Federal Funding

Something to keep in mind while the House GOP leadership toys with the idea of sending national transportation policy back to the 1950s…

Funding to make biking and walking safer has taken something of a beating in both the House and Senate transportation bills. The fate of the most significant federal bike-ped programs -- Safe Routes to School, Transportation Enhancements, and Recreational Trails -- is still very much in doubt. Under the Senate bill, passed Wednesday, local agencies would at least have greater access to the funds that remain for these programs. At last glance, the House bill completely obliterated dedicated bike-ped funding.

Add Federal Transit Administrator Peter Rogoff to the list of people saying that it's premature to declare victory over the House's attempts to cast transit into the abyss. Rogoff knows a thing or two about transportation bills: He was an aide on the Senate Transportation Appropriations Subcommittee for 20 years, during which time the federal government passed three long-term transportation laws.

In its annual “Views and Estimates” document [PDF], the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee indicates that when it comes to transportation policy, despite a few nods to transit, House Republicans still want to cut spending and let highway-centric state DOTs sort out the details. While the House transportation bill could be on its last legs, the document shows that the House GOP hasn't given up on its quest to eliminate street safety programs for walking and biking while giving a free hand to states to build more sprawl projects.

Last May, Streetsblog ran an article with the headline "Experts Agree: Six-Year Transportation Bill Won't Pass This Year." A lot has happened since then, but we're still right where we started, butting up against a deadline with more than enough gridlock to give even optimistic experts pause.

Majority Leader Harry Reid has incorporated much of the Ben Cardin/Thad Cochran amendment into the so-called "manager's mark" of the Senate transportation bill. The move means that the amendment's provisions letting local governments directly access funding from popular bicycle and pedestrian programs will be included in the bill without having to come up for a separate vote.

The U.S. Senate voted 51-48 today to reject an amendment to their transportation bill that would overturn measures in President Obama's signature health care law dealing with contraception coverage. The vote clears the way for the Senate to finally begin considering actual transportation issues rather than dealing with delay tactics.

UPDATE (3:45 p.m.): Citing a lack of support from his colleagues, Speaker John Boehner has dropped his 18-month transportation proposal and has not yet offered an alternative, according to Politico. "A five-year bill is the best way to do this," he said.

On January 6, 1983, the icon of the modern conservative movement, Ronald Reagan, signed legislation to raise the gas tax for the first time in more than two decades, devoting a portion of the revenue to transit.