Transportation Policy
Basics
LaHood on Transport: ‘We Don’t Want to Pit One Mode … Against Another’
While Vice President Biden was giving a candid take on cities' difficulties taking advantage of the economic stimulus, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood was giving a recovery speech of his own in Chicago -- where he sent a message of transport reform to an audience that might not have expected it.
September 4, 2009
Feds Still Forcing Transit Agencies to Bow to Private Charter Buses
Streetsblog Capitol Hill reported yesterday that the U.S. DOT would end a Bush-era mandate to reward new transit projects for using private contractors -- but a similar pro-privatization rule for bus service remains in effect, preventing local transit agencies from competing with private charter companies.
September 3, 2009
New Poll: Public Supports Congestion Tolling Over Gas Tax Hike by 2 to 1
(Graphic: HTNB) The puzzle of how to pay for new federal investments in transportation is the single greatest stumbling block facing members of Congress — should a gas tax increase be combined with a vehicle miles traveled (VMT) tax? How about a national infrastructure bank that leverages private capital? A poll released today by the … Continued
September 1, 2009
Know Your Transportation Lobbyists: The American Trucking Association
Earlier this week, we took a closer look at the congressional lobbying teams employed by the transport sector's biggest players, AASHTO and APTA. Today, it's time to meet the representatives of the American Trucking Association (ATA), which reported $1.32 million in lobbying spending during the first half of this year on its congressional disclosures -- more than AASHTO and APTA's combined K Street bills.
August 21, 2009
Carper: Climate Bill Must Focus on Transport, Not Just Power Plants
Sen. Tom Carper (D-DE), chief sponsor of a plan to give green transportation 10 percent of the emissions allowances in the upcoming climate change bill, took to the pages of his home-state newspaper yesterday with an op-ed that begins with a pithy description of "the problem":
August 19, 2009
Know Your Transportation Lobbyists: Transit Beats Roads — Sort Of
Transportation lobbying is a complicated universe, in which multi-issue environmental groups can be as active as organizations that exist only to influence infrastructure decision-making.
August 18, 2009
Transit Cuts Report Underscores Cities’ Congressional Influence Gap
In a report released this morning, Transportation for America (T4A) expands on its months-long effort to map transit cutbacks across the nation and concludes that 10 of the largest 25 local agencies are being forced to hike fares by more than 13 percent.
August 18, 2009
Tracking Transport Subsidies: As Tough as Following the Stimulus Money
The $787 billion economic stimulus effort was intended to be a model of government transparency -- but a privately run website called Recovery.org soon began beating out the government in the race to trace federal dollars. Now, as the Pew Charitable Trusts begins to expand its Subsidyscope fiscal monitoring project, some similar gaps in spending data are emerging.
August 17, 2009
Obama Administration Touts Nation’s First All-Electronic Toll Road in N.C.
The U.S. DOT dispatched Federal Highway Administrator Victor Mendez to North Carolina yesterday to kick off construction of the $1 billion Triangle Expressway, the state's first toll road and the nation's first to use per-mile electronic tolling.
August 13, 2009
Senate’s New DOT Spending Bill Eases One Transit Funding Barrier
During the lengthy process of pursuing a "New Starts" funding agreement with the U.S. DOT, local transit officials are often at the mercy of cost-benefit calculations that have failed to keep pace with evolutions in transport planning. But one aspect of that slog could soon change, thanks to Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA).
August 11, 2009