America is going through an economic catastrophe the likes of which we haven’t seen since the Great Depression. That’s why we need government spending on the order of the New Deal.

A big part of President Obama’s stimulus package should be a massive public works program. Our roads and bridges are wearing out faster than they’re being replaced. There is a huge backlog of projects ready to go. Putting people to work on bridge and highway construction will put money in their pockets, and that money in turn will circulate through the domestic economy.

President Obama’s biggest challenge will be getting Congress to approve a stimulus big enough to jolt the economy into growth. He needs to get it done, get it done fast and get it done right.

Getting it done fast will be tough. Senate Republicans will still have enough members to sustain a filibuster, and Blue Dog Democrats will be cautious about adding to the national debt.

Getting it done right will be even tougher. No one knows the right answer to the question of “How much to spend?”, let alone how much to spend on roads and bridges. The Federal Highway Administration has estimated that the backlog of road and bridge projects is $460 billion. But all that can’t be spent at once.

Even more troublesome will be the question of what projects to spend it on. Without a long-term strategy for infrastructure investment, transportation funds are sometimes spent on pork-barrel projects.

Some will argue that it’s better to pay people to dig holes and then fill them than to let them stay unemployed. Others will say that we can’t afford to spend scarce resources on unnecessary programs like dog parks and bike trails.

With a massive and hurried public works program comes the risk that trivial projects will be funded at the expense of projects that are crucial to the movement of goods and people. President Obama will have to be careful to spend infrastructure funds both wisely and quickly. He needs to make sure there is oversight and accountability, and that the jobs created are good union jobs.

Without accountability and oversight, President Obama will lose public support for increased investment on our roads and bridges – just as the highway bill comes up for reauthorization and additional financing mechanisms must be found.

Responding to the challenge:

I’d like to start from the beginning with this question. So rather than talk prescription or recommendations in this first communication, I would like to concentrate on process. In this spirit I propose to open with a few thoughts on what we mean by this word infrastructure, then on to a word on transport in cities (that being where the people are), followed by a quick look at who we are (and who we should be if we are to get this job done right). Finally, a modest proposal to create an appropriate base to guide the incoming administration and players toward more effective and just policies and investments in our sector. Read on:

1. What is infrastructure?

Of the 28 thoughtful contributions thus far posted in response to this good question, all but one or two have largely interpreted "infrastructure" as primarily a physical entity. This tilt to the purely physical introduces a fundamental, if implicit, bias against most forms of social and behavioral "infrastructure". However, this last is precisely what we need to consider above all when we look at a future in which virtually all of the past patterns are being challenged.

A quick word-frequency check this morning of those first 28 contributions yields a shortlist of the words and phrases that turn up most often, and which as a whole give us a fair feel for the focus and concerns of the group thus far. They are:

1. Infrastructure >100

2. Highways/roads/bridges –102

3. Aviation/Airport/airline/aircraft – 79

4. Trucks/trucking/freight/goods – 59

5. Energy/gas/oil – 53

6. Investment – 46

7. Billion – 46

8. Public transport/mass transit – 12

9. Marine/river/water/canal – 12

I wonder if the physical infrastructure is really the appropriate starting place if we are to fulfill our charge?

2. Where do people travel most?

This seems like a solid place to start. After all more than 80% of all Americans today live in or around our towns and cities. And since that’s where all those people need to move most in their day-to-day lives, it seems only reasonable that this should be the principal target of transportation policy and practice.

Our collaborative work under the New Mobility Agenda over the last two decades has been informed by the active participation of transportation planners, academics, policymakers, activists, and those who create and operate the transportation systems in more than 30 countries in all parts of the world (see www.newmobility.org). We have consistently taken as our starting place not the physical manifestations of the transportation system – important though they may be – but rather peopleandcommunity.

It really does matter what you take as your starting place. Just to give a feel for what happens if we shift this basic focus, I have run the same 28 posted commentaries through a second round of frequency counts, this time looking out for the kinds of people-oriented issues which we believe to be the right starting place --and which we really cannot afford to ignore during this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to redefine our transportation system. Here is what I came up with:

1. Bicycle/Bike/Biking/Cycle – 16

2. Green – 12

3. Climate – 10

4. Congestion - 7

5. Bus – 8

6. Walking – 7

7. Injuries/death – 5

8. Sidewalk – 4

9. Pedestrian – 3

10. Urban – 3

11. Suburban – 3

12. Bus rapid transit/BRT – 2

13. Street - 2

14. Transportation Alternatives – 2

15. Child, children – 1

16. Land use – 1

17. Equity – 1

18. Multimodal – 1

19. Carshare/ carsharing – 0

20. Demand management/TDM – 0

21. Elderly – 0

22. Free – 0

23. Handicapped – 0

24. Interdependent – 0

25. Isolated – 0

26. Job creation – 0

27. Livable – 0

28. Needy – 0

29. Neighborhood – 0

30. Poor – 0

31. Public space – 0

32. Quiet – 0

33. Small – 0

34. Subway/metro – 0

35. Taxes – 0

36. Telecommuting/ telework – 0

37. Tram/LRT – 0

38. Woman/Women – 0

I find this absence, with only a very few exceptions, of attention to the daily life concerns and practices of a majority of Americans highly disturbing. After all transportation is above all about people and services. Not about big physical objects and products. And while this is a problem, it is one we are well positioned to do something about.

3. Who are we?

This seems like a good place to go next. Above, we have started to get our arms around the job to be done. Now we should probably take a few minutes to exchange ideas as to the kinds of people who are best qualified to get it done right.

Let’s start by considering our list of contributors weighing in on this topic: 28 in all, of which 24 male. Oops.

This is no once-off phenomenon: it’s more or less exactly in line with prevailing practices in our sector. Transportation policy and investments up to now has been shaped almost excusably by males – and not just any males but males with jobs, more or less decent university educations, a full place in the community, and a generally serene view of the future. And oh yes, to a man, owners and drivers of cars. (A word of self-disclosure here: I have just pretty well described myself.)

Is this the way our panel should look if we are to be up to our mission? Should we not shake ourselves hard and set out to rectify this as quickly as possible so as to be able to provide wise and balanced counsel to the incoming administration? I would say yes and yes -- and I am sure the majority of you will agree (but if not just ask your wives and daughters).

If we have learned one thing about transportation over the last decades, it is that only a portion of the solutions of the transport related problems can be solved within the sector itself. This means that we must be AGGRESSIVELY INCLUSIVE in all respects.

We could make this very complicated if we wanted to, but there is also a solution which is at once obvious, easy and ready for implementation as soon as we decide to do it. Here is my proposal: Let us come together to make 2009 the Year of the Woman in Transportation and use that to set off the much needed transition process.

4. 2009: The Year of the Woman in Transportation

How to move from this fine sounding idea to concrete operational reality? For starters we can take it upon ourselves to ensure full and fair representation of women in every transportation planning and decision forum we are involved in, no matter where it is. Either we have full gender parity or something very close to it (say, no less than 30% female participation), or the event gets canceled. It is that simple.

We do not need a law to make this happen, but we do need a high public commitment by leaders and a growing culture which accepts that there is simply no other way of going about this.

Surface parity, while a start, is unlikely to be sufficient. Many women who do get into key roles very rapidly begin behaving like or reflecting the behavior and values of men. Examples would be very dangerous ... but try to think of women in such powerful positions who HAVE acted differently to the males in previous or similar positions of influence and power. It’s just that the worldviews and values are in general, very male! And this is precisely what we need to change to realize our very different future.

This forced, high-priority network expansion can help us to increase greatly the range of backgrounds and skills we bring into the various transportation fora, an opportunity to rectify some of the debilitating historical inadequacies in the sector that have led to its underperformance in many areas.

So as we look to bring in more women, we need of course to bring in more expertise in the entrenched professional skills such as transport planning, traffic management, financial planning, modeling and the usual array of “hard skills” which have the front stage in the sector. But that is not enough. We also if we are to get the job done need greatly enhanced competence in such areas as behavioral psychology, community relations, social services , education, childcare, public health, job creation, poverty reduction and all those other key areas of our daily lives which thus far have not received the necessary attention in the transport discussions and decision-making process. And in these, we need both women and men to enhance our understanding of the issues and to inform policy in the process.

But is it that women are for some reason better, smarter or more noble than we Y chromosome-encumbered males? That’s not the point. Rather it is my experience that women often have a different view of the world in many respects, not all women perhaps but most of those whom I know and have worked with and learn from in the past. It is this differentness that we need to bring in and profit from. Put enough women into a forum and they will keep us on our toes. (The key being the ”enough”.)

One important wrinkle on this is provided by a phrase of the Gender and Built Environment collaborative program at http://www.gendersite.org/ who advise us: “Don't treat women equally”. Hmm. Something I think that is important for each of us to think through for ourselves.

My own long experience of trying to achieve some form of decent parity in the projects that I have led has shown to me that it is no easy task. Try as I have, I must admit that, other than in one or two rare cases, we have never got anywhere near full parity in any of our projects. Shame on me. But now, on to the future. This is clearly a job for a team, for a crowd, for new leadership, for a new culture. That could be us.

With this I think we are ready. So what could be better than starting with this outreach right now, than starting with ourselves and this panel?

I invite each of you to reach out into and beyond your networks to find at least one qualified female colleague, especially those who have worked directly with less advantaged people, groups and communities, including in the developing world. Within a few days, weeks at most, we will have our balanced panel and surely some very different ideas and counsel for our new administration.

I will start making my nominations this morning and will post them as “Comments” to this statement . Please join me.

Conclusion:

I hereby move that we now make this a major discussion topic for this fine panel in the weeks immediately ahead. Ladies? Gentlemen?

Transportation of freight plays a critical role in the success of our nation’s economy, and in the next 10 years ATA predicts total U.S. freight tonnage will increase more than 25 percent. President-Elect Obama correctly recognizes the challenges this growth will place on our nation’s existing infrastructure.

Trucks deliver nearly 100 percent of consumer goods and about 70 percent of overall freight tonnage in the United States. Economists predict this trend to continue, and as our nation moves forward with short and long-term transportation strategies we need to keep in mind the essentiality of the industry. Even railroads and marine transportation depend on trucks for intermodal delivery of their freight to its final destination.

Trucks serve different markets than trains, yet the railroads continue to tout the ability of trains to shift freight from the road to the rails. No matter how idyllic the claims, 80 percent of U.S. communities don’t have access to railroad tracks. So a shift from road to rails simply cannot be done. Economic consulting firm IHS Global Insight estimates in the next 10 years, rail intermodal freight tonnage will continue to grow but gain very little market share (less than a half of a percentage point), and rail carload tonnage not gain any market share.

ATA strongly supports significant investment in highway infrastructure as part of a broad strategy to stimulate immediate economic growth and create jobs throughout the country. The U.S. Department of Transportation finds that every $1 billion of federal highway investment, when combined with required state matching funds, supports 34,799 jobs in our nation. Over 3,000 highway and bridge construction projects with a total cost of $17.9 billion could be under way within 90 to 120 days after enactment of economic recovery legislation, according to the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO).

Project selection should be based on their potential for producing long-term safety, mobility and environmental benefits. We urge Congress to come up with a set of criteria for project selection that ranks projects according to their ability to achieve these goals. Preference should be given to projects on the federally designated National Highway System, which carries 40 percent of the nation's traffic and 75 percent of truck traffic. Specifically, projects that alleviate critical choke points in major freight corridors deliver the greatest benefit for the public. Projects that focus on congestion reduction benefit the economy and the environment by increasing shipping efficiency and reducing fuel consumption.

While the immediate goal is to stimulate the economy, we should not lose this opportunity to make investments that will pay dividends well into the future.

Sticking to Our Knitting: Transportation and Stimulus

The transportation community should not take ownership of stimulus projects designed more for economic development and job creation than they are for meeting transportation priorities. If monies are going to be distributed quickly, a certain amount of deference is going to have to be given to governors and mayors for projects they deem important.

Transportation advocates should spend our time identifying infrastructure projects that meet stimulus goals, as well as transportation goals, and developing a consensus around long-term strategies to incorporate in the surface authorization and other transportation bills. That is the best way to ensure that the transportation community is perceived as a responsible contributor to curing our nation's financial ills.

No doubt there will be efforts to discredit government's role in stimulating the economy and providing transportation infrastructure by pointing out examples of pork-barrel spending and what some identify as wasteful projects. We should not take the bait; instead, we should do our best to see that the best transportation projects are well represented in the overall package.

Airports play an important role in creating jobs through construction and infrastructure and safety improvements. Economic studies show time and time again that airports serve as economic engines for local communities and have a large multiplier affect on job creation. Investments in airport infrastructure are not only vital to the local community, but they are also important to the larger transportation system by providing connectivity to roads, transit, and public transportation. In this way they promote economic activity well into the future. They are the stimulus gift that keeps on giving.

As the incoming Obama Administration and Congressional Leaders begin to craft a package to help our country come out of recession, a significant investment of at least $1 billion in airport infrastructure will help not only create high paying jobs, but it will also help renew faith in our aviation system. As Craig Fuller from Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association pointed out in his posting and as 11 other aviation groups agreed, an investment of at least $1 billion in airport infrastructure funding will create 35,000 jobs. With the unique circumstances of airport construction, this stimulus funding could be used very quickly, thus spurring economic growth in a very short period of time.

Airports are committed to providing safe, efficient, secure and environmentally friendly facilities for passengers. In order to do this, however, airports need access to capital markets. Currently, interest earned on airport private activity bonds is subject to the alternative minimum tax (AMT). As long as the buyers for these bonds assume the risk of having to pay a higher tax liability on their returns on investing in airports, airports will continue to have trouble finding buyers for bonds. In fact, no airport private activity bonds for new construction have been sold on the market since October. In order to provide the level of service that passengers expect and to continue to make safety and security improvements, airports need access to the markets; therefore, the stimulus package should include an exemption of airport bonds from the AMT.

Finally, I should note that these arguments apply to the need to pass a long-term FAA reauthorization bill that gives airports the ability to invest in needed infrastructure. As the President-elect has noted, this economic downturn will be difficult to turn around and in the long-term, reauthorization passed in 2009 that provides airports needed tools to invest will play a large role in any future turnaround.

Upgrading and maintaining our nation’s infrastructure is critical to the economy of the United States. Airports are an important part of that infrastructure and play a vital role in providing efficient movement of passengers and cargo both domestically and internationally. I agree with my colleagues (and have noted in my blog, Airport Check-in) that investments in aviation through efficiency upgrades can help move our economy in the right direction. A key component of those upgrades should come from federal support for airport infrastructure improvements and the elimination of the AMT from interest earned on airport bonds.

I agree with some points made by Ken Orski and Pete Ruane. These project lists are being assembled hastily, and Congress does not appear to be scrutinizing them. This legislation needs to be crafted expeditiously but with a great deal of care, so as to avoid unintended consequences as Ken Orski notes. Pete Ruane has some good ideas for such accountability.

Regardless of the specific mechanism or mechanisms, national performance objectives which assure multiple payoffs including reduced oil dependence and pollution must be used as tools for screening project lists. Leaning on a single, thin "shovel-ready" criterion would yield boondoggles as well as useful projects, sure to spur another public backlash against pork.

In an op-ed in the The Wall Street Journal (December 10) , Reason Foundation's Robert Poole cites a sampling of the 11,391 "ready-to-go" infrastructure project requests that the country's mayors say they need to jumpstart the economy:
-Hercules, Calif., wants $2.5 million for a 'Waterfront Duck Pond Park,' and another $200,000 for a dog park.
-Euless, Texas, wants $15 million for the Midway Park Family Life Center, which includes a senior center and aquatic facility.
-Natchez, Miss., needs a new $9.5 million sports complex 'which would allow our city to host major regional and national sports tournaments.'
-Henderson, Nev., is asking for $20 million to help develop a 60 acre multi-use sports field complex.
-Brigham City, Utah, wants $15 million for a sports park.
-Arlington, Texas, needs $4 million to expand its tennis center.
-Miami, Fla., needs $15 million for a 'Moore Park Community Center, Tennis Center and Day Care' facility. The city also wants $3.6 million to build a covered basketball court and a new tennis court at Robert King High Park and $94 million for an Orange Bowl parking garage. -La Porte, Texas, wants $7.6 million for a 'Life Style Center.' - Oakland, Calif., needs $1 million for Fruitvale Latino Cultural and Performing Arts Center.
How do we prevent the stimulus program from becoming another poster child for wasteful spending on bridges-to-nowhere type earmarks masquerading as economic stimulus?

There are thousands of “ready to go” transit, highway, aviation, water, and other infrastructure projects worth tens of billions of dollars awaiting funding. Many of these projects could be initiated in the short run to preserve and create jobs and generate economic activity. So the U.S. Chamber believes that investment in ready-to-go projects should be a key component of any stimulus package.

There is no question that infrastructure investment supports jobs. It directly puts people to work in construction. At a time when unemployment in construction is higher than in any other sector of the economy - at 10.8 percent up from 6.1 percent a year ago - stimulus is critical. Infrastructure investment also supports jobs in manufacturing construction equipment, quarrying materials, design, engineering, planning and finance.

The best news is that when projects are done, infrastructure draws businesses to the location, inducing even more jobs. That’s just one way that infrastructure investment in the stimulus package will provide lasting economic benefits. The ultimate benefit of infrastructure investment, though, is in lasting assets.

Roads and rails, runways and waterways, fiber, pipelines, transmission lines and water pipes are the physical platform of our economy. Yet the U.S. has not kept pace with the demands of pressing economic, safety, energy and environmental needs in transportation, energy, water and broadband networks.W ith government budgets and public and private credit markets tightening, many planned infrastructure projects are being left without adequate funding and financing across the country, meaning the backlog of maintenance, repair and capital construction needs are growing.

Without investments in maintaining, modernizing and expanding these systems, the movement of people, goods, energy and information will be less safe, inefficient and unreliable.

Stimulus investment in ready-to-go projects to help states and communities address critical maintenance, modernization and expansion needs, as well as put people back to work in well-paying jobs and supporting key industries.

But the stimulus package will not lessen the urgency for Congress to act next year on the major legislative packages – including SAFTEA-LU, FAA and Water Resources authorization wills – that will contribute to economic recovery and underpin economic growth by reforming, refocusing and recapitalizing Federal transportation programs to addressing national goals.

Ultimately, through both stimulus and major legislation, coupled with state and local efforts and opening opportunities for private participation and investment we build a strong foundation for future economic growth.

It’s important to remember what the President-elect is trying to accomplish with these new infrastructure investments – stimulate new jobs and new economic growth. The best way to do that is to identify the kind of projects that can put people to work and get money flowing into the economy as quickly as possible.

Most states have projects that have already completed lengthy and thorough environmental reviews, have been permitted and are ready to go. In many cases these infrastructure projects have been identified as part of states’ long-term planning because they are most needed for reducing traffic congestion, improving safety and supporting economic development. Unlike the earmarked projects we hear about in the news, these projects are ready, needed in their communities and are most likely to deliver short-term jobs and long-term economic growth.

Because getting projects moving quickly is so vital, we also need to make sure that we don’t do anything that would needlessly decelerate timelines or escalate costs. Congress and the President-elect should avoid, for example, adding language that would require project labor agreements with any of these projects. Regardless of their merits, there is no question that requiring these agreements would force lengthy contract negotiations that would only delay the start of construction.

This isn’t a time for wish lists. It is a time to fund ready projects that will deliver real results. To be successful, the projects that get funded need to put some of the more than 770,000 construction workers who have lost their jobs over the past two years back to work. They need to start putting money into the economy now, not a year from now. And they need to deliver the kind of infrastructure improvements that will keep us competitive in the global market place for decades to come.

Climate change is the greatest environmental and energy challenge that America has ever faced. Now, we are also in the midst of what could turn out to be the greatest economic challenge we’ve ever faced. President-elect Obama and the leadership in Congress have made it clear that they see economic recovery and America’s transition to clean energy as two sides of the same coin.

I couldn’t agree more.

It is critical to consider our transportation sector an integral part of this clean energy economy. Transportation in the U.S. is responsible for 30 percent of our greenhouse gas pollution and nearly 70 percent of our oil consumption. We cannot solve our energy and climate challenges without addressing transportation and ensuring that it is far cleaner and more efficient.

With that in mind, at a press conference this morning, a number of environmental groups, including Friends of the Earth, released recommendations for a green recovery package that include nearly $60 billion in clean transportation projects that will put America back to work, save families money on transportation costs, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and other pollution, and cut oil consumption. This investment would also create 1.5 million new green jobs, and preserve 500,000 existing ones.

When crafting these recommendations, we relied on a few guiding principles:

1. Transparency and Accountability: First and foremost, it is critical that deficit spending on transportation programs is transparent and provides investments in infrastructure that is truly needed, and that advances President-elect Obama’s goals of job creation, energy independence, and climate change mitigation.
2. Reduce Greenhouse Gasses and Oil Consumption: The net effect of transportation spending should reduce the quantity of greenhouse gas pollution created by state and regional transportation systems.
3. Utilize the Power of Municipal Governments: Ample funds must be suballocated to regional planning agencies and local governments, which are responsible for sidewalks, transit stops, and local streets that make up the majority of the nation's road network.

With these principles in mind, our recommendations lay out two key components for transitioning to a greener transportation system through the economic recovery package. First, we must invest in a substantial expansion of efficient public transportation and other low-carbon transportation alternatives, such as biking and walking facilities, and passenger rail. These options not only offer more efficient travel choices for a variety of trips, but also promote more efficient development and land use patterns which reduce travel demand and further cut greenhouse gasses and oil consumption. We recommend an overall $34.1 billion investment in these areas.

Second, we must seriously begin to address the multi-billion dollar backlog of maintenance and rehabilitation needed throughout our entire transportation system - public transportation, roads, and bridges. Taking care of deferred maintenance and other rehabilitation can promote system efficiency and safety, as well as encouraging more efficient infill development. We recommend another $16 billion, split evenly between highway and transit projects for maintenance and rehabilitation.

Third, we recommend $4 billion in emergency service and operations grants to transit agencies. Transit providers across the country have been hurt by high summer gas prices, collapsing financing deals, and large drops in tax revenue, all while trying to accommodate record high ridership. Ensuring that these millions of transit riders have quality, accessible, and affordable service is key to retaining their patronage.

While there is much we can accomplish building clean transportation infrastructure, we must be careful to spend taxpayer money wisely, investing only in projects that will move the country forward economically and environmentally. We must insist on transparency, with a clear idea of which projects will move forward, so that we understand what we are investing in. Accountability is important to ensure that jobs are created, and that greenhouse gasses and oil consumption are reduced.

The need for transit expansion and infrastructure maintenance and rehabilitation is large enough that we should not spend any recovery funds on projects to expand roadway capacity. (There will be plenty of time to decide the appropriate level of roadway expansion in next year’s transportation debate.)

Expanding roads has been shown to increase oil consumption and greenhouse gasses, especially over the long term, which would take us backwards rather than move us toward true economic and environmental recovery. It would also add to our already staggering maintenance deficit. Additionally, more jobs are created with public transportation and roadway maintenance investments than with new roadway projects.

Following these principles and investing in truly clean transportation will go a long way towards moving money quickly into the economy to put America back to work, while also advancing America’s energy security and climate stability, giving us a true win-win.

President-elect Obama has made a hefty economic stimulus the first item on his legislative agenda and signaled that he wants a significant infrastructure component. How should the money for transportation infrastructure be distributed to maximize job creation in the short run while ensuring that the projects deliver the greatest benefit for the public? And who gets to decide which projects move first?

The need to invest in the nation’s deteriorating transportation infrastructure – roads, transit, airports, railways and waterways – existed well before the current economic downturn. Even in the best of times, the level of our transportation investment was insufficient to keep pace with population growth; and its focus was primarily highways. All states have large projects on the horizon related to reconstruction of the nation’s 50-year-old interstate system. In addition, we have a once-in-a-generation opportunity with the economic stimulus funds to put people back to work building the multi-modal transportation system we need to improve the mobility of people and freight in our nation and begin to restore our global economic competitiveness.

The states have identified ready-to-go projects in all transportation modes. At least 41 states are facing budget shortfalls, and in those states, transportation projects that were planned for the coming year could be delayed without a stimulus. While some projects require years of engineering and environmental analysis, the maintenance and repair of existing projects can be done quickly. States have identified some 5,000 ready-to-go projects worth $64 billion. These projects could support jobs for 1.8 million people within 180 days – jobs not only in the construction field, but also in manufacturing and technology. An even larger number of projects could begin construction within six months. Wisconsin has identified $300 million worth of such work. The Federal Highway Administration estimates that every $1.25 billion in transportation investment supports 35,000 jobs.

The U.S. Congress spent years developing the formulas through which transportation funds are currently distributed to the states. The quickest and fairest way to distribute stimulus funds for transportation projects would be through the existing federal formulas. Where formulas do not exist, it may be appropriate to distribute the funds to state departments of transportation based on the percentage of obligation authority provided to each state in the last federal transportation appropria­tions bill. These methods were proposed in the House and Senate stimulus bills. The state transport­ation departments are in the best position to administer the funds and to prioritize the projects that are in already their transportation plans, which were developed in cooperation with local and regional governments. I believe it is important that funding be provided in the most flexible way possible to state departments of transportation to be sure that projects can be on the ground in record time to provide the jobs we need to stimulate our economy.

How Should The Infrastructure Stimulus Be Spent?

While investing in highway and transit projects is a road to economic recovery and should be a key part of any stimulus package, simply throwing transportation dollars at the current crisis—unless done right—would be a critical mistake. Unfortunately, much of the public has come to equate the term “road” with another four-letter word: pork.

Every transportation dollar included in the stimulus package should be subjected to a strict review process. To that end, both the U.S. Department of Transportation Inspector General and the Government Accountability Office should be charged with conducting independent reviews and issuing timely public reports on how the funds are utilized, the types of projects they build and the time frame in which they are completed. These safeguards will ensure the investment of funds is entirely transparent and will demonstrate their social utility.

A top-level White House “czar,” with the full confidence and authority of the President, should also be appointed to work directly with relevant federal agencies and the governors in accelerating the delivery of worthy projects.

Projects such as road, bridgeand airport runway resurfacing; bridge inspections, repair, scraping and painting; intersection improvements; rail and transit infrastructure maintenance and upgrading; and safety investments in lighting and signage, can be done quickly.

A key to accelerating projects is to structure the flow of funds so that they can put the projects and people to work as quickly as possible. Imposing “use-it-or-lose-it” mechanisms that require states and local authorities to commit funds by a date certain is highly effective. In addition, the stimulus package should cover the full cost of the worthy projects and ensure these funds support real economic growth.

The construction industry and its materials and equipment suppliers have been hard hit by the economic downturn. About 20,000 highway and bridge workers lost their jobs in the last month alone. They are eager to get back to work. We have the capacity and expertise to take on additional work quickly, with the support of transportation agencies moving with a sense of urgency. And here’s the really good news. Unlike some other, transitory, stimulus initiatives, highway, bridge, transit and aviation capital investments create tangible assets that will provide public benefits and put America on the road to recovery for years to come.

In an historic first, President-elect Obama pledged that America’s leadership on climate change “will start with a federal cap and trade system. We will establish strong annual targets that set us on a course to reduce emissions to their 1990 levels by 2020 and reduce them an additional 80% by 2050.” His team is also moving fast with a stimulus package dedicated to “creating and saving 2.5 million jobs, jobs rebuilding our infrastructure, our roads, bridges, modernizing our schools and creating the clean energy infrastructure of the 21st century.”

The question is: will these two decisions end up pulling in the same direction? Will reckless stimulus investment threaten to undo the cap? Every road built in 2009 sets a carbon course for 2050. Every ton of carbon pumped into the atmosphere by road expansion has to be reduced somewhere else – from power plants, vehicle fuels, other industries. Other industries will pay the price if infrastructure runs wild.

Get the infrastructure right, and capping carbon will be easier. We’ll have a new generation of transit in the suburbs, green freight corridors at ports, efficient buildings, complete streets designed for walking, cycling, driving, and transit, and maybe even a new grid to bring electricity from solar and wind to our “smart” garages, to plug-in our (made-in-Detroit?) hybrids.

Would we give Detroit money to build new Hummer factories? No. Why give states DOTs a blank check to build more sprawl? Here’s an example of what’s at stake. The Inter-County Connector highway project in suburban metropolitan Washington, DC could be built one of two ways. Done in the traditional way with 6 lanes on a new right-of-way through parklands, transport GHG emissions will go up as more lanes breed more traffic. But manage existing motorways with congestion pricing that funds new Bus Rapid Transit would cut regional GHG emissions 11%. That’s more than we’d save on pollution if we shut off the state’s largest coal-fired power plant for a month a year.

Just as any bail-out of Detroit must push the car industry to greener technologies, the same must be true of infrastructure. Here are a few common-sense steps to get there.

1) Jobs and carbon together. The main screen for stimulus spending right now looks to be jobs. Add one more criterion: carbon pollution. Use the stimulus package as a big first step toward a permanent carbon screen to be built into the upcoming transportation bill.

2) Ask for and reward innovation. Cities across the country are trying to reinvent transit to fit the US landscape, from bus rapid transit to light rail. But many state DOTs are leaving these off their project lists in favor of more roads. Many proposals have been stalled by a federal funding and review process that retards transit while advancing roads. The incoming Administration should issue a call to the states and the cities for innovative transit and transport management projects.

3) Treat infrastructure repair and infrastructure expansion differently. Repair should move fast. Anything that results in new lanes or capacity needs a clear greenhouse-gas screen that pushes decisions toward high productivity investments incorporating bus or truck lanes, bike lanes, sidewalks, pricing and other operational improvements and rail. One solution would be to push funds out for repair early and fast, with a second slug of investment coming in later in 2009 to give states time to prepare GHG-reducing alternatives to the old-style concrete in their project pipelines.

4) Don’t forget freight. America's ports want to modernize and to cut pollution. The Port of Los Angeles, for example, has a plan to cut soot emissions 50% over five years, by switching out to clean trucks and inviting innovation in freight-handling technology. Here are some steps that could work right away:

• Put stimulus money into a vastly expanded clean truck program, to clean up and replace the old trucks serving America’s ports.
• Give ports resources to incubate clean technologies, so they can attract and create demand for clean trucks, clean construction equipment, clean ship technologies.
• Invest in and encourage projects to expand freight-rail and intermodal facilities. These are often run through separate agencies, distinct from state DOTs, or by the private sector. Don’t leave them out of the stimulus.

The bottom line is this: stimulus is climate policy. Don’t just shovel money at a bunch of bad projects, but make states and metro areas compete for the funds based on maximizing both jobs and pollution reduction. Make sure much of the money goes directly to local governments that can spend it on sidewalks, bike lanes, and local street and transit improvements that can create jobs quickly while boosting travel choices. The evidence is clear that transit investment creates more jobs and economic gain than standard road-building. The Obama Administration will need to provide strong leadership to ensure its climate and energy policies aren't smothered by the stimulus before they are even born.

AVIATION GROUPS SEND IMPORTANT JOINT MESSAGE

This week, some of us have discussed in this space the need to give serious consideration to investment in the aviation infrastructure as part of any economic stimulus package.

Now, twelve aviation groups have joined together to share this perspective with leaders in Congress. In a letter just sent to Capitol Hill, the groups suggest that if Congress were to include the aviation sector in its economic stimulus packages, more than 40,000 high-paying jobs would be created, aviation safety would be improved, and there would be positive effects for the environment, according to a coalition of aviation organizations.

We at AOPA are pleased to be among the group of twelve that signed this letter suggesting to Senate and House leaders that the industry’s proposals would, “not only achieve short term economic stimulus goals, but would also lead to long-term efficiencies and economic growth.”

The proposals would also improve environmental stewardship. “Very few government investments have the potential to positively influence two policy objectives at the same time. This is an investment we cannot afford to postpone,” the aviation industry said in the letter to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio).

Included in the industry proposals were more funds for airport construction and incentives to aircraft owners and airlines to install equipment to take full advantage of the NextGen air traffic control system. The group proposed some $3 billion be spent on NextGen infrastructure, which would reduce airline delays, improve aviation safety, and reduce emissions. Included in the proposal is some $2.5 billion to support aircraft equipage, including ADS-B (Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast) transceivers. That would “accelerate many of the economic and environmental benefits.”

“Approximately 20,000 aircraft could be equipped with this investment, generating at least 5,500 high-paying green jobs in the high-tech fields of civil aviation manufacturing, flight operations, maintenance and environment,” the letter noted.

The aviation organizations proposed that the current Airport Improvement Program (AIP) receive an additional $1 billion in funding. There are more than 5,000 public-use airports in the United States, but only about 500 have commercial service. General aviation airports are the transportation life-links for the majority of America’s communities.

There are improvement projects that would increase the utility and safety of these vital airports that could go to contract within 30 days if the money were available. The aviation groups predicated that this proposed infrastructure funding could create some 35,000 jobs.

Also proposed were changes in the tax code to make airport bonds more attractive to investors, providing more money for construction. The group also wants other changes that would help keep aircraft manufacturing production lines moving and encourage new research and development in the aviation industry.

While the aviation industry is feeling the current economic pain like everyone else, “all forecast point to robust growth in the civil aviation sector in the coming years,” the group said.

From the many fine comments and points of view expressed by expert contributors to the National Journal’s transportation blog, it is clear that many good options exist from which to craft a meaningful economic stimulus package. I am particularly pleased that key groups in the aviation sector came together to delineate how investment in our aviation infrastructure can pay dividends for generations.

A first class transportation system is measured not only by how quickly or easily you arrive at your destination but whether or not you arrive there safely. Although our nation’s highway system has created mobility opportunities that are the envy of the world it has resulted in a morbidity and mortality rate that is not a source of pride.

A major investment in transportation infrastructure is a top priority of President-elect Obama but so too is health care and the environment. Motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death and injury for all Americans between the ages of 3 and 33. In fact, over 42,000 deaths and 2.5 million injuries every year due to motor vehicle crashes at a conservative cost of more than $230 billion are a major drain on our economy and an unacceptable public health crisis. Little, if any, progress has been made in the past 15 years to seriously reduce highway deaths and injuries.

During the five-year authorization time frame of the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient, Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users (SAFETEA-LU), it is expected that more than 200,000 people will die on our highways and nearly 13 million more will be injured. This will occur despite the largest surface transportation investment in our nation’s history.

Transportation investments should simultaneously create jobs, protect the environment and advance safety. These are not incompatible goals and can be accomplished with sound and sensible investments.

We need to invest in today’s and tomorrow's infrastructure needs. Tuesday’s hearing on the domestic auto industry bailout held by the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming featured speakers representing entrepreneurs involved in the development of energy efficient vehicles. While the auto industry and others are racing to give consumers vehicles that operate using alternative energy sources like electricity there are concerns about whether or not our current transportation infrastructure can accommodate these vehicles. Questions about how and where consumers can access electricity to recharge battery-operated vehicles will be a major challenge and potential obstacle to consumer use unless significant planning and investments are underway now.

Identify infrastructure projects that encourage walking, biking and using transit. There is no question that getting people out of their cars promotes health and safety. Walking and biking contribute to an individual’s well being as well as reduce risk and exposure to motor vehicle crashes. That’s why safety groups like Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety support transit as well as pedestrian and bicycle transportation improvements. However, crossing the street to use transit, walking to the store or riding a bike to work should not be a death-defying act. We don’t want to trade our unacceptable motor vehicle death and injury toll with increased pedestrian and bicycle fatalities and injuries. Major investments and upgrades in roads and highways need to put a priority on the safety of both motorized and non-motorized transportation users sharing the same road.

Bridges are a high priority. There are many bridges in the U.S. that are structurally deficient and have been posted for lower weights or even have been closed. In the case of bridges posted for lower weights, trucks carrying illegally overweight loads regularly violate the lower weight postings, thereby dramatically accelerating bridge deterioration while increasing the chances of catastrophic bridge collapses. Posted bridges also frequently cause diversion of heavy truck freight traffic, resulting in far longer trips that increase crash risk exposure, including placing these large commercial motor vehicles on lower-class roads that are well-known to have higher crash rates than facilities with better design quality. Although the entire U.S. system of streets and highways arguably is badly deteriorated, the most crucial design feature of these roads is safe bridges that meet the needs of traffic demand both current and projected volumes and vehicle mixes. In many cases, extra lanes have been squeezed in on existing bridges by narrowing travel lanes across these bridges or by converting bridge shoulders into travel lanes. Both actions seriously jeopardize safety.

We need to achieve parity for rail passenger and freight transportation. Abandonment of rail right-of-way has accelerated over the past half-century to the point where only a few national rail systems still exist, while most short-haul rail companies and track systems have disappeared. A sea change in traditional infrastructure funding philosophy is badly needed, as was indicated in the recent congressionally mandated report, Transportation for Tomorrow. The benefits of a renewed, robust national rail system to move people and freight are obvious: they include the much higher fuel efficiency of rail transport in the use of carbon-based fuels, reduced emissions, and significant displacement of freight and personal transportation from our highways to the rail system. That displacement will result in lower highway crash deaths and injuries, as well as substantially reducing the constant pressure on both states and the federal government to build and reconstruct more and more miles of highways.

Accelerated highway construction cannot shortchange safety. Drastically accelerating highway and bridge projects both to enhance surface transportation efficiency in the short term while adding many badly needed jobs to a struggling economy can produce demands at all levels of government as well as in the private sector to dismiss or abbreviate important safeguards in the project approval process, including environmental impact assessments, right-of-way procurement, and even in fundamental geometric and cross-section design features that are necessary for ensuring enhanced highway safety. Federal and state governments and Congress must resist the temptation.

Lives and dollars must be protected. Our new government must also reject demands from the trucking industry for longer, heavier trucks. Bigger trucks mean bigger damage and more deaths and injuries. Allowing overweight trucks would accelerate the deterioration of the very highways and bridges that would be constructed with a renewed national surface infrastructure initiative. This includes opposing efforts to create national freight corridors to carry heavier trucks and to allow the trucking industry, in effect, to continue to be subsidized by the owners of passenger motor vehicles while substantially underpaying their fair share of highway and bridge use and destruction.

Our quality of life depends on a transportation system that is safe, reliable, economical and environmentally sound. Every day 117 people are killed on our nation’s streets and highways and 7,000 more are injured. Transportation projects that reduce deaths and injuries and promote the health and safety of our nation and the environment will deliver the greatest benefit to the public.

Congress and the Obama administration should commit at least $50 billion of a stimulus package to highway and bridge improvements - $25 billion a year for two years. The funds should be distributed by the existing SAFETEA-LU formula, because any attempt to select projects from Washington, D.C., would surely get bogged down in bureaucratic processes that would delay putting these funds to work. The first-year funds should be redistributed if not under contract within 180 days. The second-year funds should be directed to projects of more substance, but those projects should also be under contract by the end of fiscal year 2009. An additional $20 billion should be committed to multimodal transportation. Ultimately, the states should be held accountable for the quick distribution of these funds by having to return any proceeds not expended within 24 months of contract.

Commercial aviation is a vital component of the economic energy of the United States. It is the nation’s circulatory system and is absolutely linked to a strong economy. According to recent Federal Aviation Administration data (2006), commercial aviation drives 5.2 percent of GDP and it ultimately supports more than 10 million jobs. Because of the fuel price situation of this past year, the airlines have taken the difficult steps to adjust their business models and are as well positioned as they can be to deal with the economic turbulence we are all experiencing. The airlines are not approaching the idea of stimulus spending by looking for a handout from the government, but we do firmly believe that in order to help jump-start the economy, our track record as a “jobs multiplier” and our essential role in moving people, goods and services efficiently, makes a strong case for wise, strategic investments.

Where and how those investments might be made ultimately will be up to Congress and the Obama administration, but we know that new air traffic management technology could bring tremendous savings in lost productive time for the national economy and, perhaps even more importantly, tremendous environmental gains. Investment in alternative fuels development for aviation, could give the United States the leadership role in an emerging green technology while furthering energy independence. Investment in high-energy efficiency upgrades for our nation’s airports could produce model programs in key transport hubs, where the benefits of these types of improvements can be dramatically demonstrated. We believe these are exactly the type of forward-thinking, “green job,” high-return, new-technology investments that President-elect Obama is looking for, and we look forward to working with his administration to help, quite literally, move our nation’s economy.

The President-elect has wisely decided that while infrastructure projects are a crucial part of stimulating the economy, it is just as important to target projects intelligently to ensure both short-term economic and long-term transportation benefits for the nation. Otherwise, money will be wasted on work that will fail to meet one or both goals. "Stimulus to nowhere" work won't serve citizens.

The stimulus package must focus on infrastructure projects that meet common-sense criteria: the projects must be "shovel-ready," that is, have their environmental and other approvals essentially finsihed. Preliminary engineering also must be complete. These A+ projects also should have their local funding share committed, so that an injection of federal funds is all that is needed to move forward.

Projects that fulfill these basic criteria don't just offer the advantage of being able to create jobs quickly. These projects also have been tested and found worthy from a planning, environmental and public benefit standpoint, because they've already completed the federal NEPA process and they have passed the rigorous reviews necessary to obtain local funding. In a sense, such projects have already passed their "background checks," and are cleared to go to work.

Dozens of projects around America can meet these basic guidelines, including, here in the New Jersey-New York metropolitan region, with our own initiative to relieve commuter rail congestion by building a new rail tunnel under the Hudson River.

The fear that a stimulus package could end up wasting taxpayer dollars is legitimate. But that's no reason for Congress to drag its feet. With proper vetting, America can have its stimulus and worthy infrastructure improvements to the transportation system, too.

Members of Congress and the new administration are currently debating a recovery plan that could direct hundreds of billions of dollars towards infrastructure to help put Americans back to work and get our economy moving by rebuilding our roads, bridges, and mass transit systems. Though state governments have tremendous outstanding investment needs, any infrastructure investments included in a recovery bill need to focus on investments that secure the existing system and help transition to a clean, efficient, energy-independent future—creating millions of green jobs and job opportunities for the under-employed in the process. There are three core recommendations:

1. Fix what is broken and build out green infrastructure

• Stimulus funds for the highway and road network should be restricted to rehabilitation and maintenance projects only. States should be given the option of flexibly transferring funds to ready-to-go transit initiatives, non-motorized initiatives, and projects that result in less driving. Reducing vehicle miles travelled will help the nation achieve its energy independence goals, as transportation contributes one-third of the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions and is the fastest growing contributor to our carbon footprint.
• To ensure we have the human capital to rebuild our nation's infrastructure, a portion of funds for each project should be set-aside for job training programs, particularly those in partnership with community colleges or trade unions. Such programs can help stabilize low income communities and provide a pathway to good, decent jobs.
• To support new capacity in fast-growing areas, the economic stimulus should include new transit expansions and projects that contribute to a clean, efficient, energy-independent future. Specifically, any pending project meeting statutory criteria seeking New Starts and Small Starts funding (section 5309) and approval should be eligible for economic stimulus funding. Over $16 billion worth of new transit capital investments could move from planning to contracts and construction in the next year ($4 billion in 90 days) if additional federal funding and contingent commitment authority were provided, and the federal review process expedited by the incoming administration. For purposes of the economic recovery, operating assistance to local transit providers is also urgent and essential.

2. Ensure states, metropolitan areas, and localities have a role in programming funds

• The mechanism for distributing the transportation infrastructure stimulus funds should be the existing Surface Transportation Program (STP). This would ensure that, in addition to the guaranteed share of STP funds reserved for the states, local officials and metropolitan areas within the states would receive a balance of the funds based on population, as federal law has provided since 1991.
• For the purposes of the stimulus package, this would mean about one-third of STP funds are "suballocated" to metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs). This process of targeting funds specifically for urbanized, or metropolitan, areas is referred to as suballocation since the federal funds are allocated below the level of the state departments of transportation (DOTs)—the traditional recipient for such funding. The state administers the funds for the other areas. Although the suballocated funds are directed to urbanized areas, federal law directs local officials to work through MPOs in their use.
• Current provisions that allow for STP funds to be used for Transportation Enhancements should also be allowed.

3. Demand transparency and accessible information

• Once the stimulus package is approved, states and metropolitan areas should quickly turn around a specific list of which projects will be funded. The list should be released publicly in a transparent and accessible manner. To the greatest extent practicable, disclosures should take advantage of recent advances in geographic information systems to provide citizens with easy-to-read state and regional maps that lay out core highway and transit investments.
• The federal government should require state and local metropolitan transportation agencies to maintain information systems that measure the impact of these projects in meeting the goals of the stimulus. This should include indicators such as jobs created, cost-effectiveness, carbon emissions, fuel use and fuel economy, safety, and demand forecasting.
• Funds should be tied to performance measures that evaluate whether their proposed use is likely to enhance economic growth in the long-term. Then the federal government should track these funds to find out whether they actually accomplished what they predicted.
• To ensure this is not an unfunded mandate, for every billion dollars invested in infrastructure, one-half of one percent should be allocated for data-collection, analysis and reporting

In order to revive the economy, President-elect Obama has proposed to create "the single largest new investment in our national infrastructure since the creation of the Interstate highway system in the 1950s". Promising strict "use it or lose it" rules to govern spending, he said "we won’t just throw money at the problem. We’ll measure progress by the reforms we make and the results we achieve — by the jobs we create, by the energy we save..." The transportation community greeted the announcement with enthusiasm. The American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) announced that more than 5,000 highway and bridge projects worth $64 billion could be under contract within six months as money became available. The nation’s Governors, meeting with Mr. Obama in Philadelphia, estimated there were 136 billion worth of "ready-to-go" infrastructure projects eligible for inclusion in the stimulus bill. Not to be outdone, the nation’s mayors released a report saying there are 11,391 infrastructure projects in 427 cities requiring a $73 billion investment. Transit officials, for their part, identified 736 projects valued at $12.2 billion as ready for inclusion in the stimulus bill. At this point there is no information regarding the specific nature of these projects.

In any event, the transportation community’s optimistic expectations are likely to be only partially fulfilled. Its wish list of projects will be competing with a number of other public works initiatives. They include renovating school buildings, upgrading the existing electrical power grid, retrofitting public buildings to make them more energy efficient and enhancing broadband access to the internet.

What criteria should guide the allocation of funds dedicated to transportation? Who gets to decide what gets funded and who should be the recipients? These questions were the subject of a panel discussion at the Transportation Finance Summit held by the International Bridge, Tunnel and Turnpike Association (IBTTA) in Washington DC. On December 8 (The Panel consisted of Karen Hedlund (Nossaman, LLP), Moderator, Robert Atkinson (Information Technology and Innovation Foundation), Emil Frankel (Bipartisan Policy Center), Jordi Graells (Abertis), Frank McArdle (member, Transportation Policy & Revenue Commission) and Robert Puentes (Brookings).

Panel members agreed that, given Mr. Obama’s objectives to put people to work and get money out the door quickly, the transportation funds will be inevitably focused on mundane projects that local jurisdictions have shelved for want of funds. Money will be spent on road resurfacing, bridge repair, bus purchases and other system preservation type activities. This was also the conclusion of the Bipartisan Policy Center’s (BPC) National Transportation Policy Project. In a December 9 statement, the BPC said, "Experience has shown that projects that focus on improving the operations of existing transportation system are often those that can be undertaken most quickly and can bring the greatest returns in terms of creating immediate construction jobs."

I agree with the IBTTA’s panel’s final conclusion that "money should be spent wisely even as we try to create jobs." Or, to use House Minority Leader John Boechner’s (R-OH) words, the money should not be used for "pork barrel spending masquerading as economic stimulus."

We do not know yet how the stimulus legislation will be structured. Assuming that the portion of stimulus funds dedicated to transportation will be allocated to the Department of Transportation for distribution to eligible recipients, the Secretary of Transportation will need to make some quick decisions concerning program implementation since a timely distribution of the funds will be of the essence. Given the expected large number of applicants, the quickest way to distribute the funds to their intended recipients will be by a formula allocation with a requirement that the recipients must evaluate and report on how well the projects they selected have achieved the stipulated goals.

The Obama stimulus proposal inevitably brings to mind Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal initiative, the Work Projects Administration (WPA). Like the economic stimulus bill, putting people to work was WPA’s primary objective. During its existence, the WPA provided almost eight million jobs. However, there is an important distinction between the two initiatives. The economic stimulus bill is intended to revive the economy on an accelerated basis. WPA was a longer-term program (1933-42) and as such was able not only to create jobs but also to contribute some impressive additions to the nation’s infrastructure. The WPA program built roads, bridges, airports, parks, courthouses, schools and hospitals. It enriched the physical landscape of America through some imaginative projects such as the Blue Ridge Parkway and San Antonio’s River Walk. In the words of author Nick Taylor, WPA "gave the country a new infrastructure to go with the new century."

In our haste to produce jobs, we shall regrettably sacrifice an opportunity to do what WPA did 70 years ago: pursue a larger vision, make a more lasting contribution to the nation’s physical plant and build a foundation for growth that will last far into the future.

Barry Holiday, chairman of the Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund Fairness Coalition and technical director of the Dredging Contractors of America, sent me the following comments that I thought everyone would find interesting. I do not take positions on any of the subjects discussed here; I am simply posting Mr. Holliday's unedited comments in my role as neutral moderator of this blog. -- Lisa

Barry Holliday, Chairman, Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund Fairness Coalition

It is very troubling that almost without exception, nearly every article, quote, or discussion of our transportation system neglects to mention or acknowledge our Marine Transportation System. Yet, our ports and harbors are gateways to domestic and international trade, connecting the United States to the world. Because of the Nation’s port system, food grown by Iowa farmers reaches tables in Japan and Russia. Manufacturers in Texas can sell goods and services profitably to foreign countries and supply food for peace. Appalachian and Midwest coal moves through coastal ports to power plants domestically and around the world, providing the fuel to heat and light homes, businesses, and cities.

Whether products are arriving at our shores or departing for foreign sale, trade relies on an efficiently operating U.S. port system. Without exception, ports are critical to every State in the Nation. On average, each of our 50 States relies on 13 to 15 ports to handle its imports and exports, which add up to more than $5.5 billion worth of goods moving in and out of U.S. ports every day. Responsible for moving more than 99 percent of the country’s overseas cargo, U.S. ports and waterways handle more than 2.5 billion tons of domestic and international trade annually, and that volume is projected to double within the next 15 years — particularly after the expansion of the Panama Canal. International trade is responsible for 25 percent of the U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Along with meeting the demands of international trade, ports are busy with a sustained surge in cruise travel. Cruises depart from 43 ports in North America with a positive economic impact in all 50 States, since over 79 percent of cruise industry expenditures are made with U.S. businesses, including airlines, travel agents, food and beverage distributors, and ship maintenance and refurbishing. On the Great Lakes, enormous quantities of raw materials that move by vessel are used to power major cities, make steel, and build roads.

Equally, or more important, is the National Defense support that our Nation’s ports provide. The U.S. military depends on numerous ports that have agreements with the Federal Government to serve as bases of operation and to deploy troops and equipment during national emergencies. Today, this role is more important than ever, given the current climate of persistent threats around the globe coupled with the closure in recent years of U.S. military terminals.

Port-related jobs are critical to augment our economy. Direct and indirect jobs generated by ports result in the employment of more than 8 million Americans who earned and spent $314.5 billion in 2006. Every $1 billion in exports alone creates an estimated 15,000 new jobs. In Texas alone one in every four jobs is linked to trade.

America’s deep-draft navigation system is at a crossroad, with a future that can be bright or bleak. The ability of the Marine Transportation System to support the Nation’s continued growth in trade and the defense of our Nation hinges on much-needed Federal attention to unresolved funding needs that are derailing critical channel maintenance and deep-draft construction projects of the water highways to our ports. Because most ports do not have naturally deep harbors, they must be regularly dredged to allow ships to move safely through Federal navigation channels. Also, as modern vessels increase in size, navigation channel depths must increase accordingly if we are to continue to be a player on the international marketplace.

A recent U.S. Army Corps of Engineers study reports that almost 30 percent of the 95,550 vessel calls at U.S. ports are constrained due to inadequate channel depths. Another Corps report states that the 59 largest deep-draft ports in the United States had only half of their channel width available at the authorized project depth for only 38% of the year in 2005, 35% of the year in 2006, and only 32% of the year in 2007. As the world’s fleets turn to larger ships to more efficiently carry their cargoes, the capability of our Federally-maintained navigation channels to accommodate those vessels is shrinking.

Without an adequate navigation channel, nothing else comes into play for a port. Attracting new customers, dealing with labor issues, environmental concerns, and public interests all go away, because without a properly-dredged channel, business goes away. Public ports are at a critical stage in keeping their channels open for business. We are losing existing business and potential new business to ports outside of the United States — and once lost, it is rarely regained.

Dredging can literally make or break the maritime industry, and a lack of dredging is an issue throughout the United States. On the Great Lakes, decades of inadequate funding for dredging have left a backlog of 18 million cubic yards of sediment blocking navigation channels. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers estimates removing that backlog will cost more than $230 million on the Great Lakes alone. In some cases, ports on the Great Lakes have actually shut down due to inadequate dredging. There are similar examples of dredging problems in ports and harbors on all coasts of our Nation.

In many cases, vessels must “load light” because of dredging shortfalls. Light-loading because of inadequate dredging impacts everyone. A ship that is light-loaded reduces its efficiencies in the same way that a commercial airplane that is required to set aside seats with no passengers would quickly lose its efficiencies.

The Harbor Maintenance Tax (HMT) and the Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund (HMTF) were established in the Water Resources Development Act (WRDA) of 1986. The HMT applies a 0.125 percent ad valorem tax on the value of commercial cargo on vessels using Federally-maintained navigation channels and HMT revenue is deposited into the HMTF. The tax is only assessed on imports and domestic cargo, as it was ruled as an unconstitutional assessment on exports in 1998 by the Supreme Court. The HMTF was authorized to reimburse 100 percent of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for its eligible Operations and Maintenance (O&M) expenditures for commercial navigation, along with 100 percent of the O&M cost of the St. Lawrence Seaway, certain costs of NOAA, and the costs to Customs to collect the tax.

HMTF revenues exceed transfers for authorized activities by an increasing margin. Yet, Federal navigation channels are not being maintained at authorized depths. The Fund is being held hostage to paper balance the budget – interestingly, not one of its legal uses. In 2007, the HMTF began with a $3.3 billion surplus and netted an additional $1.4 billion – resulting in a $4.7 billion surplus, while only $751 million was used for maintenance dredging.

Don’t let gridlock take hold of our maritime transportation system. As supported by the Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund Fairness Coalition (see www.ramphmtf.org), the next transportation authorization bill must ensure that all of the annual HMT revenues are used for their intended purpose: operation and maintenance of Federal ports and harbors.

I applaud President-elect Obama's commitment to investment in transportation infrastructure as a critical component to economic recovery. Focusing on the nation's infrastructure will not only bring immediate benefits in terms of creating millions of jobs, it will yield long-term benefits in the form of expanded capacity to move both freight and people.

With demand for freight transportation expected to double over the next 30 years, freight rail investment will be critical to keeping America’s economy moving without clogging our highways. Freight rail should be included in any infrastructure stimulus package for the following reasons:

Freight rail projects get underway much more quickly
Unlike highways and other public works projects, which can take years to plan and begin – and even longer to actually build – freight rail projects get underway much more quickly, often within a matter of months.

Rail investment will deliver tangible economic relief - JOBS
Freight rail investment would deliver the tangible economic relief that our citizens need: new jobs – an estimated 20,000 jobs nationwide for every $1 billion of new rail investment.

Rail investment helps ensure that our nation remains globally competitive
A rail infrastructure component in the stimulus bill would accelerate rail projects that would improve the ability of our nation’s farms, coal mines, chemical factories and other companies to move their goods to domestic and global markets.

Freight rail is GREEN
Many of the comments below mention a "green" infrastructure stimulus plan. I couldn't agree more. In addition to easing highway congestion, increased rail capacity also helps the environment. Freight trains are at least four times more fuel efficient than trucks, and can move one ton of freight 436 miles on a single gallon of fuel.

Freight rail investment is good for the economy now, will help our country grow in the future and will benefit our environment for decades to come; it should be a critical component of the infrastructure stimulus.

First and foremost, this money must stay in the United States—a new “buy American" program. The stimulus must show immediate results. The first wave should fund “ready-to-go” infrastructure projects, those that can get people working in 60-90 days.

The full capacity of our U.S. engineering and construction industries needs to be tapped to make this happen—construction organizations, governmental oversight and private sector program management, inspection and design. Until all resources are exhausted, the money should continue to flow.

Prudent application of stimulus funds offers a triple win:

• Use the money for projects that have a direct, demonstrated benefit to the rebuilding of this country by maximizing jobs, repairing critical infrastructure, building new infrastructure that can be proven to enhance competitiveness, improving education and quality of life, and providing that products necessary to these efforts are manufactured domestically.
• Use some of the money to make the effort sustainable by assuring the construction pipeline is full. This can be done by funding the planning and design of projects to be ready for construction in 2010 and beyond.
• Funnel some of the stimulus money into an initiative that encourages increasing technical capacity in the U.S. through improving job prospects for engineers and scientists, and a program to train workers to be technicians and skilled labor in the construction industry. A program that retrains the American workforce can provide long lasting results.

How to Spend the Stimulus Bill

John Porcari is right. There will be plenty of time in the coming months to debate the outlines of the surface authorization's policy and funding architecture that will guide our policy over the next few years. Last week's post was heartening in the degree of consensus about including national priorities such as contributing to energy security, reducing transportation's carbon footprint, improving planning and finally having an intermodal transportation policy that lives up to ISTEA's promises and our future challenges. While there was agreement on many of the principles, there undoubtedly will be many debates on how those principles take life in a new surface authorization. This will make the development of a consensus, always important for a ground-breaking bill, very challenging.

But right now the task is to put people to work and jump-start the faltering economy. This cannot wait for the debate to come. Projects ready-to-go should be given priority. That means fixing our roads and bridges which have been neglected even in the aftermath of the Minneapolis bridge collapse. It definitely means providing assistance to local public transportation authorities to construct extensions, add new lines, and put out to bid proposals for buses, train cars, and other capital equipment. Here some acceleration of the normal FTA review process is required.

Craig Fuller is right as well. The nation's airports have many capacity and safety projects that are ready to go. We made the mistake of not using a lull in traffic in 2001-2003 to invest for the future. It is time not to make that mistake again. Similarly, if the FAA has air traffic control towers and other projects that are in the queue, let's accelerate them.

What we should not do is use stimulus to somehow truncate the environmental review process. The consideration of alternatives contributes to building good projects (in every sense of the term) and is one of the defenses against "bridges to nowhere."

Use the policy and funding architecture we have now to get projects moving. Debate and deliberate the rest of the year about new priorities for the upcoming, multi-year surface authorization effort.

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President-elect Obama is correct to liken an infrastructure stimulus to Eisenhower’s historic initiative to create the Interstate Highway system. That endeavor set the patterns for America’s car-dominated transportation network and suburban growth throughout the second half of the twentieth century. The coming stimulus similarly presents a tremendous opportunity to advance transportation goals for the twenty-first century.

It is critically important how infrastructure stimulus money gets spent. It is not enough to simply spend money. Nor should Congress assume that more transportation is always better. As many have pointed out, America’s transportation system isn’t just broke; it’s also broken. In fact, transportation contributes to many of America’s most pressing problems. Consider:

• Each year Americans waste billions of dollars and millions of hours stuck in traffic – a problem that is often made worse by construction of new highways.
• Our transportation system is also the chief source of our nation’s addition to oil, consuming two our of every three barrels, and leaving our nation vulnerable to volatile prices and hostile foreign regimes.
• Cars and trucks are the biggest end-user source of global warming pollution. We will not succeed in reducing these emissions unless we allow Americans to reduce the number of miles they drive.
• Finally, too many transportation projects like Alaska’s infamous “Bridge to Nowhere” have been embarrassing boondoggles that erode confidence in government and divert dollars from more productive uses.

Clearly, not every infrastructure dollar is equally good for the public interest. As state Departments of Transportation eagerly offer lists of favored projects, how should Congress and the Obama administration decide?

There needs to be a commitment to spend for results rather than simply to inject dollars. The reason that there is such wide consensus that our national transportation system is dysfunctional is because the current system primarily collects gas taxes from the states and then pumps those dollars back based on outdated formulas forged by political compromises that had nothing to do with achieving national goals. For decades, the federal government has spent billions of dollars on highway projects with little evaluation and no accountability. That must change. Spending is not based on allocating dollars where they will yield the greatest results. There are not even clear goals for what the transportation system should accomplish.

Thus the next Congress should

should spend taxpayers’ money more wisely by focusing transportation dollars on solving our nation’s biggest problems. Federal transportation money should be spent only on projects that produce real results over the long haul – for example, by reducing our dependence on oil, curbing global warming pollution, alleviating congestion, improving safety, and supporting healthy, sustainable communities.

A rough guide for what that change looks like can likened to the difference between the early Detroit bailout requests and the emerging counter proposals. Rather than simply throw more money toward continuing failure, the emerging consensus seems to be that funds most go toward a fundamental shift in the business model and in the mix of vehicles that get produced. No less substantive change should be demanded from a stimulus package for our dysfunctional transportation system.

As part of ensuring accountability, state DOTs should report on the results of how transportation stimulus money gets spent. That sounds like common sense but it would actually be a major shift from the current system. States should report back on the extent to which the projects funded with stimulus money increased or decreased jobs, energy security, carbon dioxide emissions, vehicle miles traveled. Perhaps the second installment of a two-year package would be allocated according to how well states advance national goals with the first installment.

Other priorities for spending transportation stimulus should also advance the nation toward future goals. Emphasis should be placed on expanding clean, efficient transportation choices for Americans by prioritizing investment of new funds for light rail, commuter rail, rapid bus service, high-speed intercity rail and other forms of modern public transportation. At least as much money should be allocated to these transportation choices as to roads and highways. In doing so, federal policy will encourage transportation investments that build dynamic and accessible communities, where more Americans can walk, bike or take transit to get where they need to go. Meanwhile stimulus money allocated to roads and bridges must prioritize "fixing it first." Investment should go to maintenance and repair of America's crumbling bridges, not massive new highway expansions.

The United States Public Interest Research Group (U.S. PIRG) has signed up growing support for these basic principles from over 100 public officials from state, local, and federal government as well as other civic leaders. To see a list of the principles and signatories see: http://www.uspirg.org/issues/transportation/more-and-better-transit/transportation-principles-signers

To see more about U.S. PIRG’s positions and reports on transportation, see: http://www.uspirg.org/issues/transportation

For an in-depth report on America’s transportation challenges and solutions, see: http://www.uspirg.org/uploads/2q/fV/2qfVu2ZrflTk-TnRQEDdDw/A-Better-Way-to-Go-vUSPIRG.pdf

There is no question that America’s infrastructure needs serious attention. There is also much to be gained by dedicating portions of a stimulus package to infrastructure investments. It is my hope that some of the resources dedicated to the infrastructure stimulus package will be directed towards meeting significant aviation needs.

There are many projects approved and ready for investment at the more than 5,000 public use airports throughout the country. Commercial airlines utilize about 600 of these airports while general aviation provides services to virtually all public airports. Enhancing the capabilities of our nation’s airports would not only create thousands of jobs, it would also leverage the investment as new economic activities would be created.

There are also significant opportunities to enhance satellite based navigation systems. Investment in the next generation air traffic control systems (NextGen) should also be viewed as an important infrastructure opportunity.

Investing in the aviation infrastructure will put people to work, help local communities across the country and encourage additional economic investment.

News accounts say this will be a package with hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars in infrastructure spending that some say will rival the Interstate Highway System. Recently, we've seen two packages make their way through Congress, the financial industry bailout and the auto company bailout (still pending).

The latter has really put the recipients through the paces, ensuring a commitment to, and a business plan for, what the President-Elect has called a "sustainable" industry. He also said automakers must "adapt to these new circumstances," referring among other things to a marketplace that values fuel economy.

This is all well and good, and neither Congress nor he should apply a double-standard to the stimulus package. States must not receive a blank check.

Instead recipients (states with the concurrence of metropolitan areas) should be required to submit plans and project lists that show a commitment to, and plan for, putting the nation on a competitive footing in what NYT columnist Tom Friedman calls "the energy climate era." States with the best-performing plans and lists would receive the most funding.

Overall, the package should be split 50-50 between highway/road and low-carbon, oil-saving mobility projects (rail, bus, bike, etc.). This is underscored by the news out today: Transit ridership is up six percent in the third quarter while driving is down for the 11th month in a row. Strapped transit agencies need help meeting demand, and expanded public transportation options will serve us well in the future.

As a matter of policy, states should have easy access to assistance for repair or maintenance. This is the "fix-it-first" priority that Secretary Porcari mentions in his comment. It makes sense to expedite deployment of assistance for repairs since more than half of miles driven happen on pavement that isn't "good ride quality" and more than a quarter of bridges are structurally deficient or functionally obsolete. On the other hand, an eligibility test based on job creation, oil savings, and global warming pollution should be applied to investments in new capacity.

Let's get money out the door quickly, while ensuring smart, no-regrets investment of taxpayer dollars by tying reasonable strings to them.

For an economic recovery plan to be effecitive, it must move quickly to first preserve the jobs that remain, and hopefully create more jobs. This argues for two approaches: 1) Utilize existing federal programs and formulas, and; 2) focus on system preservation projects.

The existing federal programs and formulas are well known and understood (though not necessarily fair to those of us that are "donor" states). Getting projects out the door is the highest priority, and this is the fastest way to do it. And focusing on system preservation-- "fix it first"-- is the right priority, and avoids a state versus local (or regional) fight.

In Maryland, the project planning process begins with local priority lists. We have a collabrative process in determining project priorities. In the case of system preservation projects, these priorities are straightforward. They are then approved through the Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs), so they have already had extensive public input.

The reality is that most, if not all, of the states have more system preservation projects today than are likely to be funded. These investments in bridges, rail transit, highway rebuildng and bus replacement will preserve and create jobs not just in our states, but in regions where the materials, vehicles and supplies are produced.

It is imperative that any economic recovery package contain regionally strategic infrastructure investments that maintain a strong focus on the priorities of local communities, act in partnership with regional planning organizations, and provide transparency in the process. The National Association of Regional Councils (NARC) released a report documenting at minimum $23 billion in transportation and wastewater infrastructure investment needed on the regional and local level as offered by Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs), regional Councils of Governments (COGs) and Rural Planning Organizations (RPOs) in urban, suburban and rural America. If funded, these projects could immediately begin to create jobs, strengthen communities, stimulate local, regional and national economies and lay the foundation for long-term economic growth.

Our member regions, as studied by NARC, face severe underinvestment as needs outstrip our ability to fund critical infrastructure. Urban and rural America are sitting on billions of dollars of unfunded, dormant infrastructure projects. To date, the regional planning organization of which I am a policy Board Member, the Mid-America Regional Council (MARC), has identified nearly $400 million worth of ready-to-go, job generating infrastructure improvements that would address congestion, create more pedestrian-friendly communities, and lessen the impact of the recession. In my region, the Kansas City bi-state region straddling the Missouri and Kansas statelines, approximately 4,000 jobs have been lost since the mid-2008 and projections for job loss are currently between 11,000 and 30,000 depending on the length of the recession and create family-wage jobs.

Infrastructure dollars are best utilized on the regional level through consensus building and planning efforts of local governments working collaboratively across multiple jurisdictions to meet the needs of communities, business and local, regional and national economies.  Regional planning organizations are today’s “boots on the ground” planners and implementers of tomorrow’s regional infrastructure. They have identified thousands of priority "ready-to-go" regional projects that would address the most pressing community issues – safety, preservation, and maintenance – and maintain and generate jobs, but have been shelved due funding limitations. These projects have gone through rigorous decision-making processes by way of local elected involvement in their regional planning organizations, are part of fiscally constrained plans and represent a piece of the overall economic vision for the region.

If the federal government wishes to be part of a unified solution tomorrow, federal leadership must be at the table today. A good way to begin reversing this trend is through the passage of a comprehensive economic recovery package.

A strong federal partner, decisive federal leadership and federal investment are needed now to help make safe and secure infrastructure a reality. When the federal government commits a percentage of economic recovery dollars to local governments, action will be taken immediately, focusing on the needs of communities – urban and rural. NARC believes the most effective application of federal transportation infrastructure investment is through the current framework and mechanism guaranteeing that local and regional needs are addressed, the Surface Transportation Program (STP). This proven and successful mechanism must be preserved in any economic recovery legislation. Regional planning is essential to the construction of infrastructure to move people, goods and services across our surface transportation network, continually bolstering our economy, and the STP guarantees the flexibility of transportation funding will be given directly to our local officials and regions. Through STP, upwards of 30 percent of funding would be sent to the 50 states. The remaining 70 percent would go to cities, counties and regions – which accounts for 90 percent of the nation’s gross domestic product.

In the case of water and wastewater funding, NARC believes that the economic recovery package should examine issuing grant funding (not subject to a local match) to local governments and regional planning organizations through the Clean Water State Revolving Fund process.

By allocating money to local governments through established and proven processes, local governments will be able to permit contracts, work with public works departments and companies to retain employees and staff-up, and ensure people are put to work on projects communities need to be safe and prosper. The proof is in the job creation numbers – the U.S. Department of Transportation estimates that for every $1 billion invested in transportation by the federal government, 34,779 jobs are created; the National Utility Contractors Association estimates that for every $1 billion spent on water infrastructure 57,400 jobs are created; and, the National Resources Defense Councils estimates that a $100 billion initial investment in clean energy infrastructure will yield two million jobs over two years.

Significant infrastructure attention and funding at all levels of government is required to improve safety, the environment, interconnectivity and commerce and, as such, NARC supports the willingness of our Congressional leaders and the President-Elect to find real solutions to these challenges as a necessary step in defining a commitment to upgrading our infrastructure nationwide. NARC encourages opportunities fostering multi-jurisdictional, regional solutions through an economic recovery effort to improve the economy and forestall severe budget cutbacks and layoffs within local governments.

NARC looks forward to working with Congress, the new Administration and our association partners to determine the best short and long-term strategies to address the convergence of a softening economy, rising unemployment, forecasted population growth, and the clear need for substantial investments in the country’s infrastructure network. We welcome a continued dialogue and the building of partnerships across government to ensure that today’s opportunity becomes tomorrow’s success.

The next Congress and Administration are right to seek an economic recovery package — projected to exceed $300 billion — that includes infrastructure spending to create jobs and boost our economy. When it comes to transportation, however, infrastructure spending could do more harm than good if it goes primarily toward building bigger roads rather than the clean transportation network we need for a truly “green” recovery.

The key goals of this investment should be to preserve America’s existing highway and transit networks, while giving our growing nation more options for getting around, in turn allowing Americans to use less gasoline. If we spend this money the right way, we should get a three-for-one-return on our investment: A revitalized economy positioned for long-term health; less dependence on oil; and a reduction in climate-damaging emissions.

We can get there by investing $100 billion to repair and preserve highways, bridges and existing public transportation service; build modern rail and rapid bus lines and upgrading all forms of service in cities large and small; develop high-speed and other forms of inter-city rail; and make streets safe for walking and biking.

Such investment in clean, green transportation infrastructure has the potential to create more jobs than simply building more highways. A recent report by Reconnecting America identified 78 communities around the country with more than $240 billion worth of planned investment in light rail, commuter rail, subway and rapid bus projects. If all were to be funded, this could support as many as 6.7 million jobs. In these tough economic times, with AT&T cutting 12,000 workers, DuPont laying off 2,500 employees, and United Airlines eliminating nearly 1,200 jobs immediately after the holidays, saving jobs and creating new ones is more important than ever.

Soaring gas prices over the summer made our vulnerability clear. As Americans across the country sought better and lower-cost options to get to or find work, shop, ship goods and otherwise get around, we found limited to no public transportation, underfinanced transit systems, and crumbling sidewalks, among other problems.

The recovery package expected in early 2009 should be seen as a down-payment on a new, 21st Century federal transportation mission to complete the second half of America’s transportation network, which began with the national highway system. Federal resources and attention must not only go to fixing our crumbling bridges and highways but also to increasing support for the cleanest forms of transportation — public transit, high speed rail, walking and biking — and ultimately helping Americans compete and thrive.

In a letter to the Transportation for America Campaign in October 2008, President-elect Barack Obama stated, “Now is the time to invest in our future and strengthen our core infrastructure…Everyone benefits if we can leave our cars, walk, bicycle and access other transportation alternatives.”

We couldn’t agree more.