Although some likened President Obama’s expansive vision to President Eisenhower’s historic call for a 42,000-mile Interstate Highway network, there is a vast difference between the two initiatives. The Interstate Highway proposal was backed by a reliable and steady revenue stream in the form of a federal gas tax. The high speed rail goal lacks a financial plan. It is not supported by a dedicated source of revenue that could maintain the program on a self-sustaining basis over a period of years.
View this complete post...Archive for the ‘Innovation Newsbriefs’ Category
The President’s Unserious Proposal
Monday, January 31st, 2011What Lies Ahead for Transportation in the 112th Congress?
Monday, January 24th, 2011Congressional action on transportation this year, including the shape of the next surface transportation bill, will be inevitably influenced by the changed political geography of the 112th Congress. Not only will the level of funding for transportation be dictated by new, fiscally conservative House majority , but the program priorities will be influenced by a newly elected GOP representation that largely hails from small-town and suburban America.
View this complete post...Skepticism About High-Speed Rail Is Growing
Thursday, January 13th, 2011“Spend first, answer questions later.” So concludes a critical editorial in the January 12 edition of the Washington Post, commenting on California’s proposed $43 billion High-Speed Rail program. The Post editorial, along with a January 11 article in the New York Times (both of which we reprint below), are emblematic of the increasingly skeptical press and public opinion concerning the fiscal and economic soundness of the Obama Administration’s high-speed rail initiative.
View this complete post...The Uncertain Future of the High-Speed Rail Program
Tuesday, January 4th, 2011The Illinois Department of Transportation has reached a cooperative agreement with Union Pacific and Amtrak that will permit the release of a $1.1 billion federal high-speed rail grant to the state of Illinois to fund passenger rail improvements between Chicago and St. Louis. The agreement was proclaimed by state and federal officials as “historic” and hailed as “one giant step closer to achieving high-speed passenger service between Chicago and St. Louis.” But stripped of its rhetoric, the announcement only reveals how inadequate and cost-ineffective the Administration’s “high–speed” program is turning out to be.
View this complete post...The Outlook for the Federal Transportation Program in the Next Congress
Monday, December 20th, 2010Innovation NewsBriefs Vol. 21, No. 32 Remarks by Kenneth Orski, Editor-Publisher of Innovation NewsBriefs before the Transportation Leaders session at the National Conference of State Legislatures, Phoenix, AZ, December 9, 2010 Broadly speaking, we can expect the changing balance of power in the next Congress to manifest itself in two ways: a strong push to […]
View this complete post...The Train to Nowhere: Three More Critical Perspectives
Monday, December 13th, 2010Lest you think Washington has begun a new era of fiscal self-restraint, consider this week’s act of political retribution by Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. Newly elected GOP Governors in Ohio and Wisconsin wanted to kill high-speed rail projects in their states and instead use the money to fix their battered roads. Sorry, guys. Mr. LaHood reclaimed the $1.2 billion and handed it to 13 other states that still want to build these high-speed trains to nowhere.
View this complete post...The Unraveling of the High-Speed Rail Program: A News Analysis
Wednesday, December 1st, 2010The future Republican House leadership is determined to retrieve whatever remains of the unspent and uncommitted stimulus (ARRA) funds. So has stated Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-CA), the prospective House Appropriations Committee chairman, as he introduced a bill (H.R. 6403, the “American Recovery and Reinvestment Rescission Act”) to rescind any unobligated ARRA funds and return them to the U.S. Treasury. Even already obligated ARRA funds may be at risk. Congressional GOP aides are reported to be closely reviewing agency records to identify particular stimulus-funded projects that could still be “reasonably” halted because work on them is only beginning.
View this complete post...A Fresh Look at the Prospects for Transportation in the New Congress
Tuesday, November 23rd, 2010Last month we conducted an informal survey among colleagues in the transportation community about the outlook for the federal surface transportation program in the year(s) ahead…One comment from a veteran transportation insider summed up concisely the collective mindset: “There will be nothing ‘transformational’ about the future program,” he opined.
View this complete post...A rail reality check that President Obama should heed
Wednesday, November 17th, 2010Innovation NewsBriefs Vol. 21, No. 28 PRESIDENT OBAMA wants Americans to zip around in high-speed trains, just as many Japanese, French, and Chinese already do. For him, the goal seems almost as much about national pride as job creation or energy savings. “There’s no reason that Europe or China should have the fastest trains,” he has said. […]
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