I was sad to see that Metro interim General Manager Dan Tangherlini has officially taken his name off the list of candidates to get the job. Dan is a person who understands the value of transit and who knows the Washington region better than most. It sounds as if none of this would have happened if he had been offered the permanent job several months ago, which WMATA board members representing the District wanted to do. I can’t imagine that he was impatient to get the permanent title. After all, he served in an acting capacity as the city’s director of transportation for years and didn’t seem too concerned about not having the full title. What might have made this situation different?

Metro’s board will have a hard time finding someone who has Tangherlini’s unique insight into the region, a true understanding and appreciation for what the customers want and need, and the management skills necessary to get things done. He also had a unique chance to learn where the skeletons are hidden at Metro from the inside, serving as a partner of the system while with DDOT as well as the time spent as a District representative on the board. He could and was cutting through some of the layers of red tape that was the old guard at Metro. It will take someone coming in from the outside a good long time to figure all of this out, but it’s from the outside where the next general manager needs to come.

I haven’t seen the list of candidates for the position who will soon be interviewed, but I can imagine where at least a few of them are coming from. Keep in mind that the Washington Metro job is truly one of the crown jewels of U.S. transit systems. It will take a special individual to take on the challenges and opportunities that this system offers, and I would imagine that the best candidate will come not from a huge system but from a system that is innovative and growing. This person will need to be a political animal who understands the nuts and bolts of an operation like this as well as ways to keep passengers happy. That means someone who is not too entrenched in federal bureaucracy, but who understands the role that the feds play here. We don’t need someone who has spent the past 20 years working for a federal agency; we need new thinking and new approaches.

Given some of the statements that have been made and the gesture in general, maybe those representatives from Virginia weren’t so far off base in having concerns that Tangherlini’s loyalty was to the District. Maybe their concerns that this might impact the process of building a system for the entire region had some validity. Maybe the representatives from Maryland who supported Tangherlini and wanted him to get the permanent job will have a better chance of getting the extension out to Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport built under someone from the outside.

Maybe this will all work out for the best.