John Hennessy III,
P.E.
Polly Trottenberg is currently the Assistant Secretary for Transportation Policy at the U.S. Department of Transportation. She was previously the Executive Director of Building America’s Future, a new non-profit organization dedicated to bringing about a new era of U.S. investment in infrastructure that enhances our nation’s prosperity and quality of life.
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BLUEGREEN ALLIANCE & ECONOMIC POLICY INSTITUTE
Economic models estimate about 7,800 green jobs are created for every billion dollars of freight rail capital investment. Furthermore, the industry has nearly doubled the amount of goods it has shipped without increasing fuel consumption over the past three decades, and creates a fraction of the pollution of other transport modes such as trucking and aviation. Its continued growth will generate green jobs, reduce dependence on foreign oil and contribute to solving climate change.
AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF STATE HIGHWAY AND TRANSPORTATION OFFICIALS
Soon, members of Congress will be asked to decide “What makes a ‘livable’ community?” Since the U.S. Department of Transportation is making livability a top priority for future transportation funding, this is an important concept to define. While some would suggest livability means a life without cars, this definition really doesn’t work for the millions of Americans who have chosen the lifestyle that an automobile affords…If enhancing livability is the objective of transportation legislation or regulation, then it must work for those who live in rural Montana just as much as it would for those in downtown Portland. Equating livability only to riding transit, walking and biking, limits its relevance and excludes a wide range of improvements and community needs.
Hoping to sustain interest in the Committee’s efforts to enact a new multi-year transportation bill during this session of Congress, Reps. James Oberstar (D-MN) and Peter DeFazio (D-OR), leaders of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, convened a hearing on April 14 to explore innovative ways of financing highway and transit investments. But while the hearing provided a useful survey of available financing tools and programs, it produced no new answers to the key question that has bedeviled transportation advocates for many months and remains as the chief obstacle to moving the legislation forward— the question of how to pay for the proposed multi-year surface transportation program.
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RESEARCH AND INNOVATIVE TECHNOLOGY ADMINISTRATION
BUREAU OF TRANSPORTATION STATISTICS
To move large quantities of goods across the country and around the world, Americans depend on the Nation’s freight transportation system—a vast network of roads, bridges, rail tracks, airports, seaports, navigable waterways, pipelines, and equipment. Today, U.S. households can buy fresh fruits and vegetables in mid-winter, expect fast and reliable next-day deliveries of Internet purchases, and use electronic appliances manufactured thousands of miles away, often in other countries. Because economic activities worldwide have become more integrated and globalized, more goods produced by U.S. factories and farms are bound for export, and imports originate from more than 200 countries. This pace of trade Americans have become accustomed to is made possible by the complex intermodal transportation network that blankets the country and links the United States with world markets.
Infrastructure 2010: Investment Imperative, the latest annual infrastructure report by Urban Land Institute and Ernst & Young, focuses on water infra and urges decision-makers to view infrastructure as a long-term investment.
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Falling behind global competitors, the United States struggles to gain traction in planning and building the critical infrastructure investments that are necessary to ensure future economic growth and support a rapidly expanding population.
Recent federal stimulus spending addresses some pressing repair needs for transport- and water-related systems and provides seed funding for high-speed rail in important travel corridors, as well as new energy infrastructure. But recession-busted government budgets, entitlement and defense expenditures, and ballooning health care costs push infrastructure down most political priority lists—leaders continue to procrastinate when it comes to new investments as stressed taxpayers balk at more spending.
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According to a U.S. DOT Report on freight traffic, the number of trucks on our highways will more than double by 2035. Inland waterways, or “marine highways,” could reduce congestion by taking on some of the freight burden.
To make the port-and-waterway system more familiar, the U.S. Maritime Administration offers an interactive map, with information on current maritime infrastructure projects around the U.S. The map also shows inland waterways, interstate highways, railroads, and port locations around the country.
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Kathryn Phillips is the Director of the California Transportation and Air Initiative at Environmental Defense Fund. Before joining Environmental Defense, Kathryn was the senior policy advisor at the Center for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Technologies (CEERT) in Sacramento, and a lobbyist for V. John White Associates. Kathryn also worked for nearly 20 years as a journalist. She wrote for newspapers and magazines on a range of topics, specializing in the later years on science and environmental issues. She is the author of two books about environmental issues.
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REGIONAL ASSEMBLY 2010: INNOVATION & THE AMERICAN METROPOLIS
“The Regional Assembly is New York’s premier public policy event, bringing together several hundred top business, civic, philanthropic, media, and government leaders from across the metropolitan region and nation. Each year the Assembly focuses on a priority issue. This year, we examine how the innovative spirit and creativity of urban America can build and sustain a better future for our cities.”
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