Steve Davis, Author at Transportation For America

About Steve Davis

Stephen Lee Davis is the AVP for Transportation Strategy at Smart Growth America.

Diving into performance measures with T4’s resident expert

Feel a little lost when it comes to the concept of transportation performance measures? In the first post of a short series expressly for T4A members, Our resident expert and USDOT veteran will help bring you up to speed with a high-level overview of the concept and a quick look at the current state of practice.

This is the first post in a series on performance measures by Beth Osborne, T4America Senior Policy Advisor. Read the rest of the series and find out how and why you should go beyond the federal requirements, learn more about choosing the best measures for addressing your priorities, and learn how to demonstrate to the public that their dollars are being used wisely. -Ed.

Beth Osborne, T4America

As Congress debates a new surface transportation reauthorization bill, it is easy to forget that the transition to performance measurement required by MAP-21 has not yet been fully implemented. The language in MAP-21 required that states and metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs) determine the success or failure of their transportation system by measuring the performance of their investments against federally-required measures, but USDOT has been slow to finalize those benchmarks and kickstart this new process for states and MPOs.

While USDOT continues to work their way through this process via three rulemakings, there are two big issues with which everyone will grapple.

First, though MAP-21 requires specific areas to be measured, the areas were limited to those on which Congress could agree — measures including safety, system condition, system performance, mobile source emissions, and freight movement on interstates and congestion, among others. MAP-21 did not address other measures like economic impact, access to opportunity, transportation cost, freight movement (beyond interstates) and other environmental impacts beyond air quality.

T4A members should be concerned about these missing areas. Regions that fail to consider them may end up only building projects that address Congress’ priorities and not the priorities of their constituents. If you or your community want to consider other factors and measures when picking projects and choosing where to invest, it is time to confer with political and civic leaders, stakeholders and the public to identify those priority areas and the measures that go with them.

Nationwide, states and MPOs are discussing this issue now — before the rule is completed by USDOT and everyone is forced to get moving on USDOT’s tight implementation timeline. We will talk more about how this can be done in the next post, with some specific examples.

Second, regions should pay close attention to the development of each performance measure rule by USDOT because those rules will establish exactly what each state and region will measure. There are more ways to measure “National Highway System performance” and even “congestion,” for example, than you may realize, with a wide range of impacts based on how each issue is measured.

Congestion could be a measure, as engineers have traditionally treated it, of moving cars through an area as fast as possible. Or we could focus on moving people instead of cars. Keeping cars moving so that traffic never slows — no matter how many cars are on the road — is an extremely expensive, if not impossible, proposition. If your goal is moving people, the solution will be much more affordable, flexible and tailored to the overall community goals.

We will dig in deeper to the issue of how the wrong measures can send a community in the wrong direction in an upcoming post.

USDOT split their full rule for performance measurement into three parts. Their first part covered safety measures; the second, system condition measures (i.e., road and bridge condition); and the third contains all the other measures mentioned above. The first two parts of the rule have already been released, commented upon and closed. The third (the biggest one) is still pending and will probably be released to the public for comment toward the end of this year.

Stay tuned right here, T4A members! Over the next few weeks, we will unpack the thorny issue of performance measures and provide you with insights into preparing for this new decision-making system and how you can use it to build support for your programs and help make a case for needed funding.

For more information, feel free to check out our report on performance measures, Measuring What We Value.

10 things you need to know about the Senate’s DRIVE Act

The Senate approved their multi-year transportation authorization bill by a 65-34 vote this week. You can view our full statement on the DRIVE Act here from T4America Chairman John Robert Smith. Meanwhile, here are 10 things that you need to know about what’s in the Senate bill.

1) Funding from deficit spending vs. pay-as-you-go

How do you pay for a six-year transportation authorization when the transportation fund is broke and Congress is unwilling to raise the federal gasoline tax? For the DRIVE Act, the Senate bridged the gap between dwindling user fee revenues and total spending by getting creative. In the end, they cobbled together $46 billion in non-transportation-related funds, fees and accounting maneuvers.

Among some of the more controversial “pay-fors” in the Senate bill is a requirement to sell 100 million barrels of the 693 million barrels in the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) between 2018 and 2025, estimated to bring in $9 billion if it can be sold at $95 per barrel ($30-40 more per-barrel than today’s price). Add to that the indexing of customs fees (ironic for a Congress unwilling to index gasoline taxes), an extension of airport TSA fees through 2025, closing estate fee loopholes, and reducing the “fixed dividend rate” the Federal Reserve pays to banks.

But while the bill needs 10 years to recognize some of the new revenues or savings that won’t occur until the 2025, it would instantly transfer billions from the general fund to the transportation fund, increasing the deficit. Senator Bob Corker (R-TN) called it “generational theft,” while T4A Chair John Robert Smith asked, “Is it fiscally responsible to place the cost of paying for three years of transportation investments on the backs of our children and grandchildren?”

A final point of clarification on the length of Senate bill: the DRIVE Act authorizes six years of spending, but provides only three years of funding certainty. In 2018, Congress will have to find an additional $51 billion to fully fund the bill for the remaining three years of its authorization. Despite calls from a diverse cross-section of industry and advocacy groups for a “long-term, sustainable funding solution” for transportation, the DRIVE Act is patched together with temporary and speculative “pay-fors,” the type that are only going to get harder to find three years from now.

Policy	Ten-year savings
Reduce the fixed dividend rate the Federal Reserve pays larger banks	$17.10 billion
Sell 101 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve	$9.05 billion
Index customs fees for inflation	$5.70 billion
Extend current budget treatment of TSA fees from 2023 to 2025	$3.50 billion
Use private debt collectors to collect overdue tax payments	$2.48 billion
Extend Fannie/Freddie guarantee fees	$1.90 billion
Require lenders to report more information on outstanding mortgages	$1.80 billion
Close an estate tax loophole about the reporting of property	$1.50 billion
Clarify the statute of limitations on reassessing certain tax returns	$1.20 billion
Revoke or deny passports for those with seriously delinquent taxes	$0.40 billion
Devote civil penalties for motor safety violations to the Highway Trust Fund	$0.35 billion
Stop paying interest when companies overpay for mineral leases	$0.32 billion
Adjust tax-filing deadlines for businesses	$0.30 billion
Allow employers to transfer excess defined-benefit plan assets to retiree medical accounts and group-term life insurance	$0.20 billion
TOTAL	$45.80 Billion

2) Local communities get the short end of the stick…again

The DRIVE Act bypasses America’s cities and towns, reducing the already small amount of funding they directly control to invest in locally-driven projects by nearly $200 million in the first year alone compared to MAP-21. We were extremely disappointed to see a bipartisan amendment from Senators Roger Wicker (R-MS) and Cory Booker (D-NJ), with support from Sens. Casey (D-PA), Durbin (D-IL), Peters (D-MI) and Stabenow (D-MI) fail to receive a fair hearing on the floor. Their plan would have put a larger share of transportation dollars in the hands of local governments by increasing the amount of flexible federal Surface Transportation Program (STP) dollars directly provided to metropolitan areas of all sizes and allowing direct access to the funding for rural areas through a grant program. By failing to bring more dollars, control and accountability closer to the local level, the bill fails to restore the trust of the American people in how our transportation decisions are being made.

3) Progress on a national freight policy but with funding stuck in 20^th century silos

The Senate recognized the economic importance of moving goods efficiently throughout the country by including a new freight program that also includes real funding: almost $1 billion in the first year, and up to $2.5 billion annually towards the end of the authorization.

Unfortunately, 90 percent of the dollars reserved for the freight program are restricted to highway projects. This decision runs counter to the realities of how our freight moves: generally, no one product gets to its destination by one mode of transportation, but rather relies on a interconnected and efficient system of ports, rail lines, highways, urban streets and intermodal yards all working together.

There’s a mixed message here. The bill requires USDOT, states and MPOs to conduct thoughtful national- and state-level freight planning to analyze the condition and performance of the freight transportation system and identify the highest priority needs to create greater efficiency and reliability in freight movement, regardless of mode. After all this planning is done, the Senate bill instructs states and MPOs to focus only on highway projects at the expense of rail lines, ports and a truly intermodal network.

4) For the first time, intercity passenger rail is included in a surface transportation bill

While the popular shorthand for the transportation authorization is “the highway bill,” the nation’s transportation program has included dedicated funding for public transportation and bicycling and walking since 1982 and 1991 respectively. But intercity passenger rail has been consistently left out of the overall surface transportation legislation – until now.

For the first time, the nation’s passenger rail policy is included in the bill, laying the groundwork for further improvements and expansion of the nation’s passenger rail service to match the recent unparalleled growth in ridership. Previously, the passenger rail bill has always passed as a standalone authorization, but the DRIVE Act would enshrine the policy in the nation’s surface transportation bill. While the rail programs would still require annual appropriations for funding, it takes an important step forward in providing Amtrak sustainable funding and helping to expand service to meet booming demand.

5) Popular TIGER program fails to win a permanent seat at the table

The USDOT’s competitive TIGER grants represent one of the few ways local communities can directly access federal funds for their local priority projects. While disaster was averted as the bill was being drafted and TIGER hasn’t been changed in this bill, the Senate missed a major opportunity to authorize the program and make it a permanent part of the nation’s transportation policy. If this bill passed, supportive lawmakers will have to continue to fight each year for TIGER funding through the annual appropriations process, resulting in up and down fluctuations in available funding year to year. That makes it tough for local communities to plan and compete within this popular and oversubscribed program.

Nearly one-third of the Senate endorsed Senator Patty Murray’s (D-WA) amendment to authorize TIGER and provide $500 million per year in contract authority via the transportation fund. Unfortunately, along with the Wicker-Booker amendment, this important provision was not given an open and fair hearing on the floor.

6) TIFIA loans can fund TOD, but under a dramatically scaled back program

One of Senator Barbara Boxer’s (D-CA) signature achievements in MAP-21 was an expansion of the TIFIA loan program from nearly $125 million up to $1 billion in annual financing authority. This move greatly expanded an innovative program of low-cost federal financing that doesn’t have to be repaid immediately, allowing the financial benefits of a project to accrue before payments are due. While two good changes were made in the DRIVE Act — making transit-oriented development (TOD) an eligible expenditure and making it easier for local projects, TOD and ITS to access this program by lowering the total project cost threshold lowered from $50 million to $10 million — the program’s funding was scaled back significantly, from $1 billion to $300 million annually.

7) Transit wins additional funds, but projects with private involvement can ‘skip the line’

Overall, public transportation was spared any cuts and in fact received a larger portion of overall authorized funding. As initially introduced by Majority Leader McConnell (R-KY), the DRIVE Act provided transit with 24 percent of the bill’s funding, but the new money used to fill the gap in the transportation fund was directed almost entirely to the highway program. As a result, the mass transit account was set to end the third year of the bill (FY2018) with a negative balance of $180 million. This was fixed on the Senate floor with help from Sen. Durbin (D-IL) and others, and in the end transit received a nearly 25 increase in funding over the six years of the authorization.

One provision in the transit title of the DRIVE Act generating controversy is the ability for projects with any private sector involvement in design, construction, operation, or maintenance of transit projects to jump to the front of the line for the already oversubscribed transit New Starts Program.

8) Active transportation funding survives intact

While the bill represents a missed opportunity for local communities on the whole, the bill slightly increases funding for the popular Transportation Alternatives Program (TAP) to $850 million, but it caps the growth there over the life of the bill. Unlike other programs, this means TAP will not be able to grow with inflation over the life of the six-year authorization.

On a positive note, communities that use TAP to help make biking or walking safer and more convenient will receive 100 percent of the program’s funds, meaning all $850 million will be available to communities. States formerly controlled half of the program’s funds — but no longer.

9) Limited progress to improve accountability through performance measures

The DRIVE Act takes one small step to build on project selection and performance management, a key reform of MAP-21. The DRIVE Act provides MPOs and states support in developing their performance measure programs by requiring USDOT to develop datasets and data analysis tools. This includes addressing data gaps for trip origin and destination, trip time and travel mode.

While USDOT has yet to complete their assignment to establish rules for the performance measures contained in MAP-21, there were steps available to the Senate such as including measures such as connectivity and access to jobs or improving project selection processes to open up the “black box” and provide greater transparency and understanding for why one project receives funds over another. None of these positive ideas were included in the DRIVE Act that passed the Senate.

10) Positive advances for next-generation transportation research

At a time when transformative changes in technology are beginning to reshape the transportation landscape, providing an outcome-based 21^st century transportation research program is needed now more than ever. Fortunately, this is an area that the DRIVE Act did well. First, the bill establishes competitive funding for local governments and MPOs, among others, to deploy and test innovative research. This is important, since MAP-21 provided limited dollars outside of formula funds to test and deploy the next generation of transportation innovations. Second, the bill would require USDOT to study “shared use mobility” (car-sharing, bike-sharing, ride-sharing, etc.) and other innovative concepts, and provide local and regional leaders best practices and better understanding of the shared use transportation sector. This is important since we need to provide our leaders the understanding of this new transportation sector so that they can adequately plan and provide for its growth.

The last thing you need to know is that the work is far from over. While the Senate passed this long-term bill, both chambers also passed short-term extensions to MAP-21, setting up October 29th as the next deadline to agree on a multi-year transportation bill. Will the House pass the Senate’s bill? Will they draft a bill of their own? Will they fail to do anything and move to another short-term extension in October? Stay tuned.

Senate on the verge of passing a multi-year transportation bill

After several contentious procedural votes to keep the bill moving forward over the past week, the Senate is likely to be taking a final vote on their three-year transportation bill at some point before the end of the week. Here’s a short update on where things currently stand.

First, here are the six most useful tidbits to know right now:

The Senate is a few more procedural votes away from a final vote on their three-year transportation bill.
Little in the bill has substantially changed since it was first introduced, though a few fixes were made to issues in the first draft having to do with transit funding and complete streets language.
The contentious amendment to reauthorize the Export-Import Bank through 2019 was approved and included in the base bill last night.
The first manager’s package of amendments has been moved to consideration, though nothing has actually been approved yet.
Whether this long-term bill passes the Senate this week or not, there will likely be an extension to MAP-21 for 3 to 5 months. This is intended to provide time for the House and Senate to negotiate a final agreement.
Including the Wicker-Booker amendment to increase transportation funding going directly to local communities is still our best chance to improve this bill. Getting more support for this amendment from other Senators is the best method to have it included in a manager’s package or as one of the few (if any) amendments considered on the floor. But the prospects are not good without more support. We’re working hard to drive up sponsors — Sen. Durbin from Illinois and Sen. Peters from Michigan hopped on as co-sponsors yesterday! — but we still need your help. Send another letter, or make a phone call as soon as possible.

After one failed vote early last week, the overall Senate transportation bill passed a cloture motion late last week that cleared the way for the bill to be considered and debated on the Senate floor.

Before they can take a final vote on the bill, the Senate has to work through the amendment process. Because of Sen. McConnell’s parliamentary actions to “fill the amendment tree,” we don’t forsee the usual open amendment process playing out where individual amendments are offered on the floor and debated. Instead, for the most part, any amendments to the bill will have to be included in the manager’s package to be voted on all at once or adopted by unanimous consent.

Last night, the Senate took small steps toward a final vote by successfully voting to include a reauthorization of the Export-Import Bank in the base bill and begin the debate on the manager’s package of amendments. Whether there is a third manager’s package or not, once they are approved, it clears the way to take a final cloture vote to halt debate on the underlying bill and move to a vote on final passage.

If that passes, we’ll have 30 hours of debate on the bill before a vote on final passage sometime before Friday night.

As to MAP-21’s expiration, the House already passed a five-month extension. However, the House has now agreed to move a shorter 3-month extension tomorrow and Speaker John Boehner has said they are leaving town after the vote for August recess. We expect the Senate to take up and pass the House’s 3-month patch and very likely pass their multi-year surface transportation authorization package this week as well.

Support the new plan from a bipartisan duo of senators to send more transportation dollars to local communities

Two Senators championing the cause of giving local communities more control over their transportation dollars have introduced a modified plan to steer more federal transportation dollars directly to local communities of all sizes — reaching a compromise that they hope to incorporate into the Senate’s transportation bill as it heads to the floor.

The Innovation in Surface Transportation Act has been one of our biggest priorities for more than a year now. That bill would put a small share of each state’s federal transportation dollars into a competitive grant program so that towns and cities of all sizes could compete directly on the merits for transportation funds. Local communities get a seat at the table and get more access to federal dollars that can be spent on a wide variety of locally determined transportation projects and programs.

ISTA is a great proposal and it remains active in the House of Representatives, but the two Senators who introduced it have come together on a new plan to accomplish the same goal, one with even more widespread support.

A new proposal from Senators Wicker (R-MS) and Booker (D-NJ) would put a larger share of transportation dollars directly in the hands of local governments by increasing the amount of flexible federal Surface Transportation Program (STP) dollars directly given to metropolitan areas of all sizes.

This new proposal will hopefully be offered as an amendment to the long-term transportation bill currently before the Senate.

We need to drive up support for this plan now as the Senate considers their bill. Send a message to your Senators and urge them to support this provision from Senators Booker and Wicker.

SEND A MESSAGE

It’s a proposal that works for red states and blue states, heavily urbanized areas and smaller rural towns — evident from the support of a Democratic Senator from the most urbanized state in the country, and a Republican Senator from the deep south where a large percentage of his state’s population lives in smaller urbanized areas.

How the current system works for local communities, and how it falls short

Today, small metro areas (under 200,000 people) are at the mercy of their state’s decision-making process for transportation spending in their area.

Large metro areas (over 200,000 people) directly receive a share of flexible federal dollars through a process known as suballocation. But in the smaller metro areas under 200,000 in population, those “suballocated” funds go directly to the state instead, which has total control over spending that money. The only basic requirement is that the state must spend a predetermined share of those funds within the state’s smaller metro areas, but the local community gets little say on how those dollars are spent.

Those decisions are left entirely up to the state, even though the funds are expressly intended by federal law for those smaller cities and metro areas.

While there’s some variety from state to state in how this plays out — a few select states are certainly more respectful of local communities’ wishes — it means that a local community could see their priorities passed over completely by the wishes of their state department of transportation. A state could have a pressing local priority like improving an important downtown street, and the state could instead decide to add a lane on the state highway on the edge of town instead. As long as the state spends the appropriate amount of money within that small metro area, that’s considered a proper use of the money intended for use in that community.

What would this proposal change?

The overall funding intended for metro areas and cities of all sizes would increase in two ways: First, the size of the flexible program known as the Surface Transportation Program (STP), which can be spent on almost anything from roads to bridges to transit to bike lanes, would be increased. Secondly, the share of STP that gets suballocated to metro areas increases from 50 percent of STP funding to 67 percent. That means more money will be given directly to metro areas and metropolitan planning organizations.

Last but not least, an important change is made to ensure that smaller metro areas aren’t left behind. Instead of being put solely at the state’s discretion, the share of STP dollars intended for communities under 200,000 people will be put into a competitive grant program for these areas, so these smaller communities will be able to apply for their share of the funding in a competitive grant program for their local priorities.

Who supports this new proposal in the Senate?

A compelling case can be made that Americans are willing to contribute more to invest in transportation, but they absolutely want to know that the dollars a) will be spent wisely on the projects that do the most get to work, school and daily needs and b) they want more decisions in the hands of the levels of government closest to them so they can hold them accountable.

A number of groups that represent local elected officials in communities of all sizes sent a letter to Congress this week endorsing this proposal. The National League of Cities, the U.S. Conference of Mayors, the National Association of Development Organizations, the National Association of Counties, the Association of Metropolitan Planning Organizations, and the National Association of Regional Councils all signed onto a letter to Congress supporting the Booker-Wicker proposal, urging it to be included as an amendment to the Senate’s full long-term transportation bill currently under consideration.

What does this mean for the Innovation in Surface Transportation Act

While numerous local mayors, county executives, chambers of commerce and other local leaders have backed the Innovation in Surface Transportation Act, it’s an even bigger sign of support to see these national associations which represent many of those leaders nationally endorse this new proposal, noting that it would be a win for mayors, cities, county executives, metro leaders and others.

But this new proposal wouldn’t have happened without the strong support that has been pouring in for months on the Innovation in Surface Transportation Act. Your emails, phone calls, letters and meetings have made it clear to these Senators that this idea has traction, and this new proposal is a direct result of your past support for the Innovation in Surface Transportation Act.

All of this means that in the Senate from here on out, we’ll be focusing our efforts on this amendment from Senators Booker and Wicker because it represents a far greater chance to accomplish many of the same goals as the Innovation in Surface Transportation Act. This new proposal is a smart compromise that should be incorporated into the full Senate long-term transportation bill currently on the floor, and one that will ensure that smart, locally-driven, homegrown transportation investments get the funding they need.

We’ll continue to drive up support for ISTA in the House, however, and we encourage you to continue supporting it in messages and calls to your representatives.

Send a message to your Senators and urge them to support this provision from Senators Booker and Wicker. It only takes a moment, and vocal support for this plan will be crucial to getting it incorporated into the full bill.

Transportation for America takes a look at the options for funding transit in St. Louis

St. Louis’s economic prospects are directly related to the quality of access to transportation for their residents — making new investments in public transportation essential. A new T4America report analyzes the possible ways that the St. Louis region could fund an expansion of their public transportation network.

This report was commissioned and released by Citizens for Modern Transit, a St. Louis-area nonprofit that supports the creation of an integrated, affordable and convenient public transportation system in the area.

Though the St. Louis region is considering several proposals to dramatically expand or improve the region’s public transportation, the bottom line is that these projects are often expensive, funding is scarce, the state may not be interested in investing in transit at all, and the uncertainty stemming from congressional inaction has only made things worse.

Like most metro areas these days, St. Louis does not possess a single regional organization or government that can singlehandedly fund any of their planned major transit projects; and just one or two funding sources are rarely enough to make these projects happen in any case. (The same can be said of most major transportation projects, whether roads or transit. But states more often decide to underwrite major local road projects.)

Many regions have successfully built new transit projects by creatively piecing together funding through a variety of sources from all levels of government, along with a variety of private sources. This new report analyzes various options for funding transit at the federal, state and local level, including ways to combine various sources of funding, to build projects from large rail projects to less expensive bus or bus rapid transit projects. It also provides examples from across the nation of actual projects built using each funding mechanism raised to illustrate how each can be applied.

To bring the issue home in St. Louis, the report also analyzes two projects currently under consideration in the St. Louis region: a new 17-mile light rail line from North St. Louis to downtown and a 23-mile highway-running BRT line along I-64 ending downtown. The report considers ways to mix and match funding from federal, state and local sources to bring projects like these to fruition in the near future.

Transportation for America undertook this analysis under our new consulting practice led by our Beth Osborne, formerly the Acting Assistant Secretary for Policy at the U.S. Department of Transportation. The goal of this kind of work is to take Transportation for America’s national research and make it practical and actionable for the local leaders clamoring to invest in their communities by making smart transportation investments.

If you’re interested in a similar analysis for your region or discussing other consulting opportunities, please get in touch with us.

UPDATED: Senate reaches preliminary agreement on a long-term transportation bill

A group of key Senate leaders announced yesterday that they’d reached agreement on a bipartisan six-year transportation bill with three years of guaranteed funding. While it’s encouraging to see this agreement ten days before MAP-21 expires on July 31, forthcoming negotiations over the actual details of the bill will be crucial as most Senators have not yet seen the policy or funding language.

Senator McCcnnell announcing deal 2015-07-21 Senator Boxer announcing deal 2015-07-21

UPDATED Thursday 9:30 a.m.: Late Wednesday, the Senate reached cloture on the transportation reauthorization bill. It got just the required number of votes to pass, 60-38. We’ll move on to discussing and debating the bill today.

UPDATED Wednesday 5:30 p.m.: Yesterday (Tuesday) afternoon, a few hours after this bill was announced on the Senate floor, the Senate failed to pass a “cloture” vote to begin debate of the bill. Senate Democrats were unwilling to begin considering and debating a bill they’d had less than a few hours to read, and a few Republicans voted against cloture as well because of objections to particular funding mechanisms.

Senators McConnell, Boxer and the others assembling the funding mechanisms were only able to find sufficient funding for three years, using a mix of funding offsets that included selling oil from the nation’s strategic reserves, lowering the dividend paid to banks that join the Federal Reserve, and tinkering with fees from the TSA. You can read the full text of the bill here (pdf), a summary of the provisions from the EPW majority, and a summary of the funding mechanisms.

Stay tuned as we watch the Senate for more. Though a vote was mentioned to reporters as a possibility today by numerous Senators, the Senate recessed this afternoon at 4:30 p.m. (Wednesday) without any movement on the bill. There’s still a possibility they could return tonight for a vote, but the more likely option is Thursday.

Original post: Speaking on the Senate floor yesterday, Senators McConnell (R-KY), Reid (D-NV), Boxer (D-CA) and Inhofe (R-OK) announced their agreement on a long-term transportation bill that cobbles together sufficient revenue to carry the policy forward for three years.

The four Senators (and especially Senators McConnell and Boxer) had been “hammering out the details” over the last few days according to an article in The Hill this morning, and today Senator McConnell announced the deal on a “six year highway authorization that will allow for planning for important projects around the country…a long-term bill that’s in the best interests of our country.” (Note: Sen. McConnell repeatedly called the bill a six-year authorization with only three years of guaranteed funding.)

What’s next?

While an agreement has been reached in principle and procedural vote will be taken this afternoon at 4 p.m to consider debate on the bill, it’s far from a done deal at this point, and Senate Democrats will especially be curious to see the details of a bill that the rank and file (and possibly some of the leadership and relevant committee chairs) have not read at all yet.

It’s also notable that the Banking Committee and Finance Committees haven’t independently passed their portions of the full bill yet, so those committee members will be especially interested to see what the bill contains for their areas of jurisdiction.

After Sen. McConnell spoke, the two key Democratic negotiators in the Senate got up and made it clear that while the agreement is a step forward, they need to know more about what’s in the bill before they can proceed.

“We can’t go forward on a bill until we’ve read it and studied it,” said Senator Reid, one of the two main Democratic negotiators on the deal. “We need to look at this document,” he said. The other key negotiator in Democratic leadership, Senator Boxer, urged her colleagues to get the text posted as soon as possible. “We want to see the text — get the text up,” she said.

The vote coming today at 4 p.m. (originally scheduled earlier in the day but moved back during this time) will be a procedural vote to bring the bill to the floor and begin debate. That doesn’t mean there will be a vote on the final bill anytime soon — especially considering that all of the Senate Democrats who spoke made it clear that there’s still work to be done and that they need to carefully study the bill first.

We’ll be watching the vote this afternoon, so stay tuned, and follow us on Twitter to stay regularly updated.

Senate committee responds to outcry, restores competitive TIGER grant program in final bill

Just a few hours after receiving a letter with 150 signatories from across the country in support of the TIGER program, late yesterday the Senate Commerce Committee removed the language from their bill that would have essentially ended that popular program of competitive transportation grants.

After many of you combined to send in over 1,700 letters to your Senators over the last 48 hours and we organized a letter of more than 150 elected officials, DOTs, MPOs, chambers of commerce and others, Senate Committee Chairman John Thune (R-SD) amended the bill late yesterday before the committee markup and removed the language that eliminated the TIGER program as we know it.

saved-tiger-featured

This is a big win and it wouldn’t have happened without your help! Thanks to everyone who got involved and made your voice heard in support of the TIGER program.

The win does come with an asterisk, however.

The original version of the Commerce bill wasn’t eliminating competitive grants entirely, it just repurposed the funds currently used for TIGER to create a smart competitive multimodal grant program explicitly for freight projects.

While a competitive program to help direct funds to the smartest freight projects is the direction federal transportation policy should be heading in, that shouldn’t happen at the expense of TIGER. We need more transportation dollars, not fewer, awarded competitively on the merits to the best projects.

Also, TIGER still lacks the permanent authorization of a program like New and Small Starts for example, which is why we’re constantly fighting battles to keep TIGER funded each year. Appropriators can choose not to fund it in any given budget year, and it’s an uphill battle to change that. Senators Patty Murray (D-WA) and Susan Collins (R-ME) introduced a bill that would authorize the TIGER program and enshrine it as a permanent part of the federal transportation program — which will hopefully be considered on the Senate floor now that the bill has cleared the committee.

Logged-in members can read our summary of the TIGER Act (S. 1748) below.

[member_content]Senate TIGER Act (S 1748) Summary memo for members
Senators Murray (D-WA), Collins (R-ME), Durbin (D-IL), and Reed (D-RI) introduced the Transportation Infrastructure Grants and Economic Reinvestment (TIGER) Act (S. 1748) to formally authorize the federal TIGER discretionary grant program for the first time.[/member_content]

There are other provisions to applaud in the Committee’s bill — some of which we’ll go into detail on in today’s open conference call— including the Railroad Reform, Enhancement, and Efficiency Act from Senators Wicker (R-MS) and Booker (D-NJ). That bill will make numerous improvements to the country’s passenger rail policy, but most importantly, by virtue of its inclusion in the full Commerce bill marked up yesterday, would be fully authorized as part of a long-term transportation bill if it remains there.

So we applaud the Committee for hearing the outcry and making the change to TIGER, but there’s still work to be done and our full request from yesterday’s letter still stands:

We request that the Commerce Committee authorize a strong, multimodal freight policy and freight investment grant program, as well as pass a complementary, authorization of the TIGER grant program separate from the multimodal freight discretionary grant program at or near equal funding levels.

We’re looking forward to working with the rest of the Senate as they continue putting together the long-term transportation reauthorization that we so desperately need.

Update: Read Smart Growth America’s post covering some of the bill’s provisions for complete streets, transit-oriented development and passenger rail, including a great summary of what to expect next — exactly the kind of topics we’ll be covering at length on today’s open conference call!

Senate leaders will combine this with other bills from the Committees on Environment and Public Works, Commerce as well as Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs. That combined bill will then go to the full Senate for consideration—possibly as early as next week. Senate leaders are also working with the Finance Committee to agree on how to fund it all.

Meanwhile, the House of Representatives yesterday passed a five-month extension of the current transportation bill, MAP-21. Questions remain as to whether the Senate will be able to pass a long-term bill or accept the House’s short-term extension before MAP-21 expires at the end of the month.

Don’t forget to register for today’s open conference call discussing everything that’s happening with regards to transportation in Congress.

Cities and towns could lose one of their best options for funding smart local projects

The Senate Commerce Committee is marking up a version of a long-term transportation funding bill Wednesday morning with no authorization for the popular TIGER program, thus limiting the money available to local communities.

Let me tell you a short story.

In central Illinois, there’s a classic medium-sized American town that desperately wanted to revitalize their downtown, fan the flames of the community’s civic pride, and provide a new lynchpin to encourage development in a part of town that had been neglected for far too long.

The elected leaders, business leaders and citizens in Normal, Illinois had an ambitious vision for their city’s core to become a powerful asset; helping them compete and prosper economically and creating a new framework for creating value for decades to come.

save-tiger-featured Since 2009, the federal TIGER program has made projects like Normal’s downtown transportation hub and civic centerpiece a reality, directing a relatively tiny $4 billion into smart, ready-to-go homegrown transportation projects that bring a high return on investment.

Unfortunately, in the just-released proposal for a new long-term transportation bill, the Senate Commerce Committee has decided to entirely scrap the oversubscribed and woefully underfunded TIGER program that awards competitive, merit-based grants.

Can you send a message right now to your Senators and urge them to preserve TIGER?

The Senate Commerce Committee is marking up the bill on Wednesday morning (7/15), so there’s not a moment to lose!

The committee is creating a very smart competitive multimodal grant program explicitly for freight projects, but that shouldn’t happen at the expense of TIGER. We need more transportation dollars, not fewer, awarded competitively on the merits to the best projects.

When we choose projects on the merits, we can get a greater bang for the buck. In Normal, where the new transportation hub opened in 2012, a total public investment of $80 million has catalyzed $165 million in private development surrounding the station, with another $40-50 million in the works.

These TIGER grants have been rewarding communities all across the country that are thinking outside the box to cut congestion, improve safety, promote economic development, or improve access to jobs and opportunities through smarter transportation investments.

It’s time to take a stand for TIGER. Can you send a message today?

Join us for the third online discussion of the Innovative MPO on July 8th

Building on the range of new ideas for metropolitan planning organizations outlined in our Innovative MPO report, join us for the third in a series of online discussions to help MPO staff, board members, and civic leaders find smart ways to use their funding and planning authority to get better outcomes for their regions.

First, if you’re asking, “What’s The Innovative MPO?”, it’s a great free resource we released in late 2014, so the first thing to do is to cruise over to this page and get your copy immediately.

With your guidebook now in hand, join us next Wednesday (July 8) for our third online discussion on the content of the guidebook. This time out, we’ll be focusing on a range of tools and techniques that MPOs can use to get to or stay on the leading edge of smart transportation planning in regions small and large.

Specifically, we’ll be looking a few provisions in the Senate’s recent proposal for a six-year transportation authorization that will create some new opportunities for innovative MPOs prepared to capitalize, how one region is taking advantage of an amazing wealth of data to better measure the performance of their transportation dollars, and an emerging placemaking and planning approach that leverages arts, culture and creativity to foster more inclusive economic development in communities of any size.

Joe McAndrew, T4America policy director, will discuss a few key provisions in the Senate’s long-term transportation bill, and the opportunities it will create for the MPOs best prepared to take advantage.
Monique De Los Rios-Urban from the Maricopa Association of Governments (MAG) will touch on performance measures and data collection. MAG has an amazing online suite of data research tools that you can test drive right here.
Erin Evenhouse, T4America Midwest outreach manager, will discuss the emerging practice of “creative place-making,” and share stories of how some metro regions are using this inclusive approach to planning — as well as some details on a forthcoming T4America toolkit for MPOs and others on the practice.

Congress kicks into high gear on transportation — let’s summarize the action

During an extremely busy week in Congress in several key committees, a long-term transportation bill and a multi-year passenger rail authorization were introduced and passed committees, along with hearings on possible ways to keep our nation’s transportation fund afloat, rural transportation issues, rail safety, and autonomous vehicles.

For those of you who don’t regularly follow Congress, this is often how things go: nothing seems to happen for a long time, and then there’s an explosion of activity all at once. That’s certainly what took place this week in the Senate, with some important ramifications for the future of transportation funding and policy. We hope that Congress shows the same focus when they return from their weeklong July 4th recess.

Four of the five Senate committees with jurisdiction over either transportation policy or funding were active this week. Two notable transportation policy bills (and one yearly spending bill) were advanced out of committees this week, and the Senate made the first big move toward passing a long-term transportation reauthorization ahead of the July 31 expiration of MAP-21, the current law. So what happened, and what should we be expecting next?

Here’s our brief rundown of what you need to know.

First up, in news we haven’t covered here yet, the Senate Appropriations Committee this morning marked up and passed their version of the yearly transportation and housing spending bill that was passed out of the House several weeks ago — a bill that cut TIGER, passenger rail, and transit construction. Unfortunately, the news out of the Senate today was only marginally better. On the plus side, TIGER funding is maintained at this year’s level: $500 million again for competitive grants this upcoming year. But the Senate actually makes deeper cuts to New and Small Starts transit construction than the House did — $520 million in cuts over last year, and $320 million more than the House passed a few weeks ago. Passenger rail funding gets a marginal increase over last year’s level.

While we were hopeful that the Senate could possibly restore some of these cuts made by the House — as had happened in several years past — the consensus by House and Senate Republicans to stick to 2011 budget sequestration-level discretionary funding amounts for all of their FY2016 spending bills result in cuts across the board to discretionary programs like these. All Democrats on the Appropriations Committee opposed this bill.

Smart Growth America offered up this statement on the THUD bill today. T4America is a program of Smart Growth America.

The United States is in the middle of an affordable housing crisis. Rents are rising, the homeownership rate is declining, and federal housing programs are already failing to meet the need for affordable homes. Gutting the HOME program at a time like this is the wrong response. If Congress’s budget caps force this outcome, the budget caps need to be changed.

Logged-in T4America members can read our full THUD summary below:

[member_content]June 24, 2015 — The Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies (Transportation-HUD) marked up and reported its FY2016 appropriation bill to the full committee on June 23 without amendment. This is T4America’s short members-only summary of the THUD bill as reported to the full committee. Read the full memo.[/member_content]

Second up was the release and the subsequent committee markup of the Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee’s six-year transportation bill known as the DRIVE Act. The EPW Committee is responsible for the largest portion of the full bill known as the “highway title” — more on the other portions below. In case you missed any of our posts about the EPW bill over the last few days, you can catch up with those below. Long story short? EPW released a bill with some modest improvements that represents a good starting point for debate, they approved it unanimously in committee while making a few small improvements, and important amendments that could ensure our investments best maintain and improve our transportation system are still outstanding and will hopefully be considered by the full Senate.

Statement on the release of the Senate’s long-term transportation reauthorization proposal

While this bill provides a positive starting point, there are other areas where Congress can and should do better.

Senate’s new transportation bill is a good start, but more should be done for local communities

The EPW committee marked up and approved this bill unanimously on June 24th without considering amendments (other than a package of amendments in a manager’s mark.) The amendments mentioned below were discussed or offered and withdrawn, and will hopefully be debated on the floor of the Senate. So keep any letters of support coming — this action is still ongoing!

Senate Committee rolls forward with speedy markup of six-year transportation bill

In a committee markup where the phrase “doing the Lord’s work” was invoked by numerous members on both sides of the aisle, the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee sped through a markup of their draft six-year transportation bill in less than an hour this morning, approving it by a unanimous vote with no amendments, save for a manager’s package of amendments agreed to in advance.

While the Senate Appropriations Committee marked up the transportation & housing spending bill this morning, the Senate Commerce Committee — the committee with jurisdiction over rail policy in the Senate — considered the Railroad Reform, Enhancement, and Efficiency Act — a bill to govern all passenger rail policy and authorize funding for the next several years. The RREEA bill is a good step forward, supported by T4America wholeheartedly:

Statement in response to introduction of the Railroad Reform, Enhancement and Efficiency Act

Senators Wicker and Booker are doing the nation a great service in crafting a bill that ensures Americans will see continued and improving passenger rail service in the years to come. Passenger rail service is vital and growing in popularity, and keeping the system working and safe requires investment. The Wicker-Booker bill embraces both those ideas. It authorizes necessary funding to start to return the system to a state of good repair and make targeted investments to improve service.

The committee markup of the bill known as RREEA was mostly uneventful, and it passed by a unanimous vote with mostly minor amendments and issues raised — some of which were safety-related and expected in the wake of the recent derailment in Philadelphia. The Commerce Committee is also responsible for freight and rail policy for the long-term bill, and we’ve heard that they could be releasing their draft long-term bill shortly after the July 4th recess.

Lastly, both House and Senate committees tasked with finding the funding to pay for the next long-term transportation bill (or finding the money to extend MAP-21 past July 31) held hearings this week to continue their work along those lines. In the case of the House, they were specifically discussing repatriation of corporate earnings as a possible revenue source.

Repatriation is the process by which companies can bring offshore earnings back to the U.S. at a reduced tax rate, and then all or a share of those tax revenues would be directed to the trust fund, providing revenues for a long-term transportation bill. It’s an idea that’s gotten some traction in the Senate — Senators Barbara Boxer and Rand Paul have introduced a proposal — but it’s still a one-time fix that’s still not a fee paid by the users of the transportation system.

A House Ways and Means subcommittee held a hearing today to discuss repatriation, and the overall takeaway from the hearing seemed to be that while repatriation may be the most feasible option after a gas tax increase was ruled out by Ways and Means Chairman Paul Ryan, there’s still little consensus in the House, and many representatives want to tie it to more thorny issues like corporate tax reform, reducing the chances that it could pass quickly or easily.

In the Senate, the Finance Committee held a hearing today as well to discuss the use of public-private partnerships — a growing trend in many states as they look to up-front cash from the private sector to help fund longer-term projects where the private party defers their payment or profits. Despite the way P3s, as they’re known, are frequently invoked as a possible funding solution, almost all the panelists today noted that although having a greater range of financing options will certainly be a boost to many states and cities, P3s won’t be sufficient without also increasing overall revenues. They’re not a panacea.

Which leads us right back to the elephant in the room: finding and agreeing upon a new, stable revenue source that can keep the nation’s transportation fund solvent for years to come. It was indeed a busy week, and we hope that Congress will keep up the momentum when they return from their weeklong July 4th recess.

Senate Committee rolls forward with speedy markup of six-year transportation bill

In a committee markup where the phrase “doing the Lord’s work” was invoked by numerous members on both sides of the aisle, the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee sped through a markup of their draft six-year transportation bill in less than an hour this morning, approving it by a unanimous vote with no amendments, save for a manager’s package of amendments agreed to in advance.

One thing was abundantly clear from the beginning of this morning’s committee markup of the DRIVE Act: the EPW Committee members are eager to get their portion of the bill completed and moved forward as soon as possible.

Led by Chairman Jim Inhofe (R-OK) and Ranking Member Barbara Boxer (D-CA), the committee opened with remarks of praise from Senators. From our vantage point most committee members sounded delighted to support the six-year bill with slightly increased funding levels over MAP-21.

“There’s no reason we can’t do this now if it’s a priority. We need to prove it’s a priority by passing this full six-year bill,” said Senator David Vitter (R-LA).

Senator Tom Carper (D-DE) was one of the first to bring up the elephant in the room. “The next challenge is to figure out how to pay for it,” he said. While that issue is out of EPW’s hands (Senate Finance and House Ways and Means will address the funding question), they did briefly discuss some possibilities. “One of the ideas I’ve heard consistently is to find a way to fix our roads and bridges and transit systems in a more cost-effective way,” Sen. Carper added.

The head of the Senate Finance Committee is Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT). During his remarks in the markup, EPW Member Jeff Sessions (R-AL) said, “I saw Senator Hatch in the hallway on the way over, and I said, you gonna find our money? And he said ‘yes.'”

It was certainly encouraging that there was no vocal opposition to any of the positive improvements this bill makes over its predecessor: providing all Transportation Alternatives program (TAP) funding to local governments, considering the needs of all users when designing and constructing road projects, changing the cost thresholds to enable more local governments have access to low-cost federal loans, providing support to smart transit-oriented development, or allowing cities to use the innovative NACTO street design manual even if their state does not allow it, along with a few others.

Though some members, just like us at T4America, are still hoping to improve the bill further, especially in providing better access and a greater share of funds for local governments of all size.

A handful of members referenced amendments or provisions they hoped to incorporate into the bill, but none were formally offered or voted on. Senator Roger Wicker (R-MS) spoke briefly about the Innovation in Surface Transportation Act, sponsored by himself and Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ), which would create a small grant program in each state to give local communities of all size greater access to federal transportation funds to complete merit-based projects.

“It’s been something that local officials have been very excited about, very hopeful about, and I’m sure there will be some disappointment that it’s not in the manager’s mark,” Wicker said. “It’s a worthy suggestion and a worthy project not to increase one penny of the spending in this bill, but to set aside a small portion of this bill” for this program to award dollars to local communities based on a competitive process to judge them on the merits.

That manager’s mark (a single group of amendments) makes a few small improvements. A small program of demonstration grants to “accelerate the deployment and adoption of transportation research” was amended to ensure local communities and metropolitan planning organizations were eligible for them — not just states.

Another change in the manager’s amendment will ensure that 100 percent of the $850 million TAP funding that helps make walking and biking safer will be be distributed to and spent in local communities. A provision in the draft bill allowing states to “flex” 50 percent of that funding to other needs was struck — guaranteeing that all $850 million will be spent on local priority projects to improve biking and walking. And a small change was made to take safety into account when designing any projects on the National Highway System.

Senator Boxer was delighted at the unanimity from the Committee.

“I’m just so happy after hearing comments from everyone. Yes there will be struggles about how to pay, but Eisenhower said it well: we can’t be a secure nation unless we have an infrastructure that works.”

The Committee approved the bill by a unanimous vote, but the Senate Banking, Commerce and Finance Committees still have to draft and vote on their portions of the bill. With the July 31 expiration of MAP-21 (and the insolvency of the transportation trust fund) looming, it’ll be an uphill battle to get a full bill passed by the Senate before the deadline, but we will be watching closely.

Members can read our full summary of the EPW bill below.

[member_content] Feature graphic - epw drive act June 24, 2015 — The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee (EPW) released its six-year MAP-21 reauthorization proposal on June 22, 2015. The DRIVE Act is a start, but needs much more work to reform — and reinvigorate — the federal transportation program in ways that will boost today’s economy and ensure future prosperity. This memo provides an overview of the key provisions included in the proposal, as well as funding levels for key programs.

Read the full members-only memo here.[/member_content]

Senate’s new transportation bill is a good start, but more should be done for local communities

At long last, there’s finally some progress to report on a new long-term federal transportation bill. Today, the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee released their draft six-year transportation bill. While we think it’s a good starting point, there are some promising proposals to improve it dramatically during a planned markup tomorrow.

Updated 6/24 3:00 p.m.: The EPW committee marked up and approved this bill unanimously on June 24th without considering amendments (other than a package of amendments in a manager’s mark.) The amendments mentioned below were discussed or offered and withdrawn, and will hopefully be debated on the floor of the Senate. So keep any letters of support coming — the action below is still ongoing! (-Ed.)

Mayors and other local elected leaders are the ones who face the music from citizens when bridges need repair, when mounting congestion makes commutes unpredictable, and when families can’t safely walk their kids to school — yet those same leaders are too often left out of the discussions over what gets built and where.

That needs to change, and several Senators have readied several amendments to do exactly that.

First, Senators Wicker (R-MS) and Booker (D-NJ) are offering their Innovation in Surface Transportation Act as an amendment, to create a competitive grant program in each state to give local communities more access to federal funds — but only for the smartest, most innovative projects judged on their merits. A second amendment from Senators Booker and Wicker would increase the amount of flexible transportation dollars directly provided to local communities by ten percent of the program’s share.

Giving local communities of all sizes the resources they need to realize their ambitious plans to stay economically competitive should be a primary goal of this bill.

Can you urge your Senators to support amendments that will help give local communities like yours more access to and control over transportation dollars?

With a new competitive grant program for local projects in each state, more communities could find success like Normal, IL, found with its Uptown Station. Normal used a grant from the competitive national TIGER program to complete the funding picture for a multimodal station and central plaza that brought new life and economic activity to its town’s core. But the TIGER program is one of the only ways local communities can directly access federal funds, and it’s wildly oversubscribed.

Lastly, an amendment from Senator Cardin (D-MD) would increase funding for the program that cities, towns and regions use to invest in projects to make biking and walking safer — restoring the Transportation Alternatives Program to its previous funding level before being slashed in the last reauthorization in 2012.

The EPW Committee is marking up their bill on Wednesday, so don’t delay — send a message to your Senators and urge them to support these key amendments to improve this bill.

Members can read our full summary of the EPW bill below.

Read the full members-only memo here.[/member_content]

New Smart Growth America report details why so many companies are moving downtown

Launched at a terrific event at Washington, DC’s Newseum just this morning, Core Values, a first-of-its-kind report, is stuffed with useful data on nearly 500 companies that have decided to either move from the suburbs to a downtown location, or that have decided to expand or open a new branch in a downtown core.

The companies featured in the report — highlighted by quotes from more than 40 interviews with executives — shared some unifying threads in their decision-making process: the desire to take advantage of the collaborative and cultural opportunities that downtown locations offer, the desire to stay competitive for younger, talented workers, and the ability to give their employees multiple transportation options for getting to work each day.

It’s a trend that we’ve been keeping our eyes on in this space over the last year, like our story about State Farm’s decision to consolidate their employees in three new regional hubs near transit, the ambitious plans of three mid-sized cities that focus on transit as a core economic development strategy, or Marriott’s clear intention to move their headquarters to a location near to transit when their current lease is up.

Smart Growth America takes these stories to a new level, pairing that sort of anecdotal data above with some hard research and in-depth interviews of company executives into one comprehensive report on the trend; showing why companies are making the move and providing recommendations for other companies hoping to do the same — or cities hoping to lure them in.

As Chris Zimmerman wrote today on the SGA blog:

In 2010, global biotechnology company Biogen moved its offices from downtown Cambridge, MA, to a large suburban campus in Weston, 25 minutes away. In 2014, less than four years later, the company moved back.

“There is so much going on in Cambridge,” said Chris Barr, Biogen’s Associate Director of Community Relations. “It is such a vibrant place to live and work—it’s been a great move back for us.”

Biogen is one of hundreds of companies across the United States that have moved to and invested in walkable downtowns over the past five years. Our newest research takes a closer look at this emerging trend.

Core Values: Why American Companies are Moving Downtown is a new report released today by Smart Growth America in partnership with Cushman & Wakefield and the George Washington University School of Business’ Center for Real Estate and Urban Analysis. The new report examines nearly 500 companies that moved to or expanded in walkable downtowns between 2010 and 2015, and includes interviews with more than 40 senior-level staff at those companies.

The results provide an overview of why these companies chose a walkable downtown and what they looked for when considering a new location. The report also includes ideas for cities about how they can create the kinds of places these companies seek.

View the report

House takes first step in process to keep the nation’s transportation fund solvent

For the first time since 2012, the House of Representatives held a hearing focused on funding the nation’s transportation system. Today’s hearing focused on the elephant in the room: how to adequately fund a transportation bill that’s longer than just a few months. While it’s a relief to see the funding issue finally getting airtime in the House, keeping the nation’s transportation fund solvent is only half of the problem — we also need to update the broken federal program that isn’t meeting our country’s needs.

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee tasked with finding the money to pay for a transportation bill, took the most obvious funding solution off the table — raising the federal gasoline excise tax — right at the start of the hearing as the gallery was still getting comfortable in their seats, deflating some members of the committee who were eager to at least discuss this option.

“We are not raising gas taxes‚ plain and simple,” he said, while adding later that the House “does need to find a real solution, a permanent solution. We are all ears.” Chairman Ryan suggested that repatriation of overseas profits (a one-time, non-transportation user fee fix) or giving states more authority could be possible solutions, but a gas tax increase is off the table.

Before the hearing, Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) held a press conference featuring a coalition of groups who support his bill to raise new revenue in the House by phasing in a 15-cent increase in the gas tax. Civil engineers, general contractors, roadbuilders, public transportation operators and T4America director James Corless spoke at the press conference to support Rep. Blumenauer’s case that Congress’ inaction is negatively impacting our nation’s economy and action is long overdue.

James corless blumenauer
T4America director James Corless speaking at this morning’s press conference

Rep. Blumenauer carried his momentum from the morning press conference into the hearing an hour later.

“We’re not keeping up our end of the bargain for the 50 percent of capital spending on big projects that comes from the federal government. We haven’t made any meaningful adjustment since 1993 to the gas tax, relying on short-term fixes, gimmicks – and no matter how you slice it, adding to the deficit,” Rep. Blumenauer said in his prepared remarks.

Rep. Lloyd Doggett (R-TX) concurred. “What is missing from our transportation policy is money – revenue. We cannot build these highways with fairy dust,” Rep. Doggett (R-TX) said.

Rep. Renacci (R-OH), who has put forward a separate plan to index the gas tax to inflation and set up a mechanism to provide long-term transportation funding, noted that “short-term fixes cost money in delay and uncertainty.” He shared a story about meeting with constituents, including some tea party members, on transportation issues. He said that they told him, “‘Quit going to the general fund and taking dollars…what you’re doing is passing it onto our children and grandchildren. What I’d be willing to do is pay a user fee as long as I get my roads and bridges fixed.’ We have to come up with a long-term solution, we can’t continue to go down this path,” he said.

As Rep. Bob Dold (R-IL) from the Chicago area noted on the topic of buying new railcars for the CTA and Metra, “Do we buy them one at a time or ten at a time? I can get a far better deal if I buy them ten at a time,” he said. When agencies can’t reliably put together a multi-year budget because they have no idea what to expect from the federal government, projects can begin to cost more than they should.

Following on the heels of today’s Ways & Means hearing, the Senate Finance Committee is holding a hearing of its own tomorrow on transportation funding.

We can hope that the newfound willingness to discuss the challenging revenue question will lead members of Congress to build consensus around a funding proposal suitable for the nation’s need. However, simply raising new funding to pour into a broken system isn’t going to get us where we need to go either — we need to fix the broken system and update it with the kinds of policies that ensure every dollar invested by taxpayers provides the greatest benefits for the economy and our communities. It’s not enough to simply raise money and spend it on the same processes that created the crisis we find ourselves in today. America can do better, and it’s important that the decisionmakers understand this fact.

On that policy question, eyes are quickly turning to the Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee, which is responsible for the highway title — the largest portion of the bill. They are planning to release and mark up their successor to MAP-21, a six-year bill, next Wednesday, June 24th.

We are counting on the Senate EPW Committee to release a bill that can maintain our current system, complete the transportation network, incentivize the strategic investments that can provide access to opportunity for all Americans and best improve connections within the cities and towns that drive our economy.

Continuing and improving a nascent process to measure the performance of our transportation investments would allow us to better ensure that our limited resources bring the best return. And a forward-looking plan to direct more of that money down to where it’s needed most would be a great companion to any plan to shore up the nation’s transportation funding.

We’re now looking to the Senate to make progress on finding a long-term funding solution, but also to make the policy changes we so urgently need to ensure those dollars are well spent.

US House approves bill by a thin margin that makes cuts to TIGER, transit construction and passenger rail

Late Tuesday night, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to pass their yearly transportation spending bill with just six votes separating the bill from defeat. While the cuts to TIGER, Amtrak and New Starts transit capital programs were unfortunately approved by the House, it’s unlikely this bill will become law any time soon. That’s because of the Senate’s likely inability to pass any annual spending bills this summer due to the parties’ lack of agreement on overall funding for the government this year.

First, to the thousands of you who sent messages to your representatives in the last week, we thank you for getting engaged on this crucial issue. Though the final vote was disappointing, there’s still hope. We do know that our voices were heard, as many amendments were rejected by significant margins that would have made further cuts to these important programs — reflecting that these legislators are indeed hearing about what their constituents value.

The bad news is that the final bill approved by the House still cut $200 million for all new transit construction, slashed the TIGER competitive grant program by 80 percent, and cut Amtrak’s budget by $240 million. These programs targeted by the House for cuts are precisely the ones that cities, towns and metro regions of all sizes throughout the country are depending on to help them stay economically competitive and bring their ambitious transportation plans to fruition.

The good news is that several short-sighted amendments were roundly defeated, including some to make these above cuts worse.

Rep. Grotham (R-WI) proposed an amendment to make the New Starts cuts even deeper by stripping the bill of all transit capital construction funding ($1.9 billion), which was rejected by voice vote with strong bipartisan opposition. Rep. Emmers (R-MN) proposed an amendment to cut all of the funds used to make transit stations easier to access, boosting ridership and making the service easier and more convenient to use, like projects to improve bike and pedestrian access or support for dense, walkable development near the stops. Transit lines don’t exist in vacuums — successful lines and stations are most often surrounded by other supportive infrastructure that helps connect them to their riders. This amendment was very close, but all House Democrats were joined by 32 of their Republican colleagues to kill the amendment 212-214.

Rep. Brooks (R-AL) proposed two amendments last week to essentially strip all capital and operating funding from Amtrak, and both were defeated by more than 125 votes with strong bipartisan opposition. Rep. Session (R-TX) proposed similar amendments that were both defeated as well. These votes are another reminder of the fact that communities of all kinds — small, large, rural, urban — depend on the service provided by the nation’s passenger rail system. Their constituents certainly don’t see the existence of an affordable transportation option as a partisan issue, to say nothing of the tremendous value provided by making valuable economic connections between metro areas large and small and rural areas throughout the country.

The House’s bill now moves to the Senate Appropriations Committee, where members are currently drafting their Transportation-HUD spending bill. We’re cautiously optimistic that at least a few of the cuts made by the House’s annual spending bill could be undone — at least partially — in the Senate. However, the only way to ensure that all of these cuts are removed and certainly the only way to increase funding over last year’s bill is for Congress to remove the poorly planned and unwise spending caps put in place by the 2011 sequestration.

One thing is certain: we’ll need your help to make that happen, and we will keep you posted as the annual transportation spending bill continues onto the Senate.

Additional insight from our policy team can be found for our logged-in T4America members below, including a full list of amendments that were voted on during Tuesday night’s debate.

[member_content]This information below is pulled from our members-only wrap-up of the vote that went up yesterday. Read the full post here. And visit t4america.org/members regularly to see these updates.

This final vote count is a sign of things to come.

The U.S. House and Senate Republicans are sticking to sequestration-level discretionary funding amounts for all of their FY2016 spending bills, established in the Budget Control Act of 2011. These spending caps limit funding for the regular appropriation bills in FY2016 to $1.016 trillion, a funding increase of just 0.29% over last year. We expect the House to continue to face uphill challenges in passing their bills and over in the Senate, with near, if not all-out, opposition from the Democrats expected for all 12 annual spending bills.

This issue will not likely resolve itself until the fall. Just yesterday, Senate Majority Leader McConnell (R-KY) rejected a call from Senate Democrats to hold a “budget summit” this month to resolve the differences between the two parties on top-line annual appropriations levels. Until this larger issue is resolved, we don’t expect the House Transportation-HUD bill that narrowly passed last night to become law any time soon.

Amendments that were considered Tuesday prior to the bills passage include:

Rep. Denham (R-CA) – An amendment to prohibit funds from the bill to be used for high-speed rail in California or for the California High-Speed Rail Authority. A similar amendment passed last year in the House by a vote of 227-186, but this amendment and others to restrict funding to the California high-speed rail project were not included in the final FY2015 transportation spending bill due to lack of support in the Senate

AMENDMENT ADOPTED BY VOICE VOTE

Rep. Bass (D-CA) – An amendment to make it easier for state and local transportation agencies to use local hire criteria for FTA procurement selection processes. A similar amendment was included in the final FY2015 transportation spending bill, and USDOT is currently implementing this through a one-year pilot. Read our take on that original provision from earlier this year.

AMENDMENT ADOPTED BY VOICE VOTE

Rep Emmer (R-MN) – An amendment to prohibit the use of funds to carry out projects to improve bicycle and pedestrian access on any FTA New Start (transit) projects.

AMENDMENT REJECTED BY VOTE 212-214 (Zero Democrats voted for the amendment — see roll call vote here)

Rep Meehan (R-PA) – An amendment to prohibit Amtrak from spending capital funds on projects other than the Northeast Corridor until Amtrak spends an amount equal to this year’s Northeast Corridor profits on Northeast Corridor capital construction. Amtrak’s profits from that line in FY2015 were $290 million.

AMENDMENT REJECTED BY VOTE 199-227 (see roll call vote here)

Rep Posey #1 (R-FL) – An amendment to prohibit funds from being used to take any actions related to financing a new passenger rail project that runs from Orlando to Miami through Indian River County, Florida. This amendment and Rep. Posey’s other two below were targeted at stopping and/or stalling the development of the private Florida East Coast Railway high-speed rail project.

AMENDMENT REJECTED BY VOTE 163-260 (see roll call vote here)

Rep Posey #2 (R-FL) – An amendment to prohibit funds from being used to authorize exempt facility bonds to finance passenger rail projects that are not reasonably expected to attain a maximum speed in excess of 150 mph.

AMENDMENT REJECTED BY VOTE 148-275 (see roll call vote here)

Rep Posey #3 (R-FL) – An amendment to prohibit funds from being used to make a loan in an amount that exceeds $600 million under the Railroad Rehabilitation and Improvement Financing (RRIF) program.

AMENDMENT REJECTED BY VOTE 134-287 (see roll call vote here)

Rep Sessions #1 (R-TX) – An amendment to prohibit funds from being used by Amtrak to support the route with the highest loss, measured by contributions/(loss) per rider (would eliminate the “Sunset Limited” line from New Orleans to Los Angeles). Rep. Sessions has in the past made amendments similar to this and the following amendment.

AMENDMENT REJECTED BY VOTE 205-218 (see roll call vote here)

Rep Sessions #2 (R-TX) – An amendment to prohibit funds being used by Amtrak to operate any route whose operating costs exceed two times its revenues based on the National Railroad Passenger Corporation FY2014-2018 Five Year Plan from April 2014, targeting nearly all long-distance routes.

AMENDMENT REJECTED BY VOTE 186-237 (see roll call vote here)

Rep Blackburn (R-TN) – An amendment to reduce the overall appropriations for the Transportation-HUD bill by 1%.

AMENDMENT REJECTED BY VOTE 163-259 (see roll call vote here)

Rep Gosar (R-AZ) – An amendment to prohibit funds from being used to implement or enforce the rule entitled “Hazardous Materials for High-Hazard Flammable Trains”.

AMENDMENT REJECTED BY VOTE 136-286 (see roll call vote here)

Rep Lee (D-CA) – An amendment to strike provisions included in the spending bill that would prohibit USDOT from allowing flights or cruise ships to travel to Cuba.

AMENDMENT REJECTED BY VOTE 176-247 (see roll call vote here)

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Louisiana legislature makes a paradigm shift to better prioritize transportation dollars and restore public confidence

Louisiana passed a bill through the state House and Senate by unanimous votes last week that will make the process for spending transportation dollars more transparent and accountable to the public — a smart first step to increase public support for raising any new transportation funding.

At least 20 states have successfully raised new funding at the state level for transportation since 2012, a trend we’ve been tracking closely here at T4America. But all states are different, and in some states, raising new state funds for transportation can be a tough sell, especially if a skeptical public doesn’t have any faith in the process for spending the money already available.

Louisiana featured bridge construction Louisiana is taking some first steps to fix that process while also trying to raise new money. A recent bill to raise the state sales tax by one cent to fund major projects fell short in the House, though a few other bills to raise gas and general sales taxes to fund transportation projects are still active this session. As our Capital Ideas report from earlier this year noted, it can be challenging to develop public support for new transportation funding when voters have no certainty that those funds will be put to the best possible use.

One emerging strategy to restore public trust and confidence in an opaque and mysterious process is adopting the use of performance measures, which can demonstrate to the public what they’re going to get for their tax dollars.

The first step in a shift toward using performance measures is to establish what your goals are. And this just-approved Louisiana bill sponsored by Rep. Walt Leger, HB 742 (bill text), starts by laying out clear, understandable criteria in plain language “to prescribe the process by which the [Louisiana] Department of Transportation and Development (DOTD) shall select and prioritize certain construction projects.”

From the bill text:

The legislature declares it to be in the public interest that a prioritization process for construction be utilized to develop a Highway Priority Program that accomplishes the following:

Brings the state highway system into a good state of repair and optimizes the usage and efficiency of existing transportation facilities.

Improves safety for motorized and nonmotorized highway users and communities.

Supports resiliency in the transportation system, including safe evacuation of populations when necessitated by catastrophic events such as hurricanes and floods.

Increases accessibility for people, goods, and services.

Fosters diverse economic development and job growth, international and domestic commerce, and tourism.

Fosters multimodalism, promotes a variety of transportation and travel options, and encourages intermodal connectivity.

Encourages innovation and the use of technology.

Protects the environment, reduces emissions, and improves public health and quality of life.

That straightforward list goes beyond what’s currently being developed as part of MAP-21 and the typical measures of success used elsewhere.

This legislation is a marked improvement on the current state statutes governing how the Louisiana DOTD chooses transportation projects, which has been described as open-ended, unaccountable and a total mystery to the public. This bill represents one of the more ambitious overhauls of a state’s decision-making processes and an important first step toward improving the transparency and accountability of distributing transportation funds, setting Louisiana on a path of ensuring every transportation dollar provides the greatest benefit.

The bill has cleared both House and Senate is is currently waiting for Gov. Bobby Jindal’s signature. The Louisiana DOTD supported the bill, and starting in 2017, the department is expected to be utilizing the new project selection process.

The next logical step for Louisiana and other states creating goals like these above is to follow it up by creating measurable data points to serve as yardsticks. That way, the public can see this straightforward list of priorities, examine what the tangible, measurable (i.e., quantifiable) goals are, and then evaluate whether or not the state is spending their transportation dollars on the projects that can help them meet those goals.

T4America congratulates State Rep. Walt Leger, the chief sponsor of this bill, for constructing and pushing it through the legislature on unanimous votes. Rep. Leger is a member of T4America’s State Advocacy Network (START), created to support efforts to successfully pass state legislation to raise transportation funding while improving accountability for spending it.

If you’d like to find out more about START, visit this page and get in touch.

UPDATE: The House is voting to slash transportation programs local communities are counting on

This evening, the House of Representatives is expected to begin debate and vote on their annual transportation funding bill. As it stands, the bill will make painful cuts to several important transportation programs that local communities depend on. With debate beginning Wednesday at 7 p.m. and continuing through the night, it’s crucial that we weigh in as soon as possible.

Updated 2:15 p.m 6/4/15: The House delayed the final vote on the bill until Tuesday, June 9th. So keep those messages coming! Share the news with your friends and if you have already sent a letter, click through to the form again and you can find your rep’s phone number for making a quick call.

Updated 10:52 a.m 6/4/15: Debate on the bill continued well into the wee hours of Wednesday night into Thursday morning, and the House is expected to vote on the bill by noon (eastern time) on Thursday.

Can you send a message to your representative today in advance of this crucial vote?

The programs targeted by the House for cuts are precisely the ones that cities, towns and metro regions of all sizes throughout the country are depending on to help them stay economically competitive and bring their ambitious transportation plans to fruition.

Specifically, this bill would:

Cut $200 million for all new transit construction. This comes at a time when public transportation ridership is booming and cities of all sizes are looking to invest in new bus, rail transit, and bikeshare projects to help them stay economically competitive. This program is what Indianapolis is currently using to kick-start their ambitious bus rapid transit network, and scores of other communities are hoping to do the same.
Slash the TIGER competitive grant program by 80 percent from last year’s level down to just $100 million. We’re now six rounds into the popular TIGER program, and it’s clearly inadequate to fulfill the huge demand throughout the country. The program has funded innovative projects in communities of all sizes in all 50 states — and in districts both red and blue.
Cut Amtrak’s budget by $250 million just a few weeks after the tragic Amtrak derailment in Philadelphia, and at a time when ridership has never been higher.

This bill moves to the House floor this evening and will be debated well into the night. The final vote is most likely to come sometime tomorrow, so don’t stop calling and sending messages before the end of the day Thursday. (See updates on timing above.)

So send a message to your representative as soon as you can today. And after you do, if you want to make an even bigger impact, pick up the phone, give them a call and urge them not to cut funding for New and Small Starts, TIGER grants and passenger rail.

House extends MAP-21 to July 31, aligning it with impending insolvency of nation’s transportation fund

After a short debate yesterday, The House of Representatives voted to extend MAP-21 for two months past its May 31st expiration to the end of July, aligning the end of the nation’s transportation law with the latest projection for the insolvency of the nation’s transportation fund. The Senate is expected to act before Friday to approve the bill before the Memorial Day recess begins.

Updated 5/26

The bill to extend MAP-21 two months was approved by a vote of 387-35. There was just one amendment considered, from Rep. Esty (D-CT), for $750M to passenger railroads to help them implement positive train control, but that amendment failed on party-line vote, 182-241.

It was a mostly uneventful debate, though a handful of legislators loudly decried yet another short-term extension of the nation’s transportation law. But most if not all of those legislators speaking against short-term extensions also know that May 31st is right around the corner, a long-term bill isn’t going to happen between now and then with recess next week, and would prefer to keep the program from shutting down entirely.

If the Senate does as expected and approves the bill and sends the extension to President Obama for his signature before the 31st, Congress will have officially kicked the can down the road another two months. This marks the 33^rd time Congress has passed a short-term extension over the last six years rather than do what Americans sent them to Congress to do: legislate and make the tough decisions to move America forward.

“While the certain disaster that would result from a shutdown of the federal transportation program has been avoided temporarily, legislators now have just have two months to put together the full multi-year authorization that we so desperately need,”said James Corless, T4America director. “Come July 31, we’ll once again face not only the expiration of our nation’s transportation policy, but also the insolvency of its funding source. With no consensus yet on how to fund a long-term bill, lawmakers have their work cut out for them.”

We’ll update this post as soon as the Senate takes action on the extension, which could come as early as Wednesday afternoon.

With MAP-21 extended an additional two months, the next immediate item of transportation business coming up in Congress will be next year’s transportation appropriations bill. Shortly after Congress returns from the Memorial Day recess on June 1st, the full House is expected to consider their version of the yearly spending bill for FY 2016 which features heavy cuts to TIGER, New Starts and Amtrak, with the Senate likely to begin their process sometime in June as well.

Update: The Senate passed the two-month extension of MAP-21 last weekend, extending the law until July 31st. The president is expected to sign the law by the May 31st deadline.

Would increasing federal transportation investment be enough to solve our problems?

Flickr photo by Paul Nicholson http://www.flickr.com/photos/paulnich/457162590/

Two mayors from very different cities penned a joint op-ed in the New York Times highlighting the need for Congress to pass a long-term transportation bill and raise new revenues to increase the United States’ overall investment in transportation infrastructure. But their strong piece begs another question: Would raising the level of federal investment be enough to meet our pressing local needs without some major policy changes and reforms to the federal transportation program?

A Republican from a red state mid-sized city and a Democrat from a blue state big city, Mayors Mick Cornett (Oklahoma City) and Bill De Blasio (New York City), teamed up to write an op-ed showing that mayors of all stripes agree: America needs to invest more in transportation to be competitive for the long term:

Working Americans pay the price of federal apathy. Those with little means have the fewest options; mass transit is often their only way to get around. Transit ridership is at record highs, with 10.8 billion trips in 2014. Meanwhile, in the 102 largest metropolitan regions, motorists take more than 200 million trips every day across deficient bridges. Freight volumes are expected to increase by 24 percent in the next seven years.

Federal investment has not kept pace with this demand, resulting in an outdated, overburdened surface transportation system that is ill equipped to handle current, let alone future, need. Spending on infrastructure in the United States has sunk to 1.7 percent of gross domestic product, a 20-year low.

And they rightly point out that, though many states and localities — including their own — have responded to the crisis by raising their own new revenues to invest, they still can’t do it alone.

This isn’t for want of local resources. Over the past decade, New York City has increased commitments to capital projects by 50 percent.In Oklahoma City, among the most politically conservative cities in the country, voters passed a temporary sales-tax increase in 2009 to build, among other projects, a $130 million streetcar line. The nearly eight-year program will raise $777 million, and it passed with 54 percent approval. There is an appetite among voters to fund these critical transit projects.

But we could not do it all on the local level even if we wanted to. In New York City, we cannot even deploy traffic cameras to catch speeding without Albany’s permission, let alone raise major revenue for transportation. Without a strong federal partner, the demands of maintaining infrastructure and preparing for future needs are beyond local means.

They end by urging “both parties to make a deal that will prevent our cities from becoming casualties of gridlock and impasse” by passing a multi-year transportation bill that raises current transportation spending over the 50 billion per year.

These are laudable sentiments that we heartily endorse across the board — strengthening the nation’s transportation fund and raising new revenues to invest is the very first point in our platform.

But is the only problem — especially for the leaders of America’s cities and towns of all sizes — that we’re not investing enough, or also that current revenues aren’t being strategically directed to the most pressing needs in our communities?

We’ve spoken to plenty of mayors and other local officials that have made it clear that the current method of doling out federal funds just isn’t cutting it. State politics continue to drive infrastructure projects and local leaders rarely have a seat at the table to help make decisions about where to spend the money. A little (or a lot) more money funneled through the current federal transportation program isn’t going to solve that problem.

As the American Association of Chamber Executive wrote to Congress two months ago:

Innovation is happening at the local level and yet our local decision makers don’t have enough of the tools, and control less than 10 percent of the funding, which limit the ability to advance key projects that can grow the economies in communities big and small.

These two mayors are writing while representing a bipartisan coalition of mayors, and it can always be tough to stake out a position that everyone can endorse. But many of these undersigned mayors might also agree that they’d like to have a little more control and say over the process of where and how federal transportation dollars get spent in their communities. Just spending more than the status quo isn’t going to bring our communities the kind of economic prosperity that we’re all seeking.

We need to find ways to give the local communities represented by these mayors and many more increased access to federal funds. And we should be rewarding the communities that take action to address their own needs — such as raising local revenues as referenced in the editorial — with opportunities for additional funding.

The Innovation in Surface Transportation Act would be a great place to start, as would instituting reforms to ensure that we prioritize repair and invest our dollars in the projects that have the greatest bang for the buck.

With public confidence in government at low levels, it’s more important than ever to quantify the public benefits of transportation investment and let voters know what their money is going to buy — especially when attempts are being made to raise any new money for transportation to fill the gap.

Will Congress reward the ambitious places that are seizing their future with both hands?

The three mid-sized regions participating in this week’s Transportation Innovation Academy in Indianapolis are a refreshing reminder that local communities – particularly a growing wave of mid-size cities — are seizing their future with both hands and planning to tax themselves to help make ambitious transportation plans a reality. Yet even the most ambitious cities can’t do it alone, and if Congress fails to find a way to put the nation’s transportation fund on stable footing, it will jeopardize even the most homegrown, can-do plans to stay economically competitive.

Following up on the first session of this yearlong academy, sponsored by both T4America and TransitCenter, that began back in March, 21 representatives from these three similar-sized cities — Indianapolis, Raleigh, and Nashville — are reuniting in Indianapolis today and tomorrow to learn from experts and from each other about how to make their ambitious transit expansion plans a reality.

Follow along today and tomorrow (May 14-15 on twitter by following @T4America, @TransitCtr, and the hashtag #TranspoAcademy. The participants will be sharing some of the helpful nuggets of info they’re hearing throughout the two-day workshop.

With Infrastructure Week events happening here in DC all week (#RebuildRenew), it’s a good reality check to hear about these forward-looking plans bubbling up from the grassroots in cities far away from Capitol Hill.

So what’s on tap in Indy that’s worth sharing with the other business and civic leaders from Raleigh and Nashville this week?

Indianapolis

Action by the Indiana legislature in early 2014 cleared the way for metro Indianapolis counties to have a long-awaited vote on funding a much-expanded public transportation network, with a major emphasis on bus rapid transit. With that legislative battle behind them, the broad Indy coalition is working toward a November 2016 ballot measure to fund the first phase of their ambitious Indy Connect transportation plan.

Read the full profile.

While the particulars vary from place to place, Indy isn’t all that different than Nashville and Raleigh. All three cities have various groups of leaders who have coalesced around the notion that big investments in transit are crucial to their long-term economic prosperity and competitiveness.

As the task force concluded in Indianapolis in the story above, a well-rounded investment in a multimodal transportation network in Indy is the long-term plan with the highest return-on-investment. Though all are in different stages of the process, all three are making plans to tax themselves and/or raise local revenue that they are hoping to pair with additional investment from a reliable federal partner.

But will the feds continue to be a reliable partner?

We’ve spent a lot of time here focusing on the trend of states raising new transportation funds over the last few years, and some have mistaken that to mean that states are ready to go it alone. The truth is far from it. While all of these states are moving to address growing needs and declining revenues, they’re absolutely counting on the feds to continue their historic role as a partner. And shouldn’t those efforts be rewarded, rather than using it as an excuse to pass the buck down to states or localities?

In a story detailed in our longer “can-do” Indy profile, Indy is counting on the feds to support their efforts to get started with their bus rapid transit network.

The Red Line won’t get off the ground without a grant from the Federal Transit Administration, and if Congress fails to keep the nation’s trust fund solvent this summer and pass an annual appropriations bill with robust funding for infrastructure, neither will happen. Not only is Indy hopefully raising their own local funds, they’re also leveraging other investments to support the corridor and help it be as successful as possible — like prioritizing their federal block grants for community development into the soon-to-be Red Line corridor.

Red Line Indy slide

Indy, Raleigh, Nashville, and dozens of other cities and regions have been putting their own skin in the game as they make their bets on smart transportation investments. Yet Congress has shown no sign of either settling on a long-term funding source or coming up with an authorization proposal that lasts more than a couple of years. (Or a couple of months!)

Infrastructure Week, happening now, is a great time to hear from leaders of all stripes about the importance of investing in our nation’s infrastructure, but it can feel a little vague or hard to wrap your head around. Which infrastructure? What kind of infrastructure? To what end?

Hearing more about these very specific plans in Raleigh, Nashville and Indianapolis is a great way to bring the point of Infrastructure Week to a specific, understandable, local focus. For these three cities, transit = continued economic prosperity.

Mark Fisher, vice president of government relations and policy development at the Indy Chamber, made this connection clear in the Chamber’s press release for today’s event. “Other regions are using transit to attract talent and investment, connect workers to jobs and spark new development. We must move forward or we will continue to fall behind,” he said.

Hopefully the leaders on Capitol Hill will take note of the things happening in Indianapolis this week — and in Nashville and Raleigh and countless others — and finally come up with the fortitude required help our local economies prosper.