Jacksonville Transportation Authority CEO Nat Ford speaks at the topping-out ceremony for the U2C Autonomous Innovation Center near Broad and Water streets in LaVilla. | Jeffrey Leeser via Jacksonville Daily Record
Published on July 22, 2026 at 12:31 pm
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Nat Ford Sr., the head of the Jacksonville Transportation Authority, has been selected to lead the Dallas Area Rapid Transit system.
The board of directors of the Dallas system approved Ford’s hiring Tuesday night. He will take over Oct. 26 as its next president and CEO.
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Ford had announced earlier that he would retire from JTA in January after 13 years with the agency. Since he’s leaving sooner, he and JTA have begun revising the transition timeline, JTA officials said Wednesday.
The JTA board will meet July 29 and could consider an interim replacement.
Ford was on a short list of three finalists for the position in Dallas after the transit system board met a week ago.
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In a news release about Ford’s hiring, DART officials said he brings decades of executive leadership in public transportation. He offers “a proven record of organizational transformation, and a deep understanding that transit is about much more than buses and trains,” DART Board Chair Randall Bryant said in the release.
Before becoming JTA’s CEO, Ford had leadership roles at the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency and the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority in Georgia. In his time at JTA, he built the Jacksonville Regional Transportation Center in LaVilla and led an authority that completed 27 projects in a road and streets initiative two years ahead of schedule.
But JTA also faces some opposition to proposed fare and service changes as part of its proposed 2026-2027 budget, which would begin Oct. 1.
The base fare is proposed to increase from $1.75 to $2, the first fare increase since 2019. It would take effect Jan. 1.
JTA is holding public meetings to gather feedback about the proposal.
Separately, ridership is low on JTA’s NAVI service, which runs autonomous vehicles from LaVilla to the Sports and Entertainment District Downtown.
NAVI, short for Neighborhood Autonomous Vehicle Innovation, cost $65 million and represents the first phase of a larger plan known as the Ultimate Urban Circulator system, or U2C.
JTA is having public meetings about the future of the Skyway system and what direction to go with the autonomous vehicles.
Despite the difficulties, JTA Board Chair Aundra Wallace called Ford “a visionary leader” in a statement issued to Jacksonville Today news partner News4Jax.
“Dallas is getting one of the best in the business,” Wallace said. “I thank Nat for his service here at JTA and wish him the best in his next chapter.”
