The following was submitted by Susan Monteverde, Vice President, Government Relations for the American Association of Port Authorities:

In a word…yes…our transportation system is safer since implementing the many security policies and programs called for after 9/11. Looking at America’s seaports specifically, from the Maritime Transportation Security Act of 2002 to the SAFE Port Act of 2006, billions of government, port authority and private-sector dollars have been invested to enhance the ports’ ability to thwart terrorism and protect people and cargo from malicious intent. These investments have ranged from guards, fences and sophisticated surveillance cameras, to federal ID cards with embedded biometrics required by anyone needing unescorted access to secure port areas.

Security is one of the highest priorities for the America’s seaports. Protecting the people and freight that move through our seaport borders and their surrounding communities is essential to keeping the country safe and open for business. AAPA and its members collaborate with both government officials and private-sector security experts to maintain and enhance seaport security because protecting our borders is a shared responsibility.

While the federal government has made significant inroads in protecting our shores from entry of illicit cargo and those who wishing us harm, the lion’s share of the financial burden for protecting port facilities remains on the ports themselves.

Since 9/11, Congress has appropriated more than $2 billion to pay for security equipment, infrastructure and training to help harden port facilities against terrorism. While this figure may seem large, it pales in comparison to the costs that ports and their private-sector partners have had to shoulder, such as the 25% cost-share match for security grants, together with the costs for long-term equipment operations and maintenance, and wages for security personnel, which aren’t covered by the grants

The 25% cost-share for public agencies is a significant economic disincentive to make security enhancements and implement regional maritime security plans. In these tight economic times, the cost-share is an even greater problem as ports are cutting back in all areas to address economic shortfalls. The Port Security Grant program is one of the few DHS grant programs that require a cost-share. Transit grants, for example, are exempt from cost-share requirements.

Both 2002 and 2006 maritime security acts provided that operation and maintenance costs are an allowable expense under the Port Security Grant program. However, DHS has narrowly interpreted this to only allow maintenance on a grant-funded project within the term of the grant; thereby limiting its usefulness. For example, under a three-year grant, it may take two years to install a camera system; therefore, the maintenance contract would only cover the final year of the grant. By clarifying that grant money can be used to purchase service contracts for maintenance agreements on past federal projects as well, the growing burden to maintain these projects can be more equally shared.

Finally, DHS should allow grant funds to be used for security personnel costs, as provided in the 2002 and 2006 security bills. Doing so would mirror both the Urban Area Security Initiative and Transit Security Grant programs. Ports should be allowed to hire new security personnel (e.g., staff for operations, emergency centers, planning and counterterrorism posts, etc.) for the term of the grant. Personnel costs should also be permitted to backfill salaries for approved training programs.

Effective port security is an evolving process, requiring full commitment from all partners to ensure that weaknesses and weak spots aren’t exploited by those plotting to do us harm. When the federal government assumes its rightful share in protecting our ports and the transportation system that feeds them, we’ll be better able to adapt to the threats ahead of us without further diminishing the velocity of goods through the supply chain that feeds our economy and way of life.

There continues to be a disconnect in America between what "real grassroots", Americans want, and what our congress and Administration is pushing. Such is the case with the nation's comprehensive transportation program and policies and how we initiate and fund it. Once again we hear the words "extend" or "restudy", or "postpone" when we speak of the critical needs of our surface, air, water and mass transit systems along with bridges and infrastructure, which are vital to not only hundreds of thousands of jobs today, but have a huge impact on our environment and future economic competiveness. Our leaders just don't get it. Our very existence here in North Myrtle Beach and the entire Grand Strand of South Carolina depend on the movement of people for our very economic survival. More than 13 million people visit this vacation destination annually and to place our country's core transportation syestem at risk is not acceptable and not an option. Our presence at the US Chamber's Transportation Fly-in this week in Washington, indicates how critically important we rank transportation and infrastructure improvements to our economic future in NMB and the coastal region of SC. We are on record calling for a comprehensive national transportation and infrastructure plan which would insure the effective and efficient movement of people and commerce connecting all modes ot transportation including air, rail, roads, and water and to plan for future capacity as well as address the replacement of aging infrastructure. Included in the core surface transportation programs due to expire on September 30, 2009, are I-73 and I-74 which have been and remain top priorities for our area. Continuing the status quo is not an option and somehow we must convice congress and the administration, to act now, but I think we all know what an uphill battle this is. Either we need to change the way we deliver our message and/or enlist more Americans to speak out., or accept the fact that in a very short period of time, no matter what happens to our health system or the environment, our lack of competiveness, and inability to move people, goods, and materials, will result in the loss of hundreds of thousands of jobs and the American way of life which made our country the envy of the world.

Modernizing our nation’s transportation policy means taking into account the unique challenges faced by different parts of the nation. In addition to making much-needed modifications to the highway reauthorization bill, it is our hope that Congress will create a comprehensive transportation policy that addresses critical regional needs while better connecting the entire U.S. with global trading partners.

Arizona’s population has been among the fastest growing in the nation for many years. Yet, Arizona has long been a donor state when it comes to federal highway funds. This means that we send more of our fuel tax dollars to Washington than we receive in return. An outdated funding formula combined with earmarks for special projects in certain Congressional districts have created a situation in which funds do not always go to the areas of greatest need.

A revised formula for funding highways should reflect actual infrastructure needs based on factors such as population growth and congestion. Additionally, the formula should ensure that money raised through the user-based system of fuel taxes is not siphoned off for unrelated types of transportation projects. While non-highway projects are important to our overall transportation system, they should be funded through a different mechanism.

Public-Private Partnerships (PPP) may be an appropriate and effective way to fund certain projects. Private companies can finance transportation projects upfront and get them built quickly, helping to tackle congestion and improve the movement of commerce. For example, private funding could be utilized for projects such as high-speed rail between Phoenix and Tucson, expansion of border ports of entry, or additional highway lanes.

Transportation needs exist outside the scope of the highway reauthorization bill. As a border state, Arizona has several ports of entry with the Mexican state of Sonora. Commercial trucks carry more than 80 percent of all commodities traded between the U.S. and Mexico. In 2005, 10.3 million vehicles, including 346,000 commercial trucks, crossed through the Arizona/Sonora ports of entry. Additional inspection booths and lanes are needed to facilitate the movement of international trade between the United States and Mexico. These improvements will also provide environmental benefits through reductions in vehicle idling time. Enhancing safety and security at border ports should also be a priority.

An expansion of airports capable of supporting significant air cargo operations is also called for. With the growth of Phoenix-Mesa Gateway Airport, states like Arizona are poised to effectively offload some of the cargo that is currently being delivered to large coastal airports and the transported further inland via trucks or rail. A more efficient system would entail the development of smaller regional airports that could get goods to their destinations with less surface travel time.

As Congress moves forward with revised highway reauthorization bill, we have a responsibility to ensure that the legislation provides equitable opportunities for all states to compete in the global economy. A comprehensive federal transportation policy should target funding to the areas of greatest need based on a user-pays model, appropriately utilize public-private partnerships, facilitate the flow of cross-border traffic while increasing security measures, and expand air cargo operations.

I am glad to see a question about economic growth. With the recent burst of enthusiasm for goals such as greenhouse gas reduction, safety, livability, and sustainability the historical role of transportation as an engine of economic growth often seems to slip between the cracks. I find this a bit ironic given the current focus on economic stimulus, where transportation seems to be an important success story.

The question has two parts: the body of the text asks about how best to make tradeoffs among a series of “equally important goals” while the headline focuses on transportation in the 21st century. Stating that these goals are equally important is a value judgment. My bias is that economic growth deserves to be at least the “first among equals” given the need for substantial resources to meet other worthy objectives. More importantly, history teaches us that when done right, our nation’s transportation networks provide a powerful engine of national economic growth. This goes beyond the example of the Interstate Highway System (although this does provide an excellent example, with investment in a national network generating about one fourth of total national productivity gains and generating annual economic rates of return of more than 50 percent a year for a couple of decades – see reports by Professor Nadiri). The transcontinental railroads and the air traffic control system offer other strong examples.

I view the “headline” question about how to modernize transportation as more interesting. I do not believe, however, that this question has received the serious attention among our industry leaders that it deserves. Much of the current debate about what is best for transportation could have taken place several decades ago – spend more money on my mode of choice or perhaps just spend more money on all modes. True, today there is greater emphasis on mass transit and a new focus on “high speed” rail and various degrees of interest in performance management. There is also interest in some circles about changing how we finance surface transportation, with an emphasis on more direct user fees (VMT fees and variable tolls) that offer the potential to generate significant sums while also encouraging more efficient use of the system.

My reading of US history is that our “model” of an ideal transportation system changes from generation to generation. These changes reflect shifts in mode, a different mix in the role of public and private sectors, and new ways to fund investment. While we learn from past successes, the best examples rarely copy the past.

Unlike most other industries, however, technology is rarely at the heart of these options – the “Next Gen” system for aviation is one exception. In my view, this is not about ITS (a worthy program of investments to be sure) but rather we should look for ways to bring about fundamental change in how we provide, manage, and finance transportation. I believe this requires an effort to integrate transportation with telecommunications (broadband in particular). These should be seen as different approaches to the same problem – how to “annihilate” distance as a barrier to economic and social activity. Another opportunity is to develop true “situational awareness” by integrating private data (say on the location of trucks or cell phones and PDAs) with public data on operations. This goes beyond efforts to generate real-time traffic information. US DOT’s Intellidrive concept (born as VII) has aspects of this. Success also calls for a mode neutral approach (very different from current calls to “balance” transportation by spending more on whatever mode we believe has been under represented) and one with an emphasis on measure of success that reflect the realities of today’s economy. This, in turn, calls for direct measures of performance. My personal favorite is to measure success by tracking accessibility to jobs and to labor.

Meeting the transportation challenges of the 21st Century is critical to the long-term prosperity of the United States. As our population and economy grows, a national transportation policy that focuses on efficiency, safety, congestion reduction, and the improvement of freight movement around our nation’s worst bottlenecks will facilitate economic growth and help our industries compete in the global economy.

ATA projects overall freight tonnage to grow almost 28 percent over the next 12 years, with the modal share moved by truck increasing from 69 percent to 70 percent by 2018. This increase in freight demand is not a zero-sum game, instead of detracting freight from one mode to another, this projection shows that all modes will need to increase capacity. Our nation must expand and repair the aging National Highway System to meet these demands. Even when communities can utilize other modes of transportation to move freight, a modern, functioning highway system is necessary to finish the delivery. ATA supports funding this expansion by increasing the federal fuel tax, only if all proceeds go into the Highway Trust Fund.

Also, updating the size and weight limits of trucks to match those in Canada and Europe will help our economic competitiveness. As countries around the world prepare for increasing freight volumes, many have already instituted programs that increase truck size and weight. These countries have seen great productivity and environmental gains while still continuing to improve safety.

At a recent conference hosted by the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute, truck industry experts from across the globe found that the U.S. is lagging in several truck productivity and sustainability categories when compared with international counterparts. ATA encourages Congress to increase the allowable weight of trucks on our national highway system from 80,000 pounds to 97,000 pounds, the same as in Canada and Europe. At present, some states already allow heavier, more productive truck combinations on their roads.

ATA supports the use of heavier, more productive trucks only on roads built to withstand the increased weights. Opponents claim that larger trucks will cause more damage to our roads, but engineers built our National Highway System to handle more than 80,000 pounds. Moreover, more productive trucks have additional axles that help with weight distribution and increase braking capacity. Operating more productive vehicles would allow companies to deliver goods while making fewer trips. The Federal Highway Administration estimated that nationwide adoption of 6-axle vehicles would result in an 11 percent reduction in truck vehicle miles traveled, thus also reducing accident exposure by 11 percent – helping to improve efficiency and safety.

In addition to these policy changes, transportation in the 21st Century must continue to become cleaner and safer. And the trucking industry is leading the way through the adoption of progressive sustainability and safety agendas.

At present, the trucking industry delivers nearly 100 percent of consumer products in the United States with clean diesel engines that burn ultra-low sulfur diesel. A new study shows that clean diesel technologies in truck engines manufactured beginning in 2007 not only reduced certain emissions by 90 percent over 2004 models, but far exceeded expectations in their performance in cleaning up the nation’s air quality. Diesel truck engines with 2010 standards will be even cleaner, slashing nitrogen oxide emissions by another 50 percent.

ATA’s sustainability agenda will have an immediate impact on the environment, reducing fuel consumption by 86 billion gallons and thus reducing the carbon footprint of all vehicles by nearly a billion tons over the next ten years. More productive trucks, speed governing trucks at 65mph or below, setting a national 65 mph limit for all vehicles, congestion reduction, and promoting efficiency will have positive impact on the environment.

In regards to safety, ATA’s 18-point safety agenda intends to improve the safety of commercial and passenger drivers, improve the safety of our vehicles, and improve motor carrier performance. ATA also advocates the accelerated deployment of advanced safety systems for commercial vehicles to help improve safety within the transportation sector. Providing tax incentives for the adoption of technologies such as brake wear monitoring systems, stability control and roll stability systems, lane departure warning systems with blind spot detection, and collision warning systems with adaptive cruise control will continue to improve safety within the industry. Congress is considering legislation to provide these incentives, and ATA encourages Congress to increase the caps on these tax credits.

It seems the answer to just about every aviation-related question these days is “NextGen”. Although this week’s question covers a lot of territory, the answer is still the same – “NextGen”. When fully implemented, the Next Generation Air Transportation System will promote growth, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, reduce congestion, increase mobility and improve safety. The FAA’s plan would achieve full implementation by 2025. But, our environment and economy can’t wait that long. That’s why the aerospace industry is completely behind the Administration’s stated goal of achieving real NextGen benefits in three to five years.

The House has passed an FAA Reauthorization Bill (HR 915), and Senator Rockefeller has just introduced a version in the Senate. Both chambers endorse the need for NextGen – it’s time to fund it.

It is a bit puzzling to those of us who understand the vast economic benefits that civil aviation bring to our nation that the administration missed what I would call a very logical and excellent opportunity to improve aviation infrastructure with “shovel-ready” improvements to our fifty-year-old air traffic control system. Aerospace manufacturing represents the largest positive trade surplus in the U.S. economy and every dollar spent on aviation generates five dollars in economic activity. We have a proposal that will dramatically accelerate the implementation of NextGen in this country for less than the Administration has already committed to high speed rail projects.

Numbers like that should be reason enough to get serious about NextGen. But, whether or not there is a “second stimulus” the current climate change policy debate presents another opportunity to revisit the issue of rebuilding our nation’s aviation infrastructure. Technologies available today could be installed in air traffic control centers and aircraft cockpits that will make our system dramatically more fuel efficient. Estimates vary, but most agree that if we start accelerating NextGen implementation now, we will save millions of gallons of fuel and reduce our CO2 output by millions of tons in less than five years. We think that’s worth doing.

Public policy that moves freight off our nation’s congested roads and onto the freight rail network will deliver significant public benefits: ease congestion, reduce pollution, save fuel, time and money. Congestion is expensive and costs the U.S. economy almost $90 billion every year in wasted fuel and excessive travel delays. Billions more are lost due to reduced productivity and cargo delays.

The health of our nation’s economy rides heavily on the rails. From the food on our tables to the cars we drive to the shoes on our children’s feet, freight railroads carry the things America depends on cheaply, safely and efficiently and with fewer harmful emissions.

Today, U.S. freight railroads are the most affordable in the world, enhancing the global competitiveness of U.S. goods, and improving our standard of living. Average rail rates have dropped by nearly half since 1981, meaning billions of dollars in savings for American consumers every year. An investment in freight rail infrastructure is also an investment in our nation’s economy. Based on U.S. Department of Commerce data, every dollar spent on investments in our freight railroads yields $3 in economic output. In addition, each $1 billion of rail investment creates 20,000 jobs.

Rail is the smart choice for America’s economy and environment — now and in the future.

Jacqueline Gillan writes that

“Simply put, it takes a modern and safe transportation system to be competitive, to increase our nation’s wealth, and to invest in the technologies and other countermeasures to conserve fossil fuel use, reduce emissions, advance public health and safety, and contribute to our overall quality of life.”

But to some it is not “simple”, when “conservation of fossil fuel” forces the production and use of less-safe cars. These policies have been reliably reported to increase deaths on US roads by about 2,000 a year.

Do the Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety support government measures to make cars less safe in order to save energy?

Kudos to Michelle Young for hitting the nail on the head! “User fees – not taxes” indeed seem to offer a key to restoring mobility to our transportation system.

With services financed by user fees, there would be no reason for the federal government to finance transport services, and its role could be much reduced. The fifty states would then be responsible for designing policies that would enable transportation users to get the services they are prepared to pay for, as is appropriate in a free enterprise economy. Different states would adopt different modernization policies. Successful reforms would then be replicated, and unsuccessful ones generally abandoned.

Some would consider this diversity undesirable, but it would surely be better than the “national” transportation policies currently offered by federal officials seeking to “coerce people out of their cars”. These seem designed not to modernize transportation systems but, rather, to bring them back to the pre-automobile age.

Another key to restoring mobility is deregulation, particularly of public transport. In most of the U.S., current regulations prohibit the provision of high-quality, high-frequency, low-cost, profitable services, with seating for all, as offered in Atlantic City and Puerto Rico by associations of minibus owners and by shared taxis. Those services benefit all income groups by improving mobility and accessibility, and stimulating employment and trade.

Regulation for safety is in the public interest. Restriction of competition is not.

Time is of the essence in approving and funding a major push in surface transportation legislation to renew and advance our highway and rail infrastructure needs. Upgrading existing highways and tackling our badly degraded national bridge system across all levels of government is now a genuine crisis that must be engaged and resolved as quickly as possible. These conclusions have been reached independently by two major Congressionally-mandated study commissions in the last two years, as well as by research institutions and state transportation organizations. The U.S. has fallen behind because key features of our surface transportation system have been allowed to continue to deteriorate without timely reconstruction and maintenance. Even so, as the nation’s roads and bridges continue to crumble before our eyes, special interests are attempting to foist old, disproven solutions onto the shoulders of all Americans, such as a renewed push to allow even bigger, heavier trucks on U.S. highways and bridges than ever before.

Wise investments to improve our surface transportation infrastructure are a major opportunity to enhance mobility and ensure safer facilities for all users.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (the Act) is an initial attempt to infuse new money into America’s aging highways and bridges that is aimed at producing both improved surface transportation and the badly needed new jobs that are created in the process. However, the Act has only general guidance on what projects should be funded with stimulus money and some projects cannot be quickly brought to contract to jump-start our economy. The pending six-year House Surface Transportation Assistance Act of 2009 wisely chooses a wide range of necessary projects that can be supported with federal funds, and many of these can be funded and implemented quickly because the inventories and planning for them have already been accomplished. There are many projects that could be implemented that have the potential to both create jobs and improve highway safety and thus reduce the death, injury and financial toll of motor vehicle crashes. These fast-track safety projects with economic and public health benefits include:

· Improved/new highway barrier systems and crash cushions to reduce lethal run-off-road crashes, especially of young, inexperienced drivers and of large commercial motor vehicles.

· Spot improvements to highway alignment and cross sections to widen shoulders, soften sharp curves, increase deficient superelevation (banking), improve drainage, and increase decision and stopping sight distance, especially on older, two-lane, two-way roads.

· Site-specific removal or relocation (telephone poles) of roadside obstacles, including fixed-object hazards and dangerous off-road slopes.

· Improved pavement surface skid resistance, particularly to reduce wet-weather skidding crashes.

· Improved bridge maintenance, including installation of weigh-in-motion scales and retrofitting bridge strain gauges to decrease big truck maximum weight violations and increase overweight truck enforcement.

· Improve highway-rail grade crossings for enhanced safety, increased freight rail efficiency, and increased greater intermodalism.

· Larger, brighter signs and other traffic control devices to provide more advance warning and increased detection time, especially for our rapidly aging driver population.

· Improved/new street lighting in suburban and urban areas, shown to improve traffic control device detection, reduce crashes, and enhance pedestrian crossing safety.

· Traffic calming measures to improve livability and enhance pedestrian safety, reduce neighborhood vehicle emissions, and revive urban population centers.

· Safe Routes to School program projects to reduce automobile reliance, create more livable communities, and improve Clean Air Act compliance.

· Improved signalization to reduce congestion, increase vehicle throughput, and enhance traffic safety, especially of pedestrians crossing intersections.

· Automated speed and signalized intersection and highway work zone enforcement to reduce deaths and injuries from violations of traffic signals and posted speed limits.

However, without predictable funding, almost none of these projects, large or small, ready-to-go or long-term, can be carried out. The STAA Act also includes urgently needed safety provisions on motor carrier safety as well as requirements for states to adopt primary enforcement seat belt laws and require ignition interlocks for drunk drivers that will be delayed another 18 months unless there is a multi-year reauthorization bill. When fully implemented these safety provisions have the potential to save thousands of lives and billions of dollars.

Simply put, it takes a modern and safe transportation system to be competitive, to increase our nation’s wealth, and to invest in the technologies and other countermeasures to conserve fossil fuel use, reduce emissions, advance public health and safety, and contribute to our overall quality of life.

Planes, trains and automobiles…who knew at the time the popular comedy was released its title would become the key focus of business communities nationwide? Previously taxes, healthcare and an insufficient workforce plagued American businesses large and small. Today businesses are more concerned with the immediate needs of an outdated and inefficient infrastructure; freight and passenger rail systems, highways and bridges.

In Pennsylvania our annual funding levels for transportation are significantly below those needed to maintain our infrastructure. In fact, almost three years ago (11/06) the Pennsylvania Transportation Funding and Reform Commission (PTFRC) confirmed a transportation funding crisis exists and recommended an increase of $1.7 billion in annual funding for transportation infrastructure needs—$965 million for roads, highways, and bridges, and $760 million for mass transit.

The members of the Greater Lehigh Valley Chamber of Commerce, the largest chamber in the state of PA, recognize the importance of maintaining our infrastructure – with the goal of improving it. Our infrastructure is vital to conducting day-to-day business and is the key to our future. The Lehigh Valley is located less than two hours from New York City, 1.5 hours from Philadelphia and about 3.5 hours from our nation’s capitol. Our members employ 144,000 people, and just about all of them utilize transportation to get to and from work every day. The modes of getting there are not well integrated, but we are working on it.

Roads and Bridges

The Lehigh Valley’s “Main Street,” US Route 22, is in need of complete overhaul. The interchanges are substandard and its largest bridge over the Lehigh River is in need of major repairs. We look to widen and modernize Rt. 22 to reduce fatalities and injuries, congestion, wasted energy and time. This project is not cheap. Experts estimate total reconstruction at more than $1 Billion.

Mass Transit

It has become clear that our public transportation system needs to play a larger role in responding to employee and employer transportation needs. Strong policies must be implemented to improve intermodal transportation options. Our public bus system (LANTA) recently completed a regional public transportation plan, concluding that connecting land use and transportation is vital for successful transit. Unfortunately, the Lehigh Valley does not have the land use patterns that exist in communities with successful rapid bus transit or rail. Furthermore, challenges abound as the Lehigh Valley grows with many more cul de sacs than interconnected roadways, making mass transit much more difficult.

Freight Rail

Let’s not forget the freight rail system needs funding. The more we move freight by rail the less trucks we will have on our highways, resulting in better air quality and less wear-and-tear on road surfaces. The Lehigh Valley is home to a very busy intermodal facility and keeping these facilities equipped with the latest technology is crucial to their existence.

Airports

Airports like the Lehigh Valley International Airport (LVIA) need assistance. As our region grows, the demand for convenient, affordable air travel also grows. Keeping LVIA equipped with efficient computer systems, up-to-date runways and traffic control devices will keep and possibly expand passenger airline service, keeping air freight moving.

“How do we pay for it all?”

Structural program reforms and operational efficiencies are critical elements of a long-term financial solution to PA’s infrastructure problems. But reform alone will not be enough - we believe the answer lies in user fees – not taxes. New approaches to user fees must be identified and implemented immediately in order to maintain and improve current systems.

I look forward to joining my colleagues in identifying solutions with our US Senators and Congressmen during the US Chamber of Commerce Transportation Fly that begins tonight.

By the way…no planes or trains for me, I’ll be driving the highways to our nation’s capital!

Another good question for us to consider this week, especially as we head toward the second decade of this new millennium. I agree with the items on Janet’s and Steve’s lists. While a detailed list of modernization needs could span many pages, here are three overarching categories:

• Adopt Performance Objectives: It is frankly bizarre that this massive public investment program isn’t driven by standards for achieving results beneficial to the nation. Transportation is a means, and making efficient and effective use of it requires specifying ends that must be furthered by investment of hard-won taxpayer dollars. Thankfully, companion bills with national transportation objectives are picking up steam in the House and the Senate. Those are touchstones for policymakers as they hammer out a bill, as are the performance-oriented planning provisions in Chairman Oberstar’s bill.
• Put Metropolitan Regions in the Driver’s Seat: The current program is largely implemented by state transportation departments, which cater to rural areas. This is deeply out of whack with 21st century demographics. It made sense a half-century ago, when the population of metropolitan regions (85 million) was almost on par with rural areas (65 million). Then metropolitan population skyrocketed, rising nearly 166 percent. Meanwhile, rural areas actually lost about 15 percent of their people. More than 80 percent of us now live in metropolitan regions, which also generate the majority of the nation’s GDP. The latest evidence that state DOTs are behind the times comes from an investigation of transportation investments implemented by states using recovery act funding. Less than half of the money for the more than 5,000 projects financed by the bill went to cities and suburbs. Congress should hew to the principle of subsidiarity, ending this yawning mismatch between governance and need by giving more authority to metropolitan regions. Chairman Oberstar’s bill lays the foundation for such reform with its Metropolitan Mobility Program.
• Deploy 21st-Century Technology: Last fall a group of us visited northern European countries to learn from their transportation policies and practices. We were blown away by the use of technology to manage traffic, from electronic signage with real-time information and variable speed limits in the Netherlands; to the congestion pricing system in downtown London; to fuel-efficient (complete with regenerative braking as in the Prius) and driverless rail cars on Copenhagen’s Metro, which consequently turns a modest profit. Comprehensive deployment of these and other technologies in the U.S. would cut congestion, save fuel and reduce pollution. With the help of groups like ITSAmerica, Congress should write this into the new transportation bill.

Details need to be filled in, and other policy categories are worthy of attention, such as an explicit re-balancing of a highway-transit investment split created more than a quarter-century ago (transit deserves much more than its outdated less-than-20-percent share). And, most importantly, all of it must add up to a program that provides clear and compelling benefits to the nation’s economic, energy and environmental future. Only then will the transaction on everyone’s mind – dramatic expansion of revenue for the program – be feasible at a time when taxpayer distaste for current law is running high.

The U.S. is losing it's competitive edge by not thinking strategically about freight movements. Canada has done an excellent job in enhancing their competitive position to attract cargoes that would have moved through US west coast ports. The Canadians have a national strategy to promote their freight system to serve "America's Heartland." They created this by focusing on system level improvements country-wide to enhance the velocity and competitiveness of their ports and freight rail system. On top of that, the Canadian Government has a well funded marketing campaign to attract cargoes from Asian to Canadian west coast ports. We need to ensure that US ports remain competitive to serve our own markets. This means we need Washington policymakers to invest in and support a system-wide network that will keep us competitive, rather than fund a list of projects that might not bear any relation to a national system.

As important as transportation is to economic competitiveness and business, it is much more than that. It has become indispensible to our way of life. But the way we invest in, operate, and use transportation today is not sustainable and requires reform.

Unfortunately in addressing transportation challenges, the U.S. has gone from being a leader to a laggard when compared to other nations in the world or what our system requires. Unless we turn it around and address our challenges, we will leave the next generations a sector that supports neither the mobility demands of individuals nor the needs of businesses. Just a few examples:

• Funding: Our surface and aviation trust funds do not provide sufficient resources for our needs. We either add revenue streams to them as part of reform, or we shrink our programs significantly and delay vital investments such as air traffic modernization.
• Modal Bias: For the most part, we continue to invest and operate in our modal infrastructure as a collection of systems, not as an integrated, intermodal system. Even a lot of the current talk about user fees misses the mark. The end is not building up one mode but providing investment dollars for passenger and freight mobility.
• Energy: Fossil fuels, which power the overwhelming percentage of our transportation movements are contributing significantly to climate change and make the U.S. and our economy vulnerable to commodity market swings and the whims of cartels and abusive governments. To take control, we must internalize the externalities into policies and daily transportation decision-making and convert our industry into one that is cleaner.
• Users: Our demographics are continuing to change with a population that is getting significantly older. Mobility choices, such as walking and transit, are imperative as are on-demand services such as paratransit.

As Janet and Jan (and as previous bloggers have posited), we must set goals for a truly national system and redesign our policy architecture and allocation mechanisms around those goals. In addition, it does us little good to pass reform unless we honestly communicate system needs and design a funding system around it to meet those needs. Each of us will have to pay more for our future mobility.

Transportation advocates must appreciate that as part of this process new interests--environmental, energy, land use and others--need to be included in the deliberations for our policies to work and to establish wider legitimacy for the goals. Non-transportation advocates need to be cognizant of and recognize the vital roles transportation plays in moving people and goods and include the sector's priorities into legislation like climate change (H.R. 2454 as currently written does not do that). If past answers to Lisa's questions are any indication, mutual respect and recognition between transportation and non-transportation advocates still has a ways to go. It is time to shift our thinking from adding new priorities onto the old system to building a sustainable transportation system that is inclusive of these priorities.

There is reason for optimism. Transportation advocates recognize the current surface and aviation models are unsustainable (a welcome change from just a couple of years ago). Congressional leaders are listening and have begun the difficult process of building a consensus for reform. As the debates ensue, all of us need to assert our own interests, recognize the interests of others, and work toward a national policy.

This question goes to the heart of the transportation policy debate. Quite simply, America needs to get more, a lot more, out of the hundreds of billions of dollars that federal, state, and local agencies spend annually on transportation infrastructure--not even counting the additional billions that consumers spend to use the system. Our transportation system serves multiple goals, and we need to set our sights on a system that continually improves the efficiency and effectiveness with which it meets these goals.

So, before we talk about how to, physically, modernize our transportation system, tackling the issues posed in the question will require that we modernize how we analyze and integrate these multiple objectives. Basically, our planning and prioritization tools will need to be a whole lot smarter and more nimble to meet the challenges of the 21st Century. Transportation agencies will need to collect and synthesize information at an unprecedented level of sophistication. Before we invest dollars in concrete and steel, let's invest in the intelligence necessary to reconcile cost-effective, integrated, long-term solutions.

I hope that all stakeholders can agree that we need more performance, more bang if you will, for each taxpayer dollar spent-even though our respective priorities may vary. We need to remember, strenuously, that transportation is not an end unto itself. Transportation helps us achieve economic, social, and other individual and collective needs; and it is generally a *cost* of meeting those needs. Arguments for stimulus spending aside, our economic and national interests are not served by spending more on transportation than we need to. Like health-care, we need to contain costs at the same time that we maximize the value derived from our investments.

A fundamental place to start is the establishment of clear "National Transportation Objectives" as many organizations and proposed legislation in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives have suggested. Articulation of national objectives is not in the latest House version of the next transportation bill-instead it kicks the task of creating a "national transportation strategy" to DOT-but I hope anyone interested in performance and accountability will urge Congress to define such objectives in the final bill. It is hard to see how Congress would spend our money well without such benchmarks for measuring success, and I suggest they don't try.

The Chamber recognizes that reforms and responsibility are needed so that this nation can rebuild the platform that American businesses need to thrive and that people require for a high quality of life. The Chamber's board has called on Congress to reform federal policies and programs around a strong, yet focused, federal role that supports addressing national needs including:

• Improve safety to reduce crashes, injuries, deaths and property damage;

• Keeping freight moving reliably and cost-effectively on the schedules that customers demand;

• Getting the gridlock out of our cities;

• Connecting rural America to the global economy; and,

• Supporting environmental and energy objectives.

Economic and environmental, efficiency and safety, congestion and connectivity goals need to be set, then adequate resources and appropriate incentives must be provided, and then public and private project sponsors using federal resources should be held accountable (without being micromanaged) for demonstrating that the national goals are being met using solutions that are appropriately tailored to local needs. There's plenty of discussion of this in the context of SAFETEA-LU reauthorization, but it's not just highways and transit that are on the minds of businesses: the needs for good conditions, targeted expansion, wide spread improvements to operations and smarter systems must be addressed in all modes of transportation.

There are solutions available that will meet many goals simultaneously. For example, dealing with truck bottlenecks speeds goods movements reduces greenhouse gas emissions and reduces fuel consumption. Widespread deployment of technology solutions to improve the management of existing capacity on both roads and public transportation systems can increase reliability and predictability, untangle congestion and reduce crashes, lessen pollution and increase quality of life through better information for decision-making by travelers.

In fact, I think that fundamentally the best way to update transportation policy is by stepping back from the day-to-day tactical discussions about legislative strategy and reminding ourselves that to get widespread grassroots support for passing SAFETEA-LU reauthorization - or any other major transportation bill - understanding and appreciating the perspectives of the users of the transportation network is important. This week over 100 businesses and chambers of commerce from around the country are coming to Washington to help Congress understand just how important and urgent it is to push ahead on SAFETEA-LU reauthorization. When they go home, hopefully everyone they meet with will have a better understanding of how top-notch transportation infrastructure drives down costs as part of supply chain management, infrastructure improvements support economic development, and access to larger labor markets is important for productivity. As we're saying this week around the U.S. Chamber, "Transportation is Our Business."