The Tappan Zee bridge overhaul is supposed to include transit facilities, but some fear that those may get dropped later on. Photo: SamuelWantman / Wikimedia

Today the administration announced its list of 14 projects, and at first glance, it seems like most of the transportation-related projects take transit, bicycling, and walking into consideration. Some of them will induce sprawl nonetheless, because they expand traffic capacity.

These projects won’t get more federal funds, but they will get federal help in expediting the process. The president promised that this fast-tracking won’t shortchange environmental reviews. The projects were highlighted by officials in several agencies and final selection was done by the White House.

Here’s the list of surface transportation-related projects, most of them recommended by the Department of Transportation:

Tappan Zee Bridge, New York: The bridge is rated structurally deficient as well as functionally obsolete, meaning that in addition to carrying more traffic than it was designed for, the structure is unsafe to carry vehicles. Constant repairs have made the bridge into a money pit, and a significant overhaul could produce long-term savings on maintenance. Notably, this project is not close to “shovel-ready” status, so its selection seems to indicate that the administration had long-term goals in mind, in addition to short-term job creation. There are plans to include a Bus Rapid Transit lane and a commuter rail line on the bridge, as well, but some advocates worry that all that widening could happen without the transit components coming through in the end.

Crenshaw/LAX, California: LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has become a champion for federal loan programs because of his zeal to expand transit in his city. The Crenshaw/LAX project is a cornerstone of his efforts and will provide a critical transit connection to the airport. The city has done a good job attracting federal interest and assistance, and the FTA is already helping them shorten the approval time for the project.

Whittier Bridge, Massachusetts: A conventional bridge along I-95 will be replaced with a wider bridge that will add vehicle lanes as well as bicycle and pedestrian facilities. While the multi-modal treatment is encouraging, the project appears to be a typical highway-widener with a gloss of bicycle- and pedestrian-friendliness added on.

Provo Westside Connector, Utah: This is the only pure road capacity project on the list. It would build a new arterial roadway between the airport and I-15. Its proximity to wetlands has led to some controversy among residents. Some are also concerned that it would increase traffic and sprawl. The mayor has insisted that the dissent won’t change his mind about going forward with the project.

Baltimore Red Line, Maryland: An east-west transit line that’s been in the works for years but was delayed due to competing proposals for BRT or heavy rail. The 14-mile light rail line provides an alternative to driving on I-40, connecting the suburban areas west of Baltimore to downtown, the Inner Harbor, and the Johns Hopkins. There are several outstanding permitting issues, and federal intervention to smooth the process could be key. The White House estimates that administration support can save the project two years, where most of the projects are slated for about six months’ savings.

City Market at O Street, District of Columbia: Every city has big tracts of city land that are fenced off and lying idle, and most of the time you just hope that there’s some plan to do something great with it at some point. One of those big vacant spaces in DC is about to get a $260 million mixed-used development project. They’ll renovate the historic, 120-year-old O Street Market, rebuild a supermarket, and build 400 market-rate apartments, 145 high-end condominiums, a 180-room hotel and 86 units of affordable senior housing. As part of expediting the review process, the federal government will help the District navigate the historic preservation permitting process. This project was recommended by HUD.

There are also projects dealing with aviation, water treatment, subsidized housing, habitat restoration, wind generation, and oil and gas exploration on prairie and grasslands.

The administration says it’s also gathering best practices from all the agencies to develop recommendations to improve the efficiency, effectiveness, transparency and accountability of federal permitting and environmental review, “without compromising our responsibility to protect safety, public health, and the environment.” They’re thinking about measures like sector-specific guidelines for timely reviews of permitting applications; encouraging early engagement with stakeholders; coordinating federal reviews with those of state, local and tribal regulatory agencies; and instituting greater oversight of the overall process.

What do you think of this list, Streetsblog readers? Can you share some insight into any of these projects listed above?

President Obama said he won't accept spending cuts without tax increases. Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

In a speech last Thursday, Boehner ruled out any form of tax increase as the deficit reduction “super committee” decides how to meet its mandate. “When it comes to producing savings to reach its $1.5 trillion deficit reduction target, the Joint Select Committee has only one option,” he said, “spending cuts and entitlement reform.”

President Obama went to the mat this morning for a different approach to cutting the deficit. He presented his own plan, which includes some spending cuts and policy changes to Medicare and Medicaid, in addition to other programs. But the centerpiece is the elimination of corporate tax loopholes and of tax cuts for the wealthy.

“I will veto any bill that changes benefits for those who rely on Medicare but does not raise serious revenues by asking the wealthiest Americans or biggest corporations to pay their fair share,” Obama said. “We are not going to have a one-sided deal that hurts the folks that are most vulnerable.”

There are many plans on the table right now, both to increase spending and to cut it. The president released his deficit reduction plan, in part, to explain how to pay for his job creation bill, which includes $50 billion for transportation infrastructure and $10 to capitalize a national infrastructure bank.

But the House has already passed about half the appropriations bills for next year, spelling out dramatic budget cuts in line with Rep. Paul Ryan’s proposals from the spring. There have also been a few spending-cut agreements, including the ones last April that saved the government from an imminent shutdown. And at the end of July, there was another round that saved the country from imminent default, as our debt limit neared expiration. The “super committee” (aka “Joint Select Committee”) formed by that agreement is tasked with another round of work to reduce the deficit. That’s the committee which Boehner is forbidding to raise taxes, and which Obama is now forbidding not to.

We’ve been saying for a long time that spending cuts won’t lay the tracks for a 21st century, sustainable transportation system. Any real solution to the dwindling Highway Trust Fund will have to include new revenues – specifically, a higher gas tax indexed to inflation, or even better, a vehicle-miles-traveled fee.

After a barrage of spending cuts since the Republicans gained control of the House — and the threat of more cuts from the super committee, the House Transportation Committee’s six-year reauthorization proposal, and the 2012 budget – it’s good to see the president using some political capital to say that he’s not willing to cut essential programs to the bone.

And to make sure the money is properly spent, we’re building on reforms we’ve already put in place. No more earmarks. No more boondoggles. No more Bridges to Nowhere. We’re cutting the red tape that prevents some of these projects from getting started as quickly as possible. And we’ll set up an independent fund to attract private dollars and issue loans based on two criteria: how badly a construction project is needed and how much good it will do for the economy.

And without ever saying the words “infrastructure bank,” he made his push for one:

This idea came from a bill written by a Texas Republican [Kay Bailey Hutchison] and a Massachusetts Democrat [John Kerry]. The idea for a big boost in construction is supported by America’s largest business organization and America’s largest labor organization. It’s the kind of proposal that’s been supported in the past by Democrats and Republicans alike. You should pass it right away.

He would capitalize the bank with an initial $10 billion, just as Sens. Kerry and Hutchison had proposed. Obama’s own earlier proposal called for a $30 billion investment.

Obama’s written plan also pledges investments in TIGER and TIFIA – good news, since the 2012 transportation budget passed by a House subcommittee yesterday zeroed out TIGER entirely. It also builds on his instruction to agency heads to identify projects that deserve federal help – if not funds – for streamlining the process.

Transportation reform advocates praised the bill, with James Corless of Transportation for America calling it “both ambitious and pragmatic.”

House Transportation Committee ranking Democrat Nick Rahall sat next to Chair John Mica during the speech, and afterward, Rahall said, “We may have walked out of the chamber with different views on the President’s proposals, but I remain committed to working together in a bipartisan fashion.”

We’ll see if they can find anything they both agree to work on. The statement Mica issued after the speech was a quick repudiation of everything the president had asked for:

While the President reconfirmed that our highways are clogged and our skies are congested, his well delivered address provided only one specific recommendation for building our nation’s infrastructure.

Unfortunately, a National Infrastructure Bank run by Washington bureaucrats requiring Washington approval and Washington red tape is moving in the wrong direction. A better plan to improve infrastructure is to empower our states, 33 of which already have state infrastructure banks.

Key interests who have supported the general notion of infrastructure investment in the past won’t necessarily fight for Obama’s specific proposal. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce issued a statement saying that infrastructure spending – even paired with all the tax cuts Obama proposed – wasn’t enough if it didn’t include de-regulation or a commitment to free enterprise instead of bigger government.

Democrats lined up in Obama’s defense. EPW Committee Chair Barbara Boxer called the president’s plan “both inspirational and specific” and pledged to work “on a bipartisan basis to pass the American Jobs Act.” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, meanwhile, called on all House Committee ranking members to urge their chairmen to schedule immediate hearings and action on the legislation proposed by the president.

One of the first things Obama said in his speech is that “everything in this bill will be paid for; everything.” But again he’s leaving the details to Congress.

When the President unveiled his ambitious $556 billion transportation agenda last February, he let his Transportation Secretary twist in the wind as Congress demanded to know how the thing was going to be paid for. All LaHood would say, for months, was that he looked forward to working with Congress on it.

This time, Obama’s leaving the funding question to the bipartisan “super committee” formed as part of the debt ceiling/deficit reduction deal this summer, which just started work and is already beginning to fracture. That committee is already tasked with finding $1.5 trillion in cuts, which was a tall order for a group that can’t seem to agree on what to order for lunch. Now Obama’s asking them to find more.

How about this for your next transportation stimulus, Mr. President? Image: Austin Strategic Mobility Plan

Given the GOP strategy of obstructing any stated goal of the administration, it’ll be a tough sell. Some Republicans have already made it clear they would rather see a $640 billion, 12-month payroll tax holiday. That would increase the deficit by more than twice what Obama’s plan would, but deficits don’t seem to matter as long as taxes are getting cut.

So it’s no surprise that the president is also looking for ways that he can spur infrastructure job creation without Congress’s approval. Last week, Obama pleaded with Congress to pass a clean extension of the transportation bill (a plea which some Republicans are gleefully denying). At the same time, he announced that he was directing some agencies to each identify three infrastructure projects that could use a little federal help in speeding up the process. Here’s what he said:

In keeping with a recommendation from my Jobs Council, today I’m directing certain federal agencies to identify high-priority infrastructure projects that can put people back to work. And these projects — these are projects that are already funded, and with some focused attention, we could expedite the permitting decisions and reviews necessary to get construction underway more quickly while still protecting safety, public health, and the environment.

He specifically called on the departments of agriculture, commerce, housing and urban development, interior and transportation to highlight three projects each. We were wondering whether this process will end up falling into some of the same traps as the stimulus, which emphasized shovel-readiness to the detriment of other evaluation criteria for new projects, like whether the money would be well-spent.

Though Obama didn’t use the phrase “shovel-ready” last week, he called for projects that are already funded and have state and local permits, which implies nearly the same thing. Without a new stimulus, which the Republicans have already promised to oppose, there is no money to fund new projects, making it imperative to find those that are already funded. Still, the president admitted last year that “there’s no such thing as shovel-ready projects.”

And despite the administration’s general friendliness toward transit and understanding of the limitations of the private automobile, 60 percent of transportation dollars in the stimulus went to highways, with just 20 percent to transit. (Most of the rest went to freight rail, with a little bit for aviation and maritime projects.)

Get used to it.

Obama said the action was taken in the interest of “reducing regulatory burdens and regulatory uncertainty, particularly as our economy continues to recover,” but environmental groups slammed the decision as “a huge win for corporate polluters,” in the words of League of Conservation Voters President Gene Karpinski.

NRDC President Frances Beinecke said, “The Clean Air Act clearly requires the Environmental Protection Agency to set protective standards against smog — based on science and the law. The White House now has polluted that process with politics.” Sen. Barbara Boxer, chair of the Environment and Public Works Committee, said she was “disappointed” with the decision.

The decision has a major impact on efforts to reform transportation, NRDC’s Deron Lovaas told Streetsblog.

“It frankly makes our job harder, in terms of reducing pollution from mobile sources,” Lovaas said. “If they had set the standard closer to 60 parts per billion, as opposed to 80, regions and states would have to get really serious about transit, and really serious about smart growth, and really serious about reducing vehicle miles traveled, because the gains couldn’t all be made through better technology.”

Business interests had long lobbied against the tighter standards, and they expressed their pleasure at the president’s announcement. The Chamber of Commerce cheered the move, rationalizing that by waiting for the statutorily-required rule-making in 2013, the EPA “can base its decision on the most recent science, not 2006 science.”

According to the National Review, some Republicans had called the ozone requirements “the single most harmful regulation proposed by the administration” and estimated that the total cost of implementation would have been “at least $1 trillion over a decade and millions of jobs.” House Speaker John Boehner called Obama’s concession to polluters “a good first step” and said he was glad the White House “recognized the job-killing impact of this particular regulation.”

Did we mention it would have saved 12,000 lives?

President Obama exhorted Congress to pass a clean extension of the transportation bill, to keep people, like some of those by his side, at work.

“I’m calling on Congress, as soon as they come back, to pass a clean extension of the surface transportation bill,” President Barack Obama said from the Rose Garden this morning. “This bill provides funding for highway construction, bridge repair, mass transit systems, and other essential projects that keep our people and our commerce moving quickly and safely. And for construction workers and their families across the country, it represents the difference between making ends meet and not making ends meet.”

While his calls for an extension of the current bill are increasingly in line with the growing realization that there is no possible way of passing a new bill before the September 30 extension, Obama did look beyond the immediate fix. “When Congress is back next week, in addition to passing these clean extensions to prevent any halt on existing work, we’re going to have to have a serious conversation in this country about making real, lasting investments in our infrastructure — from better ports to a smarter electric grid, from high-speed internet to high-speed rail.”

The president’s speech, first announced yesterday, made a push not only to put people back to work, but to “reform the way transportation money is invested, to eliminate waste, to give states more control over the projects that are right for them, and to make sure that we’re getting better results for the money that we spend.”

We need to stop funding projects based on whose districts they’re in and start funding them based on how much good they’re going to be doing for the American people. No more bridges to nowhere, no more projects that are simply funded because of somebody pulling strings. We need to do this all in a way that gets the private sector more involved. That’s how we’re going to put construction workers back to work right now, doing the work that America needs done, not just to boost our economy this year but for the next 20 years.

That focus on performance is good news for transportation reformers who have been demanding that the next reauthorization spend limited transportation dollars more wisely, using a cost-benefit analysis and other evaluative tools to determine whether a given project meets national and regional transportation goals. Obama’s mention of long-term economic growth, in addition to short-term job creation, is also a welcome change to those who have pushed politicians, including the president, to take the long view.

“The Interstate system created a lot of jobs, but no one talks now about how many jobs it created from constructing it,” Joshua Schank, CEO of the Eno Transportation Foundation, told Streetsblog last month. “People talk about the impact it had on the economy.

President Obama also said that he had directed some federal agencies to identify high-priority construction projects that are already funded but could use a jump-start with expedited permitting decisions and reviews “while still protecting safety, public health, and the environment.”

During his remarks, the president was flanked by Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka and Chamber of Commerce Chief Operating Officer David Chavern.

His mention of Congress’ inability to pass a new FAA bill highlighted another reason why significant action on a new bill will be impossible before the end of this month: Congress’ most recent extension of the aviation reauthorization expires first, and the chambers will busy themselves fighting over a few million aviation dollars before the September 16 deadline for that bill, before they can get around to arguing about surface transportation.

If the bill is delayed just 10 days, the country would lose over $1 billion in transportation funding — “That’s money we can never get back,” Obama said.

President Obama with daughter Malia on Tuesday. Not pictured: Secret Service SUVs. Photo: Jim Watson/AFP/Getty via Transportation Nation

This week marked the 109th anniversary of the first presidential motorcade, starring Theodore Roosevelt. If you’ve ever wondered why TR’s successors so rarely ditch their limos in favor of human-powered transport, read on. Staged photo op or no, it seems being elected president is a great way to spoil a family outing.

Copy from Politico’s Carrie Budoff Brown via the White House Press Office. Emphasis added.

The First Family took a leisurely ride Tuesday morning through Manuel F. Correllus State Forest.

After about a half-hour wait, shortly after 11 a.m., the pool got a glimpse of the president, decked out in a helmet, sunglasses, a black polo shirt and dark jeans.

But first up: First Lady Michelle Obama and daughter Sasha took the lead, passing first by the pool, which was assembled in knee-deep grass off a concrete bike path. Neither said anything to the reporters, photographers and TV cameras recording them.

Several minutes later, the president and daughter Malia rode by.

“Hello, everybody,” Obama said to the pool and about two dozen or so less-famous bikers who greeted him.

“Any word on Qadhafi’s whereabouts?” yelled the Associated Press’s Mark Smith.

The president didn’t take the question, choosing instead to keep his focus on the small group of cheering spectators as he moved further down the path.

The full procession through the park offered a stark contrast that underscored the strange existence of a president.

Shortly before Michelle and Sasha Obama arrived, two trucks carrying Secret Service agents rode along the same narrow concrete path usually reserved for bikers and walkers. A rolling caravan of agents and staff followed on bikes ahead of the president and Malia, who were then followed by several more SUVs full of agents.

“Can you imagine living like that?” one female biker asked her fellow onlookers.

But there’s still a lot to be said for the president coming out with guns blazing and setting a high bar for smart infrastructure investment. And while the overall scale of the president’s proposal doesn’t stand much of a chance, several aspects of its policy reforms are still alive and kicking around the Capitol.

President Obama, with other transportation leaders, called for a six-year infrastructure plan last October. Reuters

The Senate and House versions of a multi-year transportation bill are due to be released soon, so Orski’s post serves as a good opportunity to take a step back, consider where things stand, and go over how the president’s plan fits into the reauthorization process.

First, let me reiterate that the draft bill that’s been circulating has been disavowed by administration officials as an early draft that does not reflect what will be in the final White House proposal. So, at this point, we’re still working off a lot of assumptions as to what the president will ultimately support.

What we do know is what the White House laid out in February as its goals for a new transportation reauthorization – a bigger share for transit, an infrastructure bank, the consolidation and simplification of program structure within USDOT, a strengthening of TIFIA and TIGER, priority for livability and sustainability work, and an infusion of cash for high-speed rail – all rolled into one $556 billion, six-year bill.

Obama’s vigorous support for these programs is a huge shot in the arm to those pursuing transportation reform goals, but advocates’ excitement about the president’s outline was quickly tempered by the sobering realization that if the administration had a plan for funding such a far-reaching proposal, they weren’t letting anybody else in on it. The president himself rejected the idea of a gas tax, and yesterday’s brief flicker of hope that he might be considering a switch to a vehicle-miles-traveled fee was quickly extinguished.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood’s constant refrain that he was “looking forward to working with Congress” on a funding mechanism continues to ring hollow in the absence of any attempt to get down to specifics. We at Streetsblog have wondered if there’s a strategy behind all that — or if the president’s full agenda was doomed to failure.

Many factors are aligned against such an ambitious agenda. As I mentioned (and Orski repeated), “a still-struggling economy, high gas prices, and a deficit-obsessed Congress” all make it a harder reach. If the president wanted to defend the feasibility of his proposal, he would have addressed those issues. Orski seems to believe the only path forward is to cave to the demands of House GOP leadership to pass a bill half the size of what he wanted. But Obama could have put his weight behind a new revenue stream that would fund the whole proposal. He could have found money elsewhere in the budget. Or he could have tried to justify a pretty hefty chunk of deficit spending.

Those are his three options. In the absence of Obama’s support for any of these politically difficult choices, he’s forced Congress to pick one, and it looks like they’re just not going to do it on their own. At least not to the extent that would make passage of the full Obama plan feasible.

That doesn’t mean the president has a bad plan. It just means he’s not fighting for it with enough conviction. So, what’s next?

Democrats and Republicans, business and labor have come together of late to push for new infrastructure financing mechanisms. Photo: Kitty Felde/KPCC

The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee and the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee have both indicated they’re getting very close to announcing their bills. The House plan will probably stick firmly to projected revenues from the Highway Trust Fund (which we’re looking forward to calling the Transportation Trust Fund). The Senate plan will probably include some deficit spending and will use the shortfall to make a strong case for an expanded TIFIA loan program and infrastructure bank, both of which leverage limited funds with private investment to complete projects that would be impossible with only public money.

The loan programs are both aspects of President Obama’s bill that are made more realistic by the funding shortfall. There are several others that have a greater likelihood of becoming law than Orski would lead you to believe.

House Republicans have already said in their response to the president’s proposal that they support TIFIA expansion and the efficient consolidation of programs. Orski’s argument that the infrastructure bank is a long shot is diminished by the bipartisan introduction in March of a bill to create such a bank. That bill hasn’t progressed far in either chamber, but that’s no surprise – all transportation and infrastructure bills passed in the past two years have been “marker bills” expecting to be rolled into the reauthorization, not passed by themselves.

Orski also claimed Obama’s livability program was unlikely to make it into the final bill, saying the whole concept is “ill-defined” (which says to me that he just doesn’t get all the fuss about giving people the choice to get around without a car). The fact that livability programs largely survived the carnage of the FY2011 budget brawl bodes well for their place in a final reauthorization bill. The interagency Partnership for Sustainable Communities lives on. TIGER got the merest trim. Clearly, someone is standing up for these programs. And just yesterday, a Complete Streets bill was introduced in the House — with bipartisan support.

Another administration priority that should find a home in the new bill is increased attention for performance measures. Many witnesses at House and Senate hearings helping craft the bill mentioned the need for greater performance metrics. Everyone seems to agree that in times of tight budgets, the country can no longer afford to throw money away on wasteful projects. A greater focus on performance can only help advance transportation reforms. There’s a strong argument to be made that highway expansion, at $39 million a mile in urban areas, is a poor investment.

To pass a bill as ambitious as the Obama plan, political leaders would have to stand up not just for increased infrastructure investment – even some of the most conservative members of Congress are for that – but for a way to pay for it. Even lacking that, however, some of the administration’s good ideas will end up in the final bill.

The Hill’s Keith Laing writes:

The proposal was included in a draft of the administration’s Transportation Opportunities Act, but a White House spokesman said it “was not an administration proposal.”

“This is not a bill supported by the administration,” White House spokeswoman Jennifer Psaki said. “This was an early working draft proposal that was never formally circulated within the administration, does not take into account the advice of the president’s senior advisers, economic team or Cabinet officials, and does not represent the views of the president.”

This calls into question not just the VMT fee but all the proposals in the draft bill being circulated. If the White House is walking away from one piece of it, who knows what other elements in the draft have already been removed?

The administration rarely writes its own legislative language to submit to Congress, and indeed, the language that comes out of the House and Senate committees with jurisdiction over transportation will be more significant, as those are the bodies that eventually vote on the bill. Still, this is the first look we’ve seen at official legislative text.

The 224-page draft, along with a 61-page analysis that’s circulating along with it, does not appear to hold many surprises for those who paid attention to the administration’s February announcement of Obama’s transportation priorities. BNA’s Adam Snider warns that USDOT “would not confirm the validity of the document, which a lobbyist warned might be an early draft that has subsequently changed.”

Snider reports that one significant addition is more information on a program to allow states to do their own environmental impact statements, to avoid letting projects get bottlenecked in the federal pipeline. This issue came up many times in House and Senate stakeholder meetings. Especially in the context of a small bill, people are looking for efficiencies and savings everywhere they can, and the environmental review process has been identified as a prime place to speed up project delivery.

Whether Obama’s bill is submitted to Congress over today or next week, we can expect to see it soon, as both houses are getting down to business on their own versions of the transportation reauthorization, which they both want to pass out of committee by Memorial Day.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid didn't have to shut down the government after all. Photo: AP

They cut $38.5 billion from the 2010 budget; $78.5 billion from President Obama’s 2011 budget proposal. Some of the more controversial riders included by the GOP were stripped, including one to block the EPA from regulating greenhouse gas emissions. To give themselves time to work out the details, vote in both chambers, and get the budget measure signed by the president, they passed a one-week extension to the current budget.

As Angie wrote in today’s network roundup, the one-week extension contained $2 billion in cuts that disproportionately hurt transit and urban development. But it does get a little better from there: The full budget for the remaining six months of the fiscal year goes easier on transit, rail and livability programs than some had feared.

Transportation didn’t escape unscathed, but it could have been worse. TIGER funding was left intact, with all $600 million for 2011 included in the budget — a piece of unexpected good news for reformers. And Transportation for America’s Sean Barry notes that the cuts to transportation and housing were largely “non-controversial” because many of them came from budget items the president was also planning to reduce or eliminate for next year. In a blog post, the White House said, “Our team also went after wasteful spending and earmarked, special interest programs including $630 million in earmarked transportation projects and at least $2.5 billion in transportation funding that is ready to be earmarked.”

Transportation advocates are beginning to take note of a trend toward talking about “wasteful” transportation spending. While it’s mostly Republicans using this rhetoric, the White House statement indicates that the Obama administration is trying to define wasteful transportation spending in its own way. With the GOP leadership staking out a sharply different position from the administration on transportation investment, the contours are starting to emerge in a debate over what it means to make smart investments in transportation. Does efficient spending involve using performance metrics and competitive grants to select projects, or does it just involve cutting transit and active transportation out of the bill?

The budget deal does indicate, however, that people on both sides of the aisle can agree that earmarks are not the best way to allocate transportation dollars. The $630 million cut from the bill isn’t just earmarks, however – they’re “orphaned” earmarks, meaning the authorization is more than 10 years old but the money was never spent. So those are easy enough to wipe off the books.

Not all cuts were so painless, however. The budget wrangling has also cut:

• $1.5 billion of the $2.5 billion allotment for high-speed rail, leaving spending for HSR at the levels originally requested by the Obama administration.
• $280 million from the New Starts program for transit capital projects – a deep cut from the $2 billion program, but still mercifully less than the House version’s cut of $430 million. This is money freed up by the cancelation of the ARC tunnel project between New Jersey and New York.
• $6.3 million from the Transportation Planning, Research, and Development for surface transportation, which may come from the Partnership for Sustainable Communities.
• $2.5 million from the Federal Railroad Administration’s Research and Development and $3.3 million from transit research.

The plan is a blueprint that Congress can use as a basis for its transportation reauthorization bill. It has a lot in common with then-Transportation Committee Chair Jim Oberstar’s bill from 2009. And, like Oberstar’s bill, it leaves unanswered the question of how to fund transportation investments. This time, however, it comes in the midst of an all-out Republican war on deficit spending.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood says the president's proposal represents the administration's "big bold vision" for transportation. Photo: Tanya Snyder

How much of this plan will survive the GOP cutting machine is anyone’s guess. There’s a lot in the president’s proposal that’s worth saving. Some notable elements:

• Transit funding is going up by 127 percent, while funding for roads and bridges is getting a 48 percent increase. That represents a significant shift in the highways-to-transit ratio, which will go from an 80-20 split to a 74-26 split.
• The Highway Trust Fund is getting a long-overdue name change. The new Transportation Trust Fund will now have four accounts – the traditional highways and mass transit accounts and also new accounts for passenger rail and an infrastructure bank.
• Some advocates are disappointed that the proposed infrastructure bank will be housed at DOT and not be formed as an independent entity, as many had hoped. Still, the shift to more discretionary, competitive grants is a huge victory for reformers.
• The consolidation of 55 road programs into five means there will no longer be separate pots of money for bridges, for example, or trucker rest areas, according to Undersecretary Roy Kienitz. That money will be rolled into a larger pot of funding for highways that states and local governments will compete for. The five programs will be: the National Highway Program, Highway Safety Improvement, Livable Communities, Federal Allocation and Research, Technology, and Education.
• The TIFIA loan program will go from a $120 million allocation to $450 million; TIGER, which has given out $2.1 billion in grants so far, will get $2 billion the first year in the president’s proposal.
• The funding for livability programs – $28 billion over six years – will include bike and pedestrian improvements, but allocation decisions rest with the states.
• While the new bill doesn’t have a line item for a new national freight policy or a new office overseeing freight movement, Kienitz said freight programs got the lion’s share of TIGER grants (pun not intended, I think) and will be well-positioned to get money from the infrastructure bank.
• Amtrak funding will be split into two accounts: one for state of good repair and one for new system development.

In a briefing at the DOT with reporters today, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood reiterated that transportation has historically been a bipartisan issue and he expects Congress will be unanimous in wanting to pass this bill, as it will create jobs in their districts. But this bill is falling into a unique political environment.

First, the House is an earmark-free zone now. A massive transportation bill was easier to vote for when lawmakers could point to specific projects in their districts that would be included. Now that their districts will have to compete for money, it might be a far harder sell. When asked about that, LaHood simply said, “We’re gonna find out.”

Second, the Republican scissorhands that control Congress, with their single-minded determination to cut spending, are sure to have a harsh response to a half-trillion dollar proposal that has no real revenue stream attached to it.

Indeed, LaHood said the administration plans to spend no more than it brings in, but they don’t actually have a plan for accomplishing that goal. He said he’d leave it to Congress to work out the revenue part. DOT officials admit it is a “non-trivial” amount of money to look for. Meanwhile, he stands by the decision not to raise the gas tax while unemployment is still high.

As the White House rolls out this budget proposal, based on input administration officials collected in six listening sessions around the country, the House Transportation Committee is holding its own listening sessions. Today it held the first two, both in West Virginia, where lawmakers heard from contractors and highway authorities about the need for a new bill.

When asked how he planned to sell a rural-oriented Congress on the bigger slice of the pie for transit, LaHood said some of that transit money will be for rural areas, not just big cities. He wants to make sure rural people who can’t or don’t drive have access to transportation “so that rural America is not left out.”

Image: Reuters

As expected, the President is trying to simplify the federal transportation program, consolidating 60 programs into five. The Post reports that those would be “limited to making investments only if Congress agrees on a financing plan that would not increase the deficit.” Politico reports that transportation would come from a “single trust fund covering highways and passenger rail systems like Amtrak.”

Insiders say there’s no gas tax hike planned (no surprise there) but there is funding to start a National Infrastructure Bank.

President Obama is also calling for increases in education spending, education research, and broadband access.

He plans to raise revenues by increasing some taxes on the wealthy, teeing up for another battle with Republicans, and ending oil and gas subsidies.

Among the cuts: community development block grants would lose $300 million, $1 billion would be cut from large airport grants, and nearly $1 billion would be trimmed from a fund that finances water treatment plans and other infrastructure projects, according to the Post.

We’ll be hearing more from the Department of Transportation in a few hours and will bring you more news when we have it.

The FY2012 budget request comes as Congress is still wrangling over the budget for the rest of FY2011 (which, by the way, started October 1, 2010).

After conversations with experts about what we can expect from the president’s transportation vision, this is what we’ve come up with:

1. We don’t really know.

The administration has been especially tight-lipped about this one. Advocates (and yours truly) have begged DOT officials for the slightest shred of information, and they’re doing an admirable job defending the secrecy of the document until showtime.

2. They’re going to make the case for a big bill and funding reforms

If the $53 billion high-speed rail announcement was any indication – and it was probably intended to be one – the administration is still thinking big on infrastructure, and they’re willing to stomach the big price tag. Obama’s economic team has been pushing for it for months.

The Council of Economic Advisers came out with a report in the fall, analyzing the economic impact of infrastructure investment – and specifically calling for a range of transportation options, a fix-it-first approach, walkability, and performance metrics.

In his State of the Union speech last month, the president said he wanted to pick transportation projects based on what was good for the economy, not politicians. And just this week, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner seconded the president’s call for infrastructure spending by pointing out the economic benefit to communities when good transportation options are present.

Put all that together with the announcement of $53 billion for high-speed rail and you know he’s talking big bucks (and a new way of spending them).

3. It will cost more than Congress wants to fund, but Obama might be able to convince them.

House Republicans have made it extremely clear that they’re not willing to tolerate big spending. So if Obama swings for the fences, it’ll be up to advocates to fight hard to defend big investments.

Our sources remind us, “these proposals haven’t been developed in a vacuum.” Secretary Ray LaHood was a longtime member of Congress and he still has many advisors from Capitol Hill. One hopes that the president’s plan has been written with some eye toward Congress’s willingness to go along.

According to one expert, when SAFETEA-LU was in the works in 2005, committee leaders Don Young and Jim Oberstar wanted a $375 billion bill. The Bush administration came back with a proposal for $250 billion. Young and Oberstar scoffed that it was a lowball number, that it cut the plan off at the knees. And the final number was $286 billion – closer to Bush’s number than the committee’s. It shows how important the president can be in setting the tone of the debate.

In 2009, Oberstar tried to be the first out of the gate, starting the debate with a big, ambitious bill. But it got tangled up in the question of how to pay for it. Which brings us to…

4. It won’t increase the gas tax.

Everyone else seems to agree it needs to happen, but neither Congress nor the administration is willing to come out in front of a tax hike. The deficit commission made a strong case that the insolvency of the Highway Trust Fund contributes to the insolvency of the nation as a whole. In a deficit-obsessed political environment, though, the president will be hard-pressed to push a big bill without an adequate revenue stream to pay for it.

5. We’ll have to read between the lines to see the whole plan.

The White House announced after the State of the Union that the president’s proposal for a six-year reauthorization would come as part of his budget. But since this budget request is just for FY2012, we’ll have to look carefully to see what it says about the next five years. The way they frame the issue and the language they use will give us a clue. It’s possible the administration will simultaneously reveal a complete six-year bill along with the budget proposal, but don’t count on it.

6. The Senate will be key.

House Republicans came out swinging when Biden made the high-speed rail announcement, but the Senate was quiet. Environment and Public Works Committee Chair Barbara Boxer didn’t say anything.

Even under Democratic control, Congress trimmed down the president’s last budget request significantly. The Republican House this time around will want to do a lot more than trim. Will the Senate come down somewhere in the middle? How will they reconcile a more moderate spending plan with the austerity of the House?

7. Metropolitan areas will have to fight to increase their role.

Oberstar’s bill included an increased role for metropolitan areas. California lets metropolitan planning organizations make the decisions about how to allocate a majority of state transportation funds, but that’s unusual and not exactly popular with state DOTs. We’ll be looking for a step in that direction, but probably just a baby step.

We’ll be following the news as it breaks Monday, and we’ll bring you the details as they emerge.

President Obama made his long-awaited infrastructure push during his State of the Union address – with more information included in an accompanying memo released today (see below). This is what he told Congress:

The third step in winning the future is rebuilding America. To attract new businesses to our shores, we need the fastest, most reliable ways to move people, goods, and information – from high-speed rail to high-speed internet. [Applause]

Our infrastructure used to be the best – but our lead has slipped. South Korean homes now have greater internet access than we do. Countries in Europe and Russia invest more in their roads and railways than we do. China is building faster trains and newer airports. Meanwhile, when our own engineers graded our nation’s infrastructure, they gave us a “D.”

We have to do better. America is the nation that built the transcontinental railroad, brought electricity to rural communities, and constructed the interstate highway system. The jobs created by these projects didn’t just come from laying down tracks or pavement. They came from businesses that opened near a town’s new train station or the new off-ramp.

Over the last two years, we have begun rebuilding for the 21st century, a project that has meant thousands of good jobs for the hard-hit construction industry. Tonight, I’m proposing that we redouble these efforts. [Applause]

We will put more Americans to work repairing crumbling roads and bridges. We will make sure this is fully paid for, attract private investment, and pick projects based on what’s best for the economy, not politicians.

Within 25 years, our goal is to give 80% of Americans access to high-speed rail. [Applause] This could allow you go places in half the time it takes to travel by car. For some trips, it will be faster than flying – without the pat-down. [Laughter, applause]. As we speak, routes in California and the Midwest are already underway.

Within the next five years, we will make it possible for business to deploy the next generation of high-speed wireless coverage to 98% of all Americans. This isn’t just about a faster internet and fewer dropped calls. It’s about connecting every part of America to the digital age. It’s about a rural community in Iowa or Alabama (focus on Grasley and Wyden, on Fox) where farmers and small business owners will be able to sell their products all over the world. It’s about a firefighter who can download the design of a burning building onto a handheld device; a student who can take classes with a digital textbook; or a patient who can have face-to-face video chats with her doctor.

All these investments – in innovation, education, and infrastructure – will make America a better place to do business and create jobs.

High speed rail proponents will cheer his support for their cause, which has been teetering in the face of serious opposition. But overall, Obama shied away from specifics on infrastructure. He didn’t return to his Labor Day push for a $50 billion “down payment” for infrastructure. He didn’t get behind a six-year reauthorization, though the administration did release a companion to the address, saying that a six-year transportation reauthorization would be rolled into the White House budget proposal. The memo also envisions “transformational investments such as an infrastructure bank.”

In his speech, Obama certainly didn’t advocate for a reform-minded transportation agenda that gets beyond the single-occupancy vehicle. And he didn’t address the people whose letters we featured earlier today, who find their mobility curtailed because of inadequate public transportation.

But were we expecting all that? This is kind of what we were expecting. It’s notable that Obama listed infrastructure third in a series with economic innovation and education, listing the strategies the country needs to use to return to its position as a global superpower. It’ll be up to advocates and supporters of sustainable, efficient transportation to keep pushing the administration – and, more importantly, Congress – for the kind of infrastructure investment and innovative reform the country needs.

Here’s a sampling:

Lisa T. in St. Louis wrote:

As a high school teacher, I see how our less-than-adequate public transportation system impacts low-income families who do not have dependable personal transportation. Students and families who do not have cars are not able to participate in parent conferences, open house events, and extracurricular activities.

Jan H. of Montana wrote the president about how her hometown has been changed by car culture:

When I was a girl, there were two trains a day: east to Chicago and west to Spokane. Now, there are nothing but freeways clogged with big trucks.

Ann E. in Washington State told the president about the importance of transit accessibility:

I use an electric scooter to get around because treatment for bone cancer has limited my range for walking. Last fall, I went to visit my daughter who lives in Philadelphia. We were able to board the outbound trains to the suburbs using a special ramp but on our return trip we found that the station didn’t have the necessary ramps.

Please include funding in your 2012 budget to make public transportation practical for all who wish to use it.

John C. of Oakland, CA, wrote that transit service is an economic lifeline for working people:

In Oakland, we want expansion of mass transit to include eco passes to provide free mass transit for junior and high school students.

Nancy H. from Wisconsin, wrote about the transit issues in her area:

Funding for transit is a necessity where I live in Racine, WI, located between Milwaukee and Chicago. Anyone without a car must deal with limited bus routes that don’t reach many of the places in the county where jobs are located. Getting from Racine to neighboring communities by bus is impossible in most cases.

For the Racine community to attract new businesses there must be dependable, networked transportation.

Robert Kelly, President of the Amalgamated Transit Union’s Local 308 in Chicago, wrote the president about how transit spurs job growth:

With a staggering set of issues before you, it is easy to understand that some domestic issues might not make the top of your priority list when you have to deal with crisis after crisis. A renewed federal commitment to urban mass transit is an issue that absolutely affects the lives of millions of Americans every single day, the environment and your Administration’s commitment to grow jobs.

Mary J. in St. Louis wrote about her years without access to transportation:

Many years ago I lived in a rural area and had no ready access to a car. My mother and I would “flag down” a Greyhound bus on a nearby road to get to town for groceries, to attend church, and to visit family. Today, living in suburbia, I have a car, but no buses come near my house.

In Los Angeles, Pariss B. wrote about the importance of the bus system:

Bus operations are important to me because I am a citizen who wants things to get better. Bus fares are high and things are only getting rougher. Times are hard. It’s time for a change.

Maybe, once he reads them, Obama should forward these letters on to House Republicans, who are expected to be a tough audience for his pitch to increase investment to “outbuild” other nations.

The President got pulses racing in the transportation world with stirring speeches about infrastructure investment this past Labor Day and Columbus Day. And his economic advisers recently put out a thoughtful report [PDF] making the case for investing now, while building costs are low and so much labor is available in construction. Now is the time for the President to make a strong pitch to Congress and more importantly to the American public in his State of the Union. This is what I would say if I were writing the speech President Obama will give on Tuesday.

**********************************************

We face a challenge in this country: Our transportation infrastructure policy is broken and it is going broke.

More than fifty years ago, Republican President Dwight Eisenhower worked with legislative leaders including Democratic Senator Al Gore, Sr. on a visionary transportation law: The National Interstate and Defense Highways Act. This launched the construction of a world-class highway system that drove prosperity in the 20th century and now criss-crosses the nation. Thirty-five years later, Republican President George H. W. Bush worked with Democratic Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Representative Glenn Anderson to pass the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act, reforming and updating Eisenhower’s vision to address America’s changing transportation needs.

Now is the time to honor that bipartisan legacy by building infrastructure that gives us a competitive edge in the 21st century.

But we’re not there yet – far from it.

The last transportation law expired more than a year ago. This is the bill that included the infamous “bridge to nowhere” earmark, and it is emblematic of government waste. We did a better job with investments in the recovery act, which had clear objectives, were merit-based and transparent to the public on the recovery.gov web site and elsewhere. Now we need to expand these features to the whole transportation program, so it is defined by clear outcomes and driven by performance. It must be transparent so the American people can get under the hood and hold us accountable.

How do we get there? We need to get back to basics.

First of all, no more earmarks. The public has lost faith in this program as the number of earmarks has spiraled out of control. Now, some have pointed out that they make up a small percentage of spending in the transportation bill, which may be true. But they are a symbol of all that is wrong with Washington – pork-barrel, wasteful spending.

Second, we need to lay the groundwork for a competitive 21st century transportation system. There is clear evidence that we’re on the road to disaster: $80 billion in lost productivity and wasted fuel due to traffic congestion, a ballooning trade deficit driven by gasoline and oil, and household transportation costs in excess of food for many families.

Instead, Americans want us to repair crumbling roads. Americans want high-speed rail links between growing metropolitan areas. And Americans want more transportation options, from bus rapid transit to new bicycle path networks in our cities. Delivering these results to the public will reduce the cost of living, improve quality of life, and lift the whole economy now and in the future.

We can do it if we slash the number of programs and simplify them to focus on achieving our shared national objectives. For example, one program should focus on bringing everything we’ve built – all of our roads, rails, and runways into top-notch condition. One should make traffic flow more smoothly and surely by linking all the ways of getting around. When a traveler walks out of a train station she should be able to drive, or take a bus, or take a cab, or even bike or walk conveniently. And commuters should be able to use the latest technology like apps on an iPhone with real-time information about traffic or train schedules.

Third, we need a program to invest real capital in new infrastructure. I know this a moment of belt-tightening on Capitol Hill, and there are good reasons to restrict spending. But these are crucial investments that will make America stronger and more competitive no matter how much some in Congress turn a blind eye to crumbling roads and falling bridges. We need to lay new asphalt and new steel rails, and we need to get started now.

And there is a way to leverage our limited resources, a way that has a proven track record around the world. The United States has helped finance infrastructure improvements around the world with the help of the private sector through special banks. The World Bank, which we helped create after World War II, has invested in projects around the world, and in the 1980s began mobilizing private sector money with innovative partnerships. Now it’s time to use that model right here at home. Doing this can multiply a federal investment several-fold.

This is why I propose the creation of an infrastructure bank. This bank will make grants and loans to jurisdictions across the country so they can work with companies to build the roads and rail we need to excel economically. The projects will be chosen carefully, based on results and outcomes. Will they boost economic growth? Will they increase energy independence? Will they save consumers money and increase quality of life? The projects that pass muster should move forward, and contractors should be held accountable for getting the job done.

The bank needs some seed capital to get started. I propose we do that by removing unneeded subsidies and tax breaks for the oil and gas industry. This industry is plenty profitable as is, and doesn’t need taxpayer help. That money should go to build a world-class 21st-century transportation system.

As I’ve said before, as we work to get the economy moving and employment up in the short run we need to keep our eye on the long haul. Building and maintaining a world-class web of roads, rail and runways will lift economic growth in a sustained way. I look forward to working with leaders of both parties to get the job done.

Steve Kroft interviews President Obama on 60 Minutes. Photo: AP

The first thing that piqued my attention was this:

In some cases, there may be worthy projects that we can’t do right now, just because we haven’t built the consensus for it. You know, that’s an aspect of leadership that I didn’t pay enough attention to in the first couple of years.

Obama seems to indicate he’s going to shy away from big legislative battles for a little while. It makes you wonder what “worthy projects” he’s going to sacrifice. It also begs the question: what does that mean for his $50 billion infrastructure push?

Well, he didn’t say anything specifically about that. Most advocates think the chances of lame-duck passage of any infrastructure spending (beyond the continuing resolution keeping spending at 2010 levels for the first couple months of next year) are, roughly, nil.

But President Obama still holds out hope for consensus on infrastructure spending.

60 MINUTES: Look, the Republicans aren’t interested in spending a trillion dollars on infrastructure right now. They don’t want stimulus programs.

PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well, you know, again, historically, rebuilding our infrastructure is something that has garnered Democratic and Republican support. I want to have a conversation with them and see if that’s still the case. What I just mentioned in terms of providing tax breaks for companies that are investing here in the United States. That’s not a traditional liberal position. That’s a traditional Republican position. That’s a Chamber of Commerce position.

60 MINUTES: It is a Chamber of Commerce position. Why haven’t they been able to persuade the Republicans that it’s a good idea?

PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well, you know my hope is that, now that the election’s over, that there’s gonna be more openness to taking those kinds of steps. The fact is that in the six months leading up to the election, I think whatever proposals we put forward were not gonna get a serious hearing. Because it didn’t serve short term political purposes.

But long-term political purposes are a whole other story. Obama’s counting on infrastructure investment to create jobs and restore American competitiveness in a world that’s outpacing us. He pointed to Chinese and European infrastructure network improvements and said it was time “for us to figure out, in a bipartisan way, how to start rebuilding our roads.” Notice he said rebuilding roads, not building new ones. He mentioned rail too.

And he still wants to “frontload” investments now, “at a time when interest rates are real low, and people are desperate for work.”

I mean, there are construction crews all across the country that are dying for work. And companies that are willing to take a very small profit in order to get work done. And so for us to say now’s the time for us to rebuild this country and equip ourselves for the 21st Century. That’s something that could make a real difference.

He made this point over and over again on 60 Minutes. Clearly he doesn’t think the Republican “shellacking” was an indication that he should give up on this particular message.

We reported last week that some reform advocates, especially on the bike-ped side of things, are nervous about talk of an earmark ban, since some good projects get funded by earmarks. Obama told 60 Minutes he’s serious about reforming the earmark process, if not banning it altogether.

Now, I campaigned saying we should stop doing earmarks. You know, even though it’s small as a part of our overall federal budget, you know, what people consider to be pork projects, no matter how worthy, make people feel that government’s not accountable. And there should be a better way of doing it… You now have a lot of Republicans who ran as outsiders, who are coming in. And my hope is that we may be in a position now where the two sides meet and agree on some things that need to be changed.

He thinks getting rid of “pork” to restore trust in government might be one of those win-win situations.

Reformers will have to be vigilant to make sure sustainable transportation doesn’t lose out in that equation.

The official White House photo of the president's meeting on infrastructure. That's Angela Glover Blackwell in the gold-checkered jacket.

On Monday, President Obama talked infrastructure with two governors, eight mayors, four former transportation secretaries (and the current one), two labor leaders – and one public interest advocate. That advocate was Angela Glover Blackwell, founder of the think tank PolicyLink and chair of the Transportation for America Equity Caucus, which launched last week. The roundtable discussed the president’s $50 billion infrastructure proposal, which is galvanizing transportation reformers as the contours come into sharper focus.

Blackwell spoke to Streetsblog about her meeting with the president, why transportation matters for social equity, and how people can help make the most of the current opportunity to reform national transportation policy.

Streetsblog: What was it like meeting with the president?

Blackwell: It was wonderful to be in a meeting with the president and the Treasury secretary and governors and mayors from around the country talking about infrastructure, with an emphasis on transportation. We’ve been focused on it for years, and it was encouraging to see it getting that level of attention and to see the President of the United States take an interest in transportation.

Angela Glover Blackwell

But I felt I had a tremendous responsibility to lift up the voices of low-income people and people of color and the communities where they live. It’s easy to talk about transportation and not talk about poverty, or the severe unemployment among Latinos and African Americans, those hit first and worst by this recession. I felt on my shoulders the responsibility to express that this has to be done in a way that impacts those who need it most. And the others there really heard what I was saying. Several referred back to what I had said, which was that transportation is a lifeline to opportunity in this country, and it’s way too important to leave to transportation professionals.

I also thought it was very important that at the top of the conversation, when the president came in, he turned to Governor Rendell and me to frame the conversation. He showed a lot of interest in talking about equity and inclusion.

SB: Set the scene for us. How long was the meeting? Did President Obama talk more or listen more?

AGB: We started the meeting at 9:30 with [Treasury] Secretary [Tim] Geithner and [Transportation] Secretary [Ray] LaHood, talking about the two reports. That lasted till about 10:00 or 10:15, when the president came in, and then we met until 11:15. So we were with the president for a good hour.

The president was mostly listening. He made opening comments about the importance of the issue, but he was very much in the mode of hearing from others about transportation, and about the $50 billion proposal.

SB: You talk about the importance of inclusivity and equity in the design of the transportation plan. These aren’t issues that everyone thinks about when they think of transportation. How does this issue affect the communities you represent?

AGB: The bottom fifth of the population spends 42% of their income on transportation. Nearly 25 percent of African Americans are without a car, and almost as many Latinos. So public transportation is very important in these communities, and it is under severe threat right now in the nation. In 110 cities, or more, public transit routes are at risk, and these are the routes residents use to take their children to school, to go to work, to go shopping. In St. Louis, in Georgia, bus lines are being cut, and people are being cut off from being able to get to work.

So we need to be investing in public transportation more, and investing in roads and bridges less. Thirty-one percent more jobs are created through public transportation than building new roads and bridges. And repairing existing roads and bridges creates 16 percent more jobs than building new ones.

What we are seeing is that more money goes into capital, and not operations. Communities need resources to keep the bus lines running, they need enough operators moving these transportation systems and to provide the support we need.

That’s the link between transportation and equity. Not just any investment in transportation produces equity. Investing in public transportation, workforce training, and operations – these are important components of equity.

SB: You’ve highlighted the problems facing rural areas.

AGB: Often when we think about equity we think about urban areas, inner cities. But there is a lot of poverty in rural areas and in those areas, people can be so isolated. People think everyone in rural areas works in family farming and all they have to do is walk out the front door and they work right there in their own fields. But family farming has virtually disappeared. Most people are working in big box retail like Wal-mart, and they travel great distances to get to their jobs, or to buy fresh fruits and vegetables, or to get their children to school. We need bus lines there; we need creative programs that invest in carpooling like jitneys that we see in other countries.

SB: What’s your sense of why the president is pushing infrastructure investment now?

AGB: I can only speculate that infrastructure is a wonderful win-win-win for the nation. It gets the nation ready for the 21^st century global economy. While the United States has been a leader in the global economy, it will not continue to be if we don’t invest in infrastructure. Infrastructure also provides good-paying jobs that will move people into the middle class and will train people for the infrastructure jobs of the 21^st century. We needed more money for infrastructure than we got in the first ARRA. This is a wonderful way to get the economy started again.

SB: What about the politics of this moment?

AGB: I personally worry about the politics of this moment. I am absolutely perplexed by them. Historically, infrastructure has not divided people along party lines in this nation. It’s quite shocking to me that we would be teeing up for a political battle over infrastructure investment, but sadly, it appears that we are. Everything seems to be falling into that abyss these days. People think nothing government does can be important, meaningful, or effective.

SB: President Obama is calling for a lame-duck push on the $50 billion proposal. Do you think that could happen?

AGB: I hope so.

SB: How can people who care about equity help influence this process?

AGB: On the $50 billion, get in touch with your congressional representatives and senators right away, saying how important it is to move this $50 billion into infrastructure, and pay attention to equity. Tell them to invest in public transportation and job training, especially in our hardest hit communities, making sure people are getting jobs who need them.

President Obama, with other transportation leaders, calls for a 6-year infrastructure plan. Reuters

He made his remarks after meeting with Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, former Secretaries Samuel Skinner and Norman Mineta, L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell, and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner. They all stood beside him as he spoke to the press.

The president’s remarks echo the promises he made on Labor Day, when he announced a $50 billion “down payment” on transportation and infrastructure spending. LaHood later told activists that the administration planned to get behind a six-year plan in February.

President Obama held up a report, released last week, from a conference chaired by Secretaries Skinner and Mineta, in which they laid out the dismal state of infrastructure in this country and the need for more funding. Obama said choosing whether or not to invest in infrastructure was “a choice between decline and prosperity.”

He also referred to a new report by the Department of the Treasury with the Council of Economic Advisers on the economic impact of infrastructure investment [PDF], emphasizing the significant return from projects that are rigorously analyzed and selected “rationally.” Noting that the average American family spends one-third more on transportation than on food, the report bolsters the administration’s strategy of investing in projects that give middle-class Americans options besides driving.

Obama’s comments — and those of the Democrats and Republicans who flanked him — underlined the traditional bipartisan support for infrastructure spending. With the elections looming, there hasn’t been bipartisan support for anything in Washington lately. They’re hoping that will change.

Perhaps as a hedge against Republican attacks, Obama emphasized that “it should not take another collapsing bridge or failing levee to shock us into action. So we’re already paying for our failure to act.”

With that one line, evoking the needless deaths in New Orleans and Minneapolis, he practically dared Republicans to oppose this plan on the basis that it involves too much spending.

The administration’s long-awaited transportation push is finally underway. We’ll have more analysis in the days ahead.