Olaf Growald
Anette Landeros is shaping the future of Fort Worth. In her new role as the chief strategy officer for Trinity Metro, the city’s public transit agency, Landeros is developing the vision and strategy that will result in more bus riders, rail riders, rideshare riders, and (eventually, fingers crossed) streetcar riders. And this demand will increase the need for a more robust public transit system, resulting in a city you might not recognize decades down the road.
However, making public transit believers out of Texans is no easy task. But, as the Trinity Metro CSO, this is Landeros’ main charge. And having spent nearly 20 years in the public sector and nonprofits, including a 12-year stint at the US Department of Transportation, it’s a task Landeros is well positioned to tackle.
Of all things, it was growing up watching heavy doses of TV news programs that led Landeros to her career in public service. Like most single-television households in the 1990s — when those were more of a thing — there was typically one person who monopolized the remote control. In Landeros’ childhood home in San Antonio, this distinction belonged to her father, a machine shop worker who wielded his power by incessantly watching news programs like “60 Minutes” and “Dateline.”
“I just remember asking a lot of questions,” Landeros says. “And [my dad is] not from here — he is an immigrant from Mexico — so he would explain the best he could. The gist of it, he would say, is that people in Washington, D.C., are deciding everything for the rest of the country.
“And I said, ‘Well, then I need to be there.’”
While it might be hard to imagine today’s bickering cable news programs inspiring such altruism, Landeros would eventually make good on her Washington, D.C., ambitions. After receiving her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in public policy at Indiana University and University of Texas at Austin, respectively, Landeros landed a job at the U.S. Department of Transportation in coveted D.C.
“But then, I didn’t like it,” Landeros says. “I think I didn’t realize how much of a Texan I was.”
Though she had never stepped foot in Fort Worth and was unaware it had buildings over four stories high (truthfully), Landeros accepted a transfer to the city’s DOT offices, assuming it would be a two-year pit stop. Eleven years later, not only is Landeros in Fort Worth, but her parents are, too. She, her husband, two children, and her mom and dad have more than settled into Cowtown, they’ve become an integral part of the community.
Landeros says her community involvement was the result of her looking for friends when she first moved to Fort Worth. “I didn’t have anything else to do,” she says. “So I was on committees and volunteered and, suddenly, I built this whole network of people who were equally as passionate about the city as I was.”
This passion and involvement would lead to her becoming president and CEO of the Fort Worth Hispanic Chamber of Commerce in 2019, leaving her position of 12 years at the DOT. Though initially uneasy with the position due to her lack of entrepreneurial experience, she and her husband, Joseph, would remedy this by opening Casa Azul, a North Side coffee shop, in late 2021. But she readily admits it was Joseph who spearheaded the idea.
“Everything seems possible to an entrepreneur,” Landeros says. “And I knew I was married to one. He was one of those guys who was always wondering what kind of business we should start. It wasn’t really for me; I always had a job and got it done — very linear. But one day I asked him, ‘If you could do anything, what would you do?’ And he said, ‘Open a coffee shop.’ And I said, ‘OK, let’s do it.’”
With Joseph manning the coffee shop on a near-daily basis, Landeros remains focused on Trinity Metro and, ultimately, shaping the future of Fort Worth.
“I think it’s really important that the whole city sees a vision of how we are all going to be connected,” Landeros says. “And we’re really committed to getting that done.”
FROM THE FEED
1. At a Texas Rangers game with husband, Joseph, and two children
2. With entire family, including father, who spent 12 years as a bus driver in San Antonio
3. Dressing up for a gala
4. Goofy photo op with the family
5. Riding sidesaddle with the Escaramuza at the Fort Worth Stock Show and Rodeo
6. Fellow Trinity Metro employees and the new Orange Line, which runs from downtown to the Stockyards
7. With the people who make public transit happen in Fort Worth
