March 2010 Archives

The most recent congressional standoff over extending the current surface transportation law -- for the fifth time since it expired on Oct. 1 -- led to the shutdown of Highway Trust Fund programs on March 1. This occurred in part because the law does not contain language on how to treat certain earmarked programs beyond the law's initial authorization and the two chambers disagreed over how to do so.

Given the delays and uncertainties associated with extending surface transportation programs after the law's authorization has run out, should the next bill spell out how to extend expired programs until a subsequent authorization is enacted? For example, it could extend them in automatic six-month increments until a new authorization is completed. This approach could hamper future Congresses' ability to control the length of continuing resolutions, but it would provide much greater certainty to state transportation departments, transit agencies and contractors. Is this a good idea? How would you suggest the next bill provide for expiring programs?

11 responses: Jeff Rosen, Emil H. Frankel, James Corless, Terry O’Sullivan, Ken Orski, Mortimer L. Downey, Patrick D. Jones, Bill Graves, Joung Lee, Jack Schenendorf, Pete K. Rahn

With all the attention last week focused on extending the surface transportation law and Federal Aviation Administration programs, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood's announcement of a major policy change regarding the way bicyclists' needs are treated in the transportation planning seems to have received little notice.

"People across America who value bicycling should have a voice when it comes to transportation planning," LaHood wrote on his Fast Lane blog March 15. "This is the end of favoring motorized transportation at the expense of non-motorized. We are integrating the needs of bicyclists in federally-funded road projects." LaHood's blog post includes recommendations for how states and communities can accomplish this, such as "treat walking and bicycling as equals with other transportation modes" and "set a mode share target for walking and bicycling."

LaHood called the new policy a "sea change," but is it a good one? Should non-motorized modes of transportation be treated as equal to other modes, particularly when modes like driving and mass transit are at least partially, if not primarily, self-funded? Or is it the essence of DOT's evolving 21st-century mission to give people more mobility options that, according to LaHood, are relatively fast and inexpensive to build, are environmentally sustainable, reduce travel costs, improve safety and public health, and "reconnect citizens with their communities"?

21 responses: Ken Orski, Lisa Caruso, Lisa Caruso, Keith Laughlin, Lisa Caruso, Bob Poole, Robert L. Darbelnet, Rep. Earl Blumenauer, D-Ore., Steve Heminger, Laura Barrett, Keith Laughlin, Nancy LeaMond, Andy Clarke, Nathaniel P. Ford Sr., Andy Clarke, Bill Graves, Parris N. Glendening, Greg Cohen, Keith Laughlin, Rob Atkinson, Petra Todorovich

A little more than a year into the Obama administration, the Transportation Security Administration remains without a permanent administrator, yet it has already faced a major test: a Nigerian man's thwarted attempt last December to detonate a bomb as his flight from Amsterdam to Detroit approached its destination.

Since then, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has held numerous meetings with representatives of the airline industry and with top government officials from Europe, Asia, Africa, the Middle East and North America to bolster the international aviation security system. DHS has also required enhanced screening of foreign nationals who have passports from or whose route included countries that are considered state sponsors of terrorism. The department is also accelerating the deployment of body scanners in U.S. airports and beefing up the presence of federal air marshals on international flights bound for the United States. For its part, TSA has proposed rules to strengthen security at foreign and domestic aircraft repair stations and apply tougher security standards to general aviation.

What are the administration's transportation security priorities? How effective has Secretary Napolitano been in making progress on them? And how do this administration's priorities differ from the previous administration's priorities?

6 responses: Lisa Caruso, Robert L. Crandall, Greg Principato, Lisa Caruso, Ron Kuhlmann, Steve Van Beek

Transportation Expert Blogger and former New Jersey Transit chief Rich Sarles has just been named interim general manager of the troubled Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, largely because Metro officials believe he can start making needed changes while they search for a new permanent leader for the system.

In the past year, Metro saw nine people killed, including the train operator, when a moving train crashed into one stopped on the tracks in June; a track worker doing maintenance work killed in August; and two more workers killed by a maintenance vehicle in January.

On March 4, the Federal Transit Administration issued a hard-hitting safety audit of Metro and the Tri-State Oversight Committee, which oversees the system's safety. The audit found both the oversight board and Metro's safety department seriously lacking in authority, resources, expertise, and effective communication internally and with each other.

The 34-year-old system also faces daunting funding challenges. Planned expansions mean its future needs are great, but it lacks a dedicated funding source to cover the 45 percent of its operating budget that fares and advertising do not. The federal government provides $150 million a year in special capital support for safety investments, matched by local contributions from dedicated sources. In return for this funding stream, created to reflect the federal government's dependence on Metro to move its thousands of employees, the Metro board was required to add four federal appointees (two voting and two non-voting) to strengthen oversight of the agency. Transportation Expert Blogger Mort Downey was appointed to one of the voting seats.

Given Metro's many problems and the expectation that Mr. Sarles can effect change during his brief tenure, what advice would you give him? How should he go about tackling Metro's safety problems, which FTA Administrator Peter Rogoff said "will only be solved through a top-to-bottom change in the safety culture and focus at Washington Metro"? Can he do enough to satisfy members of Congress from the region, who have called for a federal takeover of the system if its safety record doesn't improve soon?

9 responses: Lisa Caruso, Laura Barrett, Joung Lee, Parris N. Glendening, Steve Van Beek, Lisa Caruso, Ken Orski, Beverly A. Scott, Mortimer L. Downey

Since the Highway Trust Fund was created in 1956, revenues from the fuels tax and other highway user taxes (such as those on tires and truck sales) have been credited to it to fund the construction of the interstate system and other highway projects. The "user pays" principle that the gasoline tax represents has until recently been the foundation of the federal surface transportation program.

But the user pays principle has been weakened as the trust fund has taken on responsibility for funding the nation's mass transit systems and as the surface transportation program has added goals of mitigating the impact of transportation on the environment and now promoting livable communities.

At a time when gas tax revenues can no longer cover the cost of maintaining, much less upgrading, the nation's surface transportation infrastructure, what should a gas tax pay for? And how should we fund the non-vehicle element of our infrastructure that we may increasingly use to move people and goods?

17 responses: Ed Wytkind, Ed Hamberger, Steve Van Beek, Gabriel Roth, Steve Van Beek, Greg Cohen, Patrick D. Jones, Mortimer L. Downey, Greg Cohen, Patrick J. Natale, P.E., Bill Graves, William Millar, Robert Puentes, Gabriel Roth, Emil H. Frankel, Bob Poole, Robin Chase