This guest post by Brendan Halleman, a fellow transportation professional, offers a paper that examines the merits of establishing a National Infrastructure Bank. As you are probably aware, the public discussion around this has been highly politicized and my note merely tries to put quantified elements on the table.

Image Courtesy: Wikipedia

Note: Brendan Halleman is a Project Consultant – Communications & Knowledge Management and has extensive experience in the transportation industry.  Check out his profile http://www.linkedin.com/in/bhalleman. All opinions expressed in this guest post are those of the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the positions of www.Transportgooru.com.

(Sources Contributing to this Hybrid Report:  Streetsblog; PBS -The Dig; Journal of Commerce)

Every six years the law authorizing national transportation policy and funding needs renewal. The current law expires Sept. 30 — in nine days.The House will consider a three-month extension of the current highway bill rather than the 18-month extension the administration and Senate want. The extension will avoid a collapse of highway spending on Oct. 1, according to House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee press secretary James Berard.

Rep. James Oberstar (D., Minn.), Chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, is staunchly against an 18-month delay. As a result, it is likely he will propose a three-month extension later this week.

The 18-month extension is favored by the Senate and White House. A Senate spokesman said that the four committees with jurisdiction over the highway bill have reported legislation to the floor, but the bills have not been up for debate before the full body.

(Source: Streetsblog, WATodau.au.com, Smart Growth America)

Image Courtesy: Smart Growth America

Within the $787 billion stimulus bill that became law in February, Congress provided states and Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs) with $26.6 billion in flexible funds for transportation projects. Today marks 120 days from the apportionment of the funds to the states.

Smart Growth America released a report today examining how well states have been spending these billions. As they say on the Smart Growth America blog today, not only did the money arrive in a time of economic recession, but “at a time of embarrassingly large backlogs of road and bridge repairs, inadequate and underfunded public transportation systems, and too-few convenient, affordable transportation options.”

So after 120 days, how have states done in addressing these pressing needs and investing in progress for their communities?

After analyzing project descriptions provided by states and MPOs, Smart Growth America found forward looking states and communities that used the stimulus money as flexibly as possible, repairing roads and bridges and making the kinds of smart, 21st century transportation investments that their communities need to support strong economic growth.

While some states proved excellent at investing wisely and making progress, most states failed to fulfill pressing transportation needs. Nearly one-third of the money, $6.6 billion, went towards building new road capacity. Only 2.8% was spent on public transportation, and 0.9% percent on non-motorized projects.

The Secretary of Transportation, Ray Lahood, in his daily blog noted that ARRA is working successfully across America. Some folks in the transportation community are not totally happy about how the money had been spent. Streetsblog points out that $6.6B in Stimulus Cash is spent on New Roads, Not Repair. It says:

Distressingly — but unsurprisingly — quite a lot is going to new roads rather than repair of existing ones. Of the $26.6 billion sent to states under a flexible transportation mandate, SGA found that $6.6 billion has gone towards building new highway capacity.

Only $185 million of the flexible stimulus aid has been used on transit and non-motorized transportation, which was given about $8 billionin separate funding as well.

One culprit behind this questionable use of taxpayer money, as SGA reports, is a theme at risk of repeating itself during the upcoming debate over broad transportation reform: the lack of accountability.

Most states and localities reported the projects they selected for stimulus aid only after the fact, allowing a privately run website to monitor the process much faster than the Obama administration.

But inconsistent reporting is just the beginning of the problem, as SGA points out in its report:

Most states failed to educate, engage, and seek input from the public before making decisions. … There is not a clear articulation of what project portfolios should accomplish, no methods identified for evaluating projects against these goals or against one another, and few repercussions for achieving or failing to achieve these goals.

SGA mined the stimulus itself, as well as comments by administration officials, to produce a list of nine goals that can be used to evaluate its transportation spending. But the lack of tangible consequences for not meeting those goals has left states free to spend at will, often focusing more on the report’s No. 1 objective (“create and save jobs”) than Nos. 5 (“improve public transportation”), 7 (“cut greenhouse gas emissions”), and 8 (“not contribute to additional sprawl”).

Interestingly enough, Senior White House adviser David Axelrod says the economic stimulus package has not yet “broken the back of the recession” but set aside calls for a second massive spending bill. Republicans, meanwhile, have called the spending under way a failure.

Some economists and business leaders have called for a second spending bill designed to help guide the economy through a downturn that has left millions without jobs. Axelrod said it’s too early to know if more spending would be needed or if the administration would seek more money from Congress.

“Most of the stimulus money – the economic recovery money – is yet to be spent. Let’s see what impact that has,” Axelrod said. “I’m not going to make any judgment as to whether we need more. We have confidence that the things we’re doing are going to help, but we’ve said repeatedly, it’s going to take time, and it will take time. It took years to get into the mess we’re in. It’s not going to take months to get out of it.”

Click here to download Smart Growth for America’s report:  The States and the Stimulus – Are they using it to create jobs and 21st century transportation?

(Source: New York Times & Planetizen)

It was hailed as the solution to America’s infrastructure spending deficit, but the influx of private funds has come to halt along with the failure of banks and the huge investment from the Recovery Act. Plus, many schemes aroused taxpayers wrath.

Late last month plans to privatize “Alligator Alley,” a 78-mile stretch of Florida highway that connects Fort Lauderdale with Naples, collapsed when no bidders showed up. The failure has had a ripple effect — in Mississippi, state officials have pushed back the bidding schedule for a new 12-mile toll road.

Then there is the $1.2 billion privatization of 36,000 parking meters in Chicago. In the five months since the deal took effect, widespread complaints about poor service and rising parking rates have created a political firestorm for the Chicago City Council. Public opposition was so strong that on Wednesday the council approved a delay in voting on any future asset sales.

Chicago public officials have called the work of the private operator, Chicago Parking Meters L.L.C., “simply unacceptable.” For its part, the operator has apologized and announced it would delay price increases at the meters.

Proponents of public-to-private asset sales point to the $1.8 billion lease of the 7.8-mile Chicago Skyway in 2004 and the $3.8 billion raised by Indiana through a 75-year lease of its toll road in 2006 as successful pioneering efforts.

In Indiana, the money went to pay for a 10-year highway infrastructure program, and Gov. Mitch Daniels was re-elected last year promoting the lease, despite bumper stickers that read “Keep the Toll Road, Lease Mitch.”

The stimulus money, as well as other infrastructure money promised by Congress, has provided temporary relief for cash-poor municipalities. But this situation will not last forever.

(Source: Streetsblog & Wall Street Journal)

The Obama administration is working on a plan to fill the shortfall in the nation’s highway trust fund by August without adding to the federal deficit, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood told Congress yesterday.

The highway trust fund, which relies mostly on gas-tax revenue, will need up to $7 billion in additional money by the end of summer to ensure states continue receiving payments, LaHood told the transportation subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee. The fund also will need up to $10 billion in the 12 months after September to ensure its solvency, LaHood said.

“We believe very strongly that any trust fund fix must be paid for,” LaHood told members of the House Appropriations Committee’s transportation panel. “We also believe that any trust fund fix must be tied to reform of the current highway program to make it more performance-based and accountable, such as improving safety or improving the livability of our communities — two priorities for me.”

The administration’s quest to offset its trust fund fix, which will cost as much as $7 billion, could prove fruitless.  Rep. John Olver (D-MA), chairman of the panel that greeted LaHood today, put it simply when asked if the necessary spending cuts could be found. “That’d be very tough,” he said, noting that his own annual transportation spending is unlikely to become law before the highway trust fund runs out of cash.  Replenishing the trust fund with a cost offset, as LaHood suggests, requires a serious conversation about finding new long-term revenue sources for not just highways but all modes of transportation.

But he said the President Barack Obama administration has ruled out raising the gas tax to provide additional funding, saying an economic recession isn’t the time to make such a move.  “We are not going to raise the gasoline tax. I’ll just say that emphatically,” LaHood said.

Click here to read the entire article.

REDMOND, Washington — Should a bridge that would connect two campuses at Microsoft’s headquarters be funded with $11 million from the federal stimulus package?

Supporters argue the bridge is an ideal public-private partnership that will benefit an entire community while fulfilling the stimulus package’s goal of getting people back to work.

An artist's rendering shows how the proposed bridge would be constructed over a busy highway.

“It’s going create just under 400 jobs for 18 months constructing the bridge,” says Redmond Mayor John Marchione. “It’s also connecting our technical sector with our retail and commercial sectors so people can cross the freeway to shop and help traffic flow.”

Marchione applied for federal stimulus money after costs jumped on the project from $25 million to $36 million. Marchione says the increase in costs were due to a rise in construction prices and because the bridge will be built on a diagonal in order to connect Microsoft’s original East campus with a newer West campus that are split by a public highway.

Microsoft is hardly getting the bridge for free. The company is contributing $17.5 million or a little less than half the tab of the $36 million bridge, which would be open for public use.

And even though the bridge goes from a parking lot behind Microsoft’s West campus across a highway to an entrance of Microsoft’s East campus, Marchione says, people other than Microsoft employees would use the overpass.

“We’re not a one-company town,” Marchione says. “Our traffic studies show that Microsoft traffic would be about 42 percent of the bridge, yet Microsoft is paying for about 50 percent of the bridge, so we think we are getting fair value.

“The United States taxpayer is leveraging their dollars, and I think everyone is getting a fair deal.”  But a watchdog group monitoring how stimulus money is being spent says the taxpayer in this case is getting ripped off.  Click here to read the entire CNN article.

Another article on Softpedia.com offers the view point from Microsoft’s General counsel, Brad Smith, and Washington’s Governor Chris Gregoire. 

“In recent days, some have questioned whether this project should have been a recipient of federal stimulus funding. We think this is a very positive example of a public-private partnership, and we are pleased to be contributing roughly 50 percent of the funding to help build this public project that will benefit the entire community. The federal stimulus dollars combine with additional state, local and existing federal dollars to fund the remainder,” revealed Brad Smith, Microsoft general counsel. 

Smith underlined that not only was Microsoft participating in the project with half the funding, but that the company had already spent in excess of $50 million to help local authorities build infrastructure projects. At the same time, the overpass will not benefit Microsoft exclusively. Employees from Honeywell, Siemens, Nintendo and Sears will also get to use the bridge and will contribute to reducing the congestion affecting 148th Avenue NE and 156th Avenue NE. 

Washington Governor Chris Gregoire explained that the overpass was not about Microsoft but “about multiple employers. It’s about thousands of employees and residents. It’s about taking people off the congestion we have in that interchange on [State Route] 520 now, where we literally have a problem in that people have to go 2 miles rather than two-tenths of a mile which that bridge would produce…. Almost 50 percent of that project is privately funded. That’s leveraging dollars. That’s what we’re trying to do, is to use private sector dollars with stimulus dollars and get a bigger bang for the buck.”  Here is a video of Gov. Gregoire discussing the issue (courtesy of Softpedia.com)

(Source:  Whitehouse.gov via Planetizen)

Just two weeks after signing that legislation, we’re about to start the biggest investment on our nation’s road, bridges, highways and tunnels since we built the Interstate Highway System over 50 years ago.  It’s a big deal.  The work is beginning now, with hundreds more projects getting underway in the next few months.  Some project will start this month, some won’t get going until the summer.  We’re going to do everything we can to get them moving as quickly as possible.  But Americans didn’t get in this mess overnight.  And unfortunately, unfortunately, it’s going to take some time for us to get out of this.

     Mr. President, you also made it clear that we have an obligation to the taxpayers of this nation to make sure their money is being used wisely, to make it accountable and transparent.  Folks, we’re going to ask of you a sense of diligence and transparency and responsibility as has not been asked before, because we’ve never made this kind of investment before.  This is a big deal.  Never before in the history of this country have the people been more able to see with such complete transparency how we’re going to put their money to work, not just in this agency but particularly here. 

Excerpts from President Obama’s address:

     Of the 3.5 million jobs that will be created and saved over the next two years as a result of this recovery plan, 400,000 will be jobs rebuilding our crumbling roads, bridges, and schools, repairing our faulty levees and dams, connecting nearly every American to broadband, and upgrading the buses and trains that commuters take every day.  Many of these projects will be coordinated by Secretary LaHood and all of you at the Department of Transportation.  And I want you to know that the American public is grateful to public servants like you — men and women whose work isn’t always recognized, but whose jobs are critical to our nation’s safety, security, and prosperity.  You have never been more important than you are right now, and for that we are all grateful.  (Applause.) 

     Now, in the coming days and weeks, my administration will be announcing more details about the kinds of transportation projects that will be launched as part of the recovery plan.  But today, I want to speak about an investment we are making in one part of our infrastructure.  Through the Recovery Act, we will be investing $28 billion in our highways, money that every one of our 50 states can start using immediately to put people back to work.  It’s an investment being made at an unprecedented pace, thanks in large part to Joe Biden, who’s leading the effort to get the money out the door quickly.  Because of Joe, and because of all the governors and mayors, county and city officials who are helping implement this plan, I can say that 14 days after I signed our Recovery Act into law, we are seeing shovels hit the ground.