By Andrew Wrucke, MnLTAP Director
At Minnesota LTAP, we’ve had the good fortune to benefit from the unique experience of engineer, teacher, and writer Al Forsberg. After many years of contributing insightful columns for the Exchange, in 2025, Al is going to attempt retirement once again and finally put down the pen.
Fueled by curiosity and a drive to teach others the lessons he’s learned along the way, Al’s career is one to be admired and emulated. A 1970 University of Minnesota graduate with a civil engineering degree, Al taught high school physics before jumping into transportation at the Twin Cities’ Metropolitan Transit Commission (MTC), where he planned and designed park-and-rides and bus shelters. Next, he joined the Army Corps of Engineers, earning a master’s degree in civil engineering on the side in 1985.
His first stint working for a municipality was as an engineer with Wabasha County, where one of his projects for the Army Corps of Engineers was designing a breakwater for Lake City on Lake Pepin. After three years, he moved to Blue Earth County, where he served as county engineer for 28 years—and retired (for the first time) at age 68. It was at this time that he reached out to MnLTAP, offering to write articles for the quarterly Exchange newsletter.
Al says that contributing articles has been a good way to stay current on important and evolving topics in the field, such as technology, regulations and laws, funding, and management. One example is surveying, which he says was “pretty much how George Washington did it” when he started as an engineer. In just a few decades, surveying has evolved into photogrammetry, GPS, CAD, and 3D rendering. Today, it's possible to use technology to show plan alternatives and adjust to public feedback in near real time.
To stay on top of such developments, Al’s advice to early- and mid-career employees in this fast-changing field is to participate in programs like MnLTAP and professional organizations, not only to keep technical skills current but also to flex their people skills. Perhaps the top reason to be active in professional development programs is to develop a “mutual support society” of people to lean on for advice on the job, he says.
A self-described “failure at retirement” after Blue Earth County, Al went on to answer the call to fill vacancies with interim county engineer roles at Steele, Waseca, and Redwood Counties during personnel transitions such as one fellow engineer’s two-year military deployment. This is a true sign of service and dedication to the field and people in it.
We at MnLTAP wish Al all the best and thank him for his valuable contributions throughout the years. I’m hoping that his example inspires other local agency transportation leaders or MnLTAP fans to reach out with their own ideas for guest columns! We’re eager to hear what topics our readers find most captivating and valuable about our field—and we’re here to collaborate on the writing, too. If you’re interested in following Al’s example and sharing your lessons and knowledge, please email me at [email protected].