More than 1,000 days after the last transportation bill expired, Congress finally voted to approve a new transportation bill just moments ago. Unfortunately for those hoping for a bold step into the future, this bill represents a definite step backwards, the last gasp of an outdated 20th century program.

Rollback of citizen input and environmental protection, weakened repair standards, reduced local control among flaws in long-delayed bill.

Members of Congress have spent the last six weeks negotiating a transportation bill in conference committee, trying to beat the clock on the current extension set to expire June 30. As part of those negotiations, some members are attempting to strip the bill of key policies that would create safer streets for pedestrians. With more than 50,000 pedestrians killed between 2001 and 2010, Transportation for America is today releasing new data presenting a breakdown of fatalities by Congressional district.

It’s always hard to tell for certain what’s really happening on the inside during House-Senate conference committee negotiations on the transportation bill. Nearly all of the meetings are in private for the most part and confirming rumors and hearsay on what’s really happening is always very difficult. Which is one reason why you haven’t read [...]

Today’s the day. We’re joining with dozens of other groups and thousands of individuals for a day of calls to Congress on the transportation bill as a select group of senators and representatives are reconciling the House and Senate bills in a select committee. Call your Senators and representative and tell them that the conference committee must preserve the strong, bipartisan provisions contained in the Senate’s transportation bill.

After months of hard work and thousands of calls and e-mails from many of you, we’re close to finally seeing a full transportation bill reach a final vote. A select group of House and Senate members are negotiating the final transportation bill right now in a conference committee, and they have immense power to affect the final product. Can you take a minute to tell your senators and representative to prioritize the repair of our roads and bridges during negotiations?

As negotiations continue between the Senate’s bipartisan transportation bill and the House’s policy provisions, it’s a good time to look once again at the process of drafting and passing a transportation reauthorization and see where things currently stand. Fortunately, we have this useful graphic from our Transportation 101 book that shows a simple view of how things usually proceed — complete with a “you are here” marker, just like a helpful wayfinding sign on a street corner.

The “conference” on the transportation bill between the House and Senate began yesterday. As the conferees work to produce a final bill, they must keep in mind the priorities that millions of Americans of all political and socio-economic stripes have expressed in polls, town hall meetings, and countless events. Many of these can be found in the bipartisan, compromise bill passed by the Senate and should be preserved during negotiations.

A House provision to undermine basic environmental safeguards and squelch citizen involvement was included in the three-month extension intended for conference with Senate. House leaders last week passed their three-month transportation bill extension to serve as a “shell” to get them to the negotiating table with the Senate. But in order to keep more conservative members happy, they included three anti-environment provisions, two of which — the Keystone XL pipeline and de-regulation of coal ash — unrelated to transportation.