Strengthening Our Infrastructure for a Sustainable Future
(Source: Brookings Institution)
Metropolitan Policy Program , Vice President and Director,
National Governors Association Winter Meeting
I want to commend NGA and Governor Rendell for dedicating such a substantial portion of your winter meeting to the topic of infrastructure. This is a topic that is routinely relegated to specialists in the field – whether they are civil engineers, or heads of your state DOT’s, or advocates.
It turns out that hard times are the right time to focus on infrastructure.
Now there are those who naturally see the current situation and want to spend more to repair our deficient infrastructure, to address our major gateways and corridors, to make transit more the norm than the exception.
But this is not just about more spending. First and foremost we need reform, then we need to invest.
So let me begin with my first point: after years and years of benign neglect, infrastructure is truly getting public hearing.
First, as we all know, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act that the President signed into law last Tuesday provides a lot of money for infrastructure.