U.S. Department of Transportation Expands Use of Salesforce, Adds AI Agents to Modernize National Transportation and Safety Systems

Salesforce, the world’s #1 AI CRM, today announced an expanded agencywide transformation initiative with the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT). Salesforce is already modernizing core functions across USDOT, helping enhance citizen safety through real-time, interstate data sharing and will simplify the management of billions in federal grants. USDOT will also deploy Agentforce — Salesforce’s AI agent platform — to help create a more efficient and responsive transportation system by handling routine tasks, offering citizens around-the-clock support, and generating immediate alerts with proposed optimal mitigation strategies for traffic and infrastructure incidents.

USDOT is critical to a thriving U.S. economy, helping ensure the safe and efficient movement of people and goods across air, road, rail, and maritime networks. However, the department’s vital work has been slowed by duplicative systems, siloed data, and administrative overload — hampering operations and speed of critical infrastructure and transportation projects.

“To deliver on our mission of building a safe, efficient, and modern transportation system, we have to start with making technology our biggest asset,” said Pavan Pidugu, Chief Digital & Information Officer of USDOT. "We needed to make a strategic shift to deliver on our mission: adding AI at the core of everything we’re doing. Now, we’re not just deploying new technology, we’re empowering our agency to work more effectively and, most importantly, ensuring the safety and future of our country’s transportation system."

USDOT will deploy Agentforce, a digital workforce of autonomous, intelligent AI agents, to assist human employees by automating manual, tactical, and operational tasks across the agency. AI agents will:

• Provide around-the-clock citizen support for things like complaints and accessing services, automating routine requests so human staff can focus on more complex cases. This more efficient system will give both employees and citizens faster, easier access to the information they need, when they need it.
• Autonomously analyze vast, complex datasets — such as weather, traffic trends, and historical incident data — to generate real-time alerts and recommend optimal mitigation strategies that can help USDOT reduce transportation accidents and injuries.
• Quickly review grant applications, verify compliance, flag inconsistencies or missing information, and draft approval recommendations for human review and approval, unlocking federal dollars faster for critical infrastructure.

Automating these manual processes will also save significant time across the agency, according to Pidugu: "It's mind-blowing what the number of actual days of work is that we can save by doing this."