joint development projects, and railroad negotiations to the Firm’s practice.
Silverman has experience negotiating all aspects of railroad and light rail projects and assembling right-of-way for new commuter and light rail service expansions, as well as new stations and related facilities. Her expertise includes negotiating and drafting joint development, utility relocation, operating, design, construction, force account, cost and risk allocation, jurisdictional, and shared use agreements.
Silverman is experienced with the procurement of major transit projects using a variety of models, including design-build, as well as with FTA funding applications. She also has extensive experience negotiating and addressing daily interactions between transit systems and the railroads who own or share corridors with fixed-guideway transit systems. Her work brings her into frequent contact with federal regulators and grant making agencies, including the FTA and the FRA, along with other significant public agencies such as the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.
The Firm’s managing partner, John Putnam, said, “We are delighted to add Suzanne’s breadth and depth of knowledge and experience in dealing with every aspect of the major projects and negotiations that lie at the core of every transit agency’s daily operations and interactions with operating partners and regulators. Suzanne’s wealth of experience and her comprehensive understanding of the inner workings of the types of public agencies we are privileged to serve will provide a valuable asset to meet our public sector agency clients’ needs.”
