(Source: Financial Times)

“History reminds us,” President Barack Obama told both houses of the US Congress on Tuesday night, “that at every moment of economic upheaval and transformation, this nation has responded with bold action and big ideas.” By “the nation”, Mr Obama means “the government”. We can tell by the episodes he uses to make his point: the establishment of universal public education, the GI Bill of Rights and – alluded to but not named – the Highway Act of 1956, at the time of its passage the largest public works project in US history.

Mr Obama’s praise for the Highway Act is disturbing. In arguments over his stimulus package and his preliminary budget released on Thursday, Republicans have made the lazy assumption that government intervention in the economy can never succeed. Mr Obama shows signs of the opposite error – believing it can never fail.

The Highway Act probably has more defenders than detractors. But Mr Obama should be among the latter. The act, which budgeted $25bn in federal money to build 41,000 miles of motorway, exacerbated the very problems Mr Obama has been most eager to solve – spoliation of the environment, dependence on foreign oil, overburdening of state and local budgets, abandonment of the inner-city poor and reckless speculation in real-estate development, to name a few.

A lot of people complain today about the rump of Republican disbelievers in Keynes, feckless though they may be, who fiddle while Rome burns. There was no hint of such heresy in 1956. The Senate passed the bill 89-1. Otherwise, the political climate bore some resemblance to our own: conformism bred of confusion. A 40,000 mile highway network had been on the wish list of the armed forces since 1944. Eisenhower was a big backer, and had hopes of justifying it as a stimulus during the recession of 1954. That downturn was long past when the bill came to a vote, but the vested interests remained, and so did the fear that one’s constituents might think it a bit communist to vote against a highway bill.

Click here to read the entire article.  (Free registration required at FT.com)

TransportGooru recommends all readers to listen to this interesting coverage on NPR.

(Source:  NPR)

 President Obama’s economic stimulus package includes $8 billion for speeding up train travel. America is far behind other industrial countries in high speed rail. A few years ago, Spain was also behind the curve. But the Spanish network is expanding fast, and the trains are beating planes.

(Source: TreeHugger)

(Source:  Wall Street Journal)

President Obama and Vice President Biden spoke with Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood Tuesday at Transportation Department headquarters, where they announced the first batch of stimulus funds getting distributed. In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, Mr. LaHood talked about spending stimulus money wisely, his opposition to an increase in the gasoline tax, new fuel emission standards and more. Below are edited excerpts from the interview.

* * *

The Wall Street Journal: What’s being done to ensure that the $48 billion going to transportation projects in the stimulus bill is spent wisely?

Mr. LaHood: Our people are in touch daily with these DOT secretaries. We generally, having worked with them for years and years and years, know what is fundable. It really falls under two categories. Projects that were started and then stopped because they ran out of money, and something that’s been sitting on a shelf in a DOT office because they didn’t have the money to fund it. Some of these, like the one we announced today (a road repaving project in suburban Maryland), have been in process…These are projects that these folks have known about and have been talking about for some time. This isn’t something brand new that’s been sprung up on them…I don’t think you’re going to see something weird pop up…It’s pretty traditional stuff. It really is.

WSJ: Are you concerned when you hear squabbles between mayors and governors over how to spend the stimulus money?

Mr. LaHood: [Cities] are concerned that 70% of the money is going to the states and they’re only going to get 30%…These disputes, look it, they’re going to take place….In the end, I’m not going to be able to change the idea that 70% of this is going to the states and 30% are going to them. I tried to make a case for them. But the way it’s designed here…it is what it is.

(Source:  New York Times)

Kansas will widen U.S. Route 69 to remove a bottleneck outside Kansas City, along with three other expensive projects. Maryland will spend its money in smaller pieces, resurfacing dozens of rutted roads and highways. Colorado will build an interchange on Elk Creek Road in Jefferson County, complete with an underpass for the elk.

Click here to read the entire article.

(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.

 

(Source: Living on Earth)

Ridership on the nation’s mass transit systems; subways, buses and light rails, is at an all time high. But while the mass is up – transit, the number of stops and services is dropping dramatically, even while ticket prices are taking a hike. The federal stimulus package will infuse a massive 16 billion dollars into public transit, half of that for high speed rails.

And William Millar, President of the American Public Transportation Association says, the money is arriving right on time.

MILLAR: Well we like to say it’s the best of times and worst of times, as that famous writer once said. In – since that – in 2007 we had reached a modern high of about 10.3 billion times that year Americans used public transit, only to be eclipsed in 2008. Looks like there’ll be at least five percent higher than that . 

Eleven federally designated high-speed rail corridors have been in the works for years, but funding for the projects was not available until now. (Courtesy of the U.S. House of Representatives)

MILLAR: In most cases the revenue is not able to keep up with the cost. While people think of paying their fare let’s say when they get on the subway line, that fare is designed to only cover perhaps a third, maybe half the cost of the system. The rest comes from a combination of federal, state and local funds, and those funds come from the very sources that we’re seeing the down turn in the economy. So, sales taxes is a frequent way that it happens or property taxes, and, of course, property values are falling throughout the country. Sometimes gasoline taxes, but, of course, we’re using less gasoline than we did. So at the very time we ought to be increasing our public transit use to meet the new demand, we’re finding that many transit systems around the country are having to cut back, having to raise fares, because, of course, we have to balance our budgets just like everyone e/lse does.

(Source: TreeHugger)

Rail station in Shanghai, China (photo via thetransportpolitic.com)

A breakdown of provisions and funding requirements for mass transit in The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

The Dig ~ Infrastructure of the stimulus plan: $8.4 billion in Mass Transit | Blueprint America.

(Source: Backgrounder, Council on Foreign Relations) 

 

Author:	Robert McMahon, Deputy Editor

Introduction : 

Transportation experts view the call for dramatic federal government action in response to the economic crisis as an opportunity to overhaul the U.S. system of highways, bridges, railways, and mass transit. A series of sobering report cards from the American Society of Civil Engineers documents the inadequacy of this system. President Barack Obama took office pledging to act; his February 2009 stimulus package provides nearly $50 billion for transportation infrastructure. But many experts look beyond the stimulus and call for shifts in longer-term policy that will fundamentally alter the approach to planning and funding infrastructure and bolster U.S. competitiveness, quality of life, and security. In the past, the United States has revamped its transportationinfrastructure to build canals, transcontinental railways, and a federal highway system, in each case helping usher in periods of economic growth.

A State of Disrepair