President Obama (Photo: AP)

"I think my team will testify when we got several trillion dollars worth of infrastructure that is falling apart, we need to put people to work, doing the work that America needs done," Obama told reporters. "But we're also in an era of fiscal constraint, which means that we've got to start finding more creative, new approaches to financing these projects."

The economic recovery meeting comes as the White House and congressional Democrats weigh the need for stronger efforts to help stem the rising unemployment rate.

Last week's surprising announcement of 3.5 percent growth in the U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) prompted a cautiously positive response from the Obama administration, reflecting concern that job losses could continue into next year.

Transportation spending is playing a central role in that economic recovery debate, with several senior members of Congress touting its job creation potential. The Senate's No. 2 Democrat, Dick Durbin (IL), on Thursday suggested that lawmakers begin working on proposals to boost infrastructure investments, including a possible "front-loading" of the House's stalled six-year transport bill.

But with the deficit at its highest level since World War II and a gas tax increase already ruled out by the White House, what kind of "more creative, new approaches" would the president's team be prepared to support? During unrelated testimony at the House infrastructure committee on Thursday, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood indicated that lack of funding continues to keep the issue in limbo:

The president wants a very strong, comprehensive, robust transportation bill... We believe it can make a difference; we believe it'll put people to work.

But we also believe we've got to find 4[00] or 500 billion dollars to pay for it, because that's probably what it takes to have the kind of bill that we all want -- that you want and that we want. We need some time to do that, to put together a good bill and to find the money to do it.

Put simply, the same revenue gap that has surrounded the transport bill since June continues to puzzle the executive and legislative branches. The House infrastructure committee's chairman, Jim Oberstar (D-MN), has projected that his legislation would require $140 billion in extra funds over its six-year lifetime, excepting money earned from the federal gas tax.

There is certainly no shortage of creative proposals on the table; Democratic lawmakers and the White House have both urged the creation of a National Infrastructure Bank to leverage private-sector contributions, while Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell (D-PA), co-chairman of the advocacy group Building America's Future, last week floated the idea of more open tolling on existing interstate highways.

Still, it's difficult to see how infrastructure spending can gain the necessary political momentum without the administration throwing its weight behind the near-term passage of a specific idea or suite of ideas -- "[putting] together a good bill and [finding] the money to do it," in LaHood's words. And if the U.S. DOT's support for an 18-month extension of existing law is any guide, that kind of specific, urgent endorsement is unlikely to come until 2011.

Photo: brainlink.org

The first forthcoming DOT rule would permanently bar the use of cell phones or text-messaging devices by rail operators. The second would ban texting and "restrict the use of cell phones" by truck and interstate bus drivers. The final rule would revoke the commercial driver's licenses of any school bus driver found to be texting behind the wheel.

The three proposed rules and the executive order signal that LaHood is prepared to back up his criticism of distracted driving with concrete action. In a statement on the Obama executive order, LaHood said the federal government "is leading by example."

But the second of the DOT's future rules is sure to provoke a lobbying firestorm by the trucking industry, which already has put the Obama administration on notice that it views a nationwide ban as "overkill." And truckers could win exemptions for their on-board computers before the full text of the trucking rule -- no pun intended -- is released.

And it's worth watching what role the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) plays in the debate over banning texting for drivers of large commercial vehicles, which are responsible for an estimated 5,000 deaths every year. The FMSCA has known for three years that cell phone use by drivers poses a demonstrable safety risk, but it never issued regulations on the practice -- and the Obama administration's nominee to take over the agency is herself a former trucking industry lobbyist.

FTA's Peter Rogoff (in hard hat) heard strong words from Rep. Oberstar today. (Photo: WP)

"They need to ... catch up with the House" on transportation policy-making, Oberstar said of Porcari and Rogoff, who were sitting within spitting distance of the chairman.

"If you don't pass our bill, you're not going to get a head start on these strategies" for reducing the carbon footprint of the transportation sector, Oberstar told the White House aides.

He added: "The president gets it -- the crowd around him doesn't."

The White House continues to press for an 18-month postponement of the next long-term transportation bill, which Oberstar asserts could drag reform past the two-year mark and continue an inequitable system that favors new highway construction over transit. 

"When highway planners sit down to build a roadway," Oberstar said today, "they don't go through the gymnastics of a cost-effectiveness index," as transit planners are currently required to do. "They sit down, get the money, and build a road."

Expanding transit, the House chairman concluded, is difficult "if you've got a millstone around your neck."

Yet the House bill has a millstone of its own obstructing movement: the lack of revenue to fund a doubling in new transit investment and other Oberstar priorities. As Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) acknowledged this morning, hiking the federal gas tax -- which has remained at 18.4 cents per gallon since 1993 -- will not be feasible until the recession dissipates.

"We are going to raise gas and diesel taxes sometime in the next decade," Blumenauer said, but "not while the economy is in freefall."

Obama during the "sprawl is over" speech last February

Referencing his formative years as a Chicago community organizer, Obama urged the mayors, governors, and Cabinet secretaries who attended the urban policy summit to think of cities and suburbs as interacting parts of the same metropolitan organism.

At one point, the president sounded a David Brooks-esque note, describing sprawl -- the days of which he declared "over" in February -- as "creating new pressures and problems [but] also opening up new opportunities":

Now, the first thing we need to recognize is that this is not just a time of challenge for America's cities; it's also a time of great change. Even as we've seen many of our central cities continuing to grow in recent years, we've seen their suburbs and exurbs grow roughly twice as fast. It spreads homes and jobs and businesses to a broader geographic area.

And this transformation is creating new pressures and problems, of course, but it's also opening up new opportunities, because it's not just our cities that are hotbeds of innovation anymore. It's our growing metropolitan areas.

Later in his speech, however, Obama criticized a pattern of Washington policy-making that "encouraged sprawl, congestion, and pollution" instead of promoting transit and smart growth.

His urban policy goals remain centered on renewable energy, transit, and high-speed rail, he added, which would not "just make our downtowns more livable [but help] our regional economies grow."

Obama announced a broad inter-agency review of urban policy, which he billed as the first of its kind in three decades, and vowed to send Cabinet officials on a listening tour of the nation's cities this summer.

Meanwhile, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood sought to do his part for cities today by calling on state DOTs to spend more federal stimulus money in urban and economically disadvantaged areas. Cities have gotten shortchanged on stimulus road funding, though an analysis by Streetsblog Capitol Hill found the top 20 U.S. metro areas faring better when it comes to the smaller pot of transit aid.

LaHood made his remarks during a roundtable with regional reporters. From the Allentown Morning Call's report:

U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said Monday that he’s concerned not enough stimulus dollars are being spent in large metropolitan areas around that country and he’s urging states to consider places with higher unemployment when choosing where to direct the government funds.

“These decisions are not being made by DOT,” LaHood told reporters today ... “Governors and [state] DOTs are deciding where this money is spent and we want to make sure that the money is being spent in highly economically distressed areas and high unemployment areas.”

Before he was president, he was a fan of "complete streets." (Photo: whitehouse via Flickr)

Many urbanites remember the last congressional transportation bill as a disappointment that pushed a pro-highways approach while forcing transit projects to compete for a small slice of the federal funding pie. But that 2005 transportation clash brought us some instructive moments that escaped the mainstream media's focus at the time.

As a semi-regular feature on Streetsblog Capitol Hill, I'll be looking back at past transportation debates that have the potential to impact the upcoming re-write. For today's installment, let's look at the "complete streets" amendment that fell six votes short of passage in 2005 but had a pretty crucial sponsor: then-Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL).

The "complete streets" amendment submitted four years ago was similar to the legislation that was recently re-introduced in both the House and Senate. It would have required state DOTs to account for bike paths and pedestrian access wherever feasible and required metropolitan planning organizations that serve populations of 200,000 or more to appoint a coordinator for bike-and-ped programs.

Obama did not speak in favor of the amendment, but the future president's early endorsement of complete streets principles provides a powerful tool to livable streets advocates working on this year's transportation bill. Few arguments are as effective in Washington as a charge of flip-flopping -- to which the Obama administration risks exposing itself if it doesn't support a national "complete streets" policy in this year's bill.

What's more, if senators maintained their past positions, the Obama "complete streets" amendment would almost surely pass into law today. Since the proposal lost by six votes in 2005, 11 GOP Senate seats have flipped to the Democratic column (including party-switcher Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania).

Of course, "complete streets" may be included from day one in the Senate's next transportation bill, especially now that the House has added similar language to its climate change legislation. But that would open the door to a GOP amendment striking "complete streets" from the bill, and to the same tired and false rhetoric that Sen. Kit Bond (R-MO) used to kill the Obama amendment in 2005:

What this amendment says is: If you are planning a highway from Leftover Shoes to Podunk Junction in the middle of a state with nobody around, you would have to plan for a bike path. We have a lot of roads through our Ozark hills and farmland where the danger is inadequate two-lane highways. People are not going to ride bicycles along those highways. They need the lanes to drive their cars. Putting an additional planning burden on agencies that don't want or need bike paths is another unwarranted mandate.

Photo: AP/Post-Standard

In politics, reputation matters. The scapegoating of the MTA has undermined the political case for transit funding and given cover to the hypocrites in Albany who blame the MTA, instead of themselves, for the agency's funding woes. Looking forward, it is critical that the MTA burnish its reputation as an effective and accountable public agency and excellent investment for public funds. There are many political forces that benefit from keeping the MTA as a scapegoat, its reputation besmirched. So, a clean bill of health for the MTA requires an unimpeachable, politically formidable force far above the gutter of the New York political fray. How about President Obama?

The president has spent enormous energy restoring public confidence in the banking system. A key part of his efforts has been the Treasury Department’s careful scrutiny of bank management and finances. Mayor Bloomberg and Governor Paterson should ask President Obama to help restore public confidence in the MTA by ordering the Federal Transit Administration to send in a team of management, finance and policy experts. The MTA receives millions in federal support and the U.S. government has a strong interest in seeing that money well spent. The FTA team would definitively and publicly assess the state of the MTA, detailing both its good and bad management practices while clarifying and vetting agency finances.

Most transit experts believe the MTA is a relatively well run public agency which compares favorably with other big American and foreign transit systems. The agency’s biggest problem is that the state and city have spent the last two decades reducing their financial support, loading the agency with debt, and making it overly dependent on volatile, cyclical funding like the mortgage recording tax. The FTA's assessment would bring these facts to the fore and lay the political groundwork for a stronger case for transit funding.

Following up on Sarah's post about transit funding woes in Illinois, this CNN segment from earlier in the month brings home the effect of service cuts and fare hikes in St. Louis. Similar scenarios are playing out all over the country. According to the latest tally from Transportation for America, 85 transit systems serving 22 million riders are facing some combination of shrinking service and higher fares.

Let's not forget that House Democrats tried to include funds for transit service in the stimulus bill, but never received backing from the White House. Now we're seeing millions of transit riders grappling with the consequences of that decision.

While President Barack Obama promoted wind power and cap-and-trade legislation, VP Joe Biden spent Earth Day talking up transit. Public radio's "The Takeaway" reports that Biden held a presser at a bus maintenance facility in Landover, Maryland, to tout a $300 million investment in hybrid buses and other municipal vehicles as part of the federal stimulus package. Said Biden:

This program, the Clean Cities program, is in its 15th year. Already it's saved two billion gallons of petroleum used since its inception. And now, it's time to ramp it up. Ramp it up in a big way. We know it works.

As reporter Andrea Bernstein points out, this is not breaking news. What's interesting, she says, is the seemingly intensifying focus of the White House on transit as the fight over the next round of federal transportation spending approaches.

I would say that up to now there has been mostly disappointment among people who care about mass transit in the Obama administration. People felt that the recovery act only had $8 billion dollars, now that's $8 billion but it's $8 billion out of $800 billion, so that's 1% and that's all the money for transit, and they were saying that isn't enough money, it doesn't show a real commitment, you can't really change things with that.

So when they begin to see the administration talking about high speed rail, when they begin to see the administration talking about mass transit going as Joe Biden did yesterday to a transit station for his Earth Day thing, they're thinking ok, so maybe this administration is going to put serious muscle behind this. As a reauthorization fight comes up, speaking to a lobbyist from NRDC who has expressed great disappointment up to now, and he said you know, I think things may be beginning to turn.

So what do you think? Are you seeing evidence of an emerging, pro-transit agenda from DC these days? Could Biden's enthusiasm over buses and Ray LaHood's cyclist pledge be part and parcel of a preemptive push to shake up the asphalt-loaded federal funding formula -- or is the admin simply playing to an attention-starved constituency?

You've probably seen this already. It's the latest graphic representation of the nation's proposed high-speed rail corridors, and it's been all over the transportation blogosphere since President Obama stood beside it at a press conference yesterday.

Those corridors are likely to change somewhat as the administration refines its new strategy for high-speed rail, says Transport Politic blogger Yonah Freemark, who credits the administration for taking serious steps toward a national rail plan.

Perhaps the biggest positive from yesterday's presser is that Obama linked the idea of high-speed rail to local transit, center cities, and car-free transportation:

Imagine boarding a train in the center of a city. No racing to an airport and across a terminal, no delays, no sitting on the tarmac, no lost luggage, no taking off your shoes. (Laughter.) Imagine whisking through towns at speeds over 100 miles an hour, walking only a few steps to public transportation, and ending up just blocks from your destination. Imagine what a great project that would be to rebuild America.

At a press event in DC yesterday, President Obama touted the two thousandth transportation project to receive federal stimulus funds. I'm speculating a bit here, but the White House probably had some discretion when choosing which item to highlight for this milestone. So did they pick a refurbished transit station? A new bike route? Perhaps a bridge repair project to signal that we're not going to repeat the mistakes that led to the I-35 bridge collapse in Minneapolis?

None of the above. The same president who proclaimed the days of building sprawl to be over boasted about the widening of a highway interchange near Portage, Michigan from four lanes to six. Obama, apparently, isn't immune to ribbon-cutting syndrome: Like many other elected officials, he can't resist associating himself with a hefty road expansion project.

In this case, the president didn't have the interchange itself as a backdrop, but he did surround himself with construction workers for the cameras. I'm still looking forward to the day when bus drivers get to serve as stage props too.

Photo: bondidwhat/Flickr

According to the Times, the Schumer-Israel bill -- the Accelerated Retirement of Inefficient Vehicles Act (ARIVA) -- is superior to an alternative proposal from Rep. Betty Sutton of Ohio, whose Consumer Assistance to Recycle and Save Act (CARS) would authorize up to $5,000 in vouchers to drivers who swap their old cars for "new ones that are assembled in the United States and carry a minimum fuel-efficiency rating of 27 m.p.g." Beginning in 2010, Sutton's bill would offer $7,500 toward domestic hybrid models averaging 100 mpg or more.

The Obama administration likes the "cash for clunkers" concept. CARS has the backing of the UAW and, not surprisingly, is favored by Detroit. "But because more than half the cars in showrooms today already meet the 27 m.p.g. standard set by the bill," write the editors of the Times, "the measure would provide fewer environmental benefits than the more ambitious Schumer-Israel proposal." ARIVA, on the other hand, would "guarantee considerable oil savings and significant reductions in carbon dioxide."

Or not. In a recent New Yorker article, David Owen sums up the argument against a CAFE-based cure-all.

If doubling the cost of gas gives drivers an environmentally valuable incentive to drive less -- the recent oil-price spike pushed down consumption and vehicle miles travelled, stimulated investment in renewable energy, increased public transit ridership, and killed the Hummer -- then doubling the efficiency of cars makes that incentive disappear. Getting more miles to the gallon is of no benefit to the environment if it leads to an increase in driving -- and the response of drivers to decreases in the cost of driving is to drive more. Increases in fuel efficiency could be bad for the environment unless they’re accompanied by powerful disincentives that force drivers to find alternatives to hundred-mile commutes.

It isn't mentioned in the Times editorial, but each "cash for clunkers" bill does in fact offer incentives for drivers to leave their cars behind -- sort of. Both CARS and ARIVA would give drivers the option of trading their personal wheels for transit vouchers, but the payout is limited to $3,000.

While such measures could conceivably entice urbanites in transit-rich environments, despite being shortchanged, to give up their cars altogether, what impact might a popular federal "cash for clunkers" program have on the rest of the country? And if the goal is to reduce fossil fuel consumption, why on earth would the transit benefit be $2,000 less than that granted to the new car buyer?

As for our auto industry, everyone recognizes that years of bad decision-making and a global recession have pushed our automakers to the brink. We should not, and will not, protect them from their own bad practices. But we are committed to the goal of a re-tooled, re-imagined auto industry that can compete and win. Millions of jobs depend on it. Scores of communities depend on it. And I believe the nation that invented the automobile cannot walk away from it.

With energy policy at the top of his agenda, the president pledged investment in solar and wind power, biofuels, "clean coal," and "more fuel-efficient cars and trucks built right here in America."

If indeed there are serious plans to include municipal mass transit -- which millions of working Americans also depend on -- as part of the mix, Obama is playing it close to the vest. Public transportation was mentioned only once during last night's speech. Along with "jobs rebuilding our roads and bridges," the president said Americans would be put to work by "expanding mass transit."

What did you think of the speech, particularly in light of the hit-and-miss stimulus package? Do you remain hopeful that Obama "gets it" when it comes to the value of public transportation in reducing oil dependence and fostering sustainable communities, or is his seemingly unflagging commitment to propping up Detroit too much?

Finally, is it true that Americans can't "walk away" from the automobile? This may be a valid point. Our obesity epidemic and general lack of sidewalks make it pretty tough to walk away from anything.

In case you missed the broadcast on Friday, watch this episode of NOW. Told mostly from the perspective of Charlotte's Pat McCrory, the Republican mayor who brought light rail to North Carolina's biggest city, the show hits just about every major transportation issue to surface during the stimulus bill debate. Federal policies that discriminate against transit, state DOTs that throw money at politically-driven highway projects, transit agencies in dire need of federal support as local tax revenues shrivel up -- it's all here.

The final stimulus bill, while an incremental step in the right direction, did not introduce any wholesale reforms to correct the systemic failures that NOW identifies. With the multi-year transportation re-authorization coming up later this year, the Obama admin will get another crack at those problems soon enough. In a Q&A last Friday with the Washington Post, the president hinted at how the transpo bill might turn out differently than the stimulus, describing an agenda closely linked to his energy policy goals. Follow the jump for the excerpt.

Q. Mr. President, if I could ask you about infrastructure, You've got infrastructure spending in the stimulus package. The need is much faster than that and the money is tight. Do you anticipate any significant further additions in federal infrastructure spending in the reasonably near future, and are you making plans to establish an infrastructure bank?

Obama: Well, number one, we've got the transportation reauthorization bill that’s going to be coming up. So one thing to keep some perspective about on the recovery package is this is supposed to provide a jolt to the economy above and beyond what we’re doing already in the federal budget. And so I expect that Secretary LaHood, working with the various transportation committees are going to be moving forward on a transportation bill. I would like to see some long-term reforms in how transportation dollars flow, and I'll give you just a couple of examples. I think right now we don't do a lot of effective planning at the regional level when it comes to transportation. That's hugely inefficient. Not only does it probably consume more money in terms of getting projects done, but it also ends up creating traffic patterns, for example, that are really hugely wasteful when it comes to energy use.

If we can start building in more incentives for more effective planning at the local level, that's not just good transportation policy, it's good energy policy. So we’ll be working with transportation committees to see if we can move in that direction.

The idea of an infrastructure bank I think make sense -- the idea that we get engineers, and not just elected officials, involved in thinking about and planning how we’re spending these dollars. I may get some objections from my colleagues, Democrat and Republican, on the Hill about that, but I think there should be some way for us to -- just think how can we rationalize the process to get the most bang for the buck, because the needs are massive and we can’t do everything, and if it’s estimated that just on infrastructure alone it would cost a couple trillion dollars to get our roads, bridges, sewer systems, et cetera, up to snuff, and we know we’re not going to have that money, then it would be nice if we said here are the 10 most important projects and let’s do those first, instead of maybe doing the 10 least important projects but the ones that have the most political pull.

• $29 billion for highways and bridges
• $8.4 billion for transit
• $8 billion for high-speed rail
• $1.3 billion for Amtrak

To compare the final transit and rail figures with the House and Senate versions of the bill, check out the table put together by the Transport Politic.

The big news, of course, is the $8 billion for high speed rail, most of which came from out of nowhere. And I'd be quite pleased with that number if it weren't for the meager sum allocated to transit. Of the four categories cited above, transit is the only one to emerge from conference committee without any bump up from the Senate's lowball offer. The endgame went something like this, according to the AP:

In late-stage talks, Obama and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., pressed for $8 billion to construct high-speed rail lines, quadrupling the amount in the bill that passed the Senate on Tuesday.

Reid's office issued a statement noting that a proposed Los Angeles-to-Las Vegas rail might get a big chunk of the money.

That Presidential muscle could have been flexed to stave off fare hikes and service cuts across the country, giving the economy a very fast-acting stimulus. This last-minute intervention, on the other hand, is more than a little puzzling. Among other headscratchers: How does getting people to the slots an hour faster move us closer to ending sprawl?

Obama in Ft. Myers

It's imagining new transportation systems. I'd like to see high speed rail where it can be constructed. I would like for us to invest in mass transit because potentially that's energy efficient. And I think people are a lot more open now to thinking regionally…

The days where we're just building sprawl forever, those days are over. I think that Republicans, Democrats, everybody… recognizes that’s not a smart way to design communities. So we should be using this money to help spur this sort of innovative thinking when it comes to transportation.

That will make a big difference.

Before you get too carried away, though, head over to Salon for a recap of Obama's pitch yesterday in Elkhart, Indiana, which included this sop to highway enthusiasts:

He promised his plan would create or save 80,000 jobs in Indiana, and that infrastructure funding would improve "roads like US 31 here in Indiana that Hoosiers count on ... and I know that a new overpass downtown would make a big difference for businesses and families right here in Elkhart."

The US 31 expansion is what you might call a sprawl project. Obama's transportation platform may still amount to a Rorschach blot, but his comments in Fort Myers can't be retracted. With the stimulus bill about to enter conference committee, having POTUS on the record opposing sprawl should bolster efforts to maximize transit funding and limit the use of highway funds to expand road capacity. Time to keep the pressure on.

Oberstar's office says the cuts were the product of the House speaker's office, the Senate majority leader, and the Obama transition team. "How those decisions were made, I don't know," Jim Berard, communications director for the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, told Grist. "It's disappointing that our recommendation was not accepted on the whole, but at the same time we got a good deal for transportation infrastructure and we want to keep the momentum going for this bill."

Opinion varies on what constitutes "a good deal for transportation infrastructure" at this moment in our nation's history. (Grist notes that there is some $50 billion in "shovel-ready" transit projects currently in the queue.) But why would a self-professed pro-urban, pro-transit, anti-oil dependence admin pull the plug on the progressive portion of this transportation spending proposal? Why would a speaker who represents downtown San Francisco go along with it?

There is speculation that Obama economic adviser Larry Summers opposed the Oberstar plan, while others think the new admin wants to reevaluate spending formulas in this year's TEA authorization, allowing an increase in transit funding that could be invested in a more deliberate, effective way -- and over a sustained period of time.

Of course, the same care could also be taken before throwing $30 billion at nebulous highway projects. 

“We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars…”
-- Barack Obama's inaugural address.

“The last thing this nation needs now is a stimulus plan aimed at the development of non-gasoline-powered automobiles married with extensive rehabilitation of the highway system.”
-- James Howard Kunstler

A face-to-face back in April. Photo: Scoop08.

I have made the case to his incoming administration that a lot of the resources have to go directly to the cities, which is where these projects will get managed and built.

We've said it before and it definitely bears repeating: This is a big opportunity and Obama can't afford to blow it. If his team is serious about its sustainability goals -- and by most accounts the energy portion of the plan is legit -- they'll heed Bloomberg. Directing transportation funds to cities is one of the most effective ways to support transit, bike, and pedestrian infrastructure. The bigger the share cities get, the better. But that's not what one of the key players, House Appropriations Chair David Obey, has in mind:

Yesterday, Congressman David Obey (D-WI), chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, stated on National Public Radio that stimulus funding directed towards transportation infrastructure will be allocated directly to states to determine how best to use the American tax dollars.

That's a recipe for disaster -- funneling tens of billions of dollars to highway-builders while starving the agencies that do the most to give people better transportation choices and more livable neighborhoods. On the campaign trail, candidate Obama promised he would talk about cities once in office. Now the inauguration is less than two weeks away. I don't think it's too early to say: "Let's hear it."

This vid has been making the rounds via Streetsblog Network member Beyond DC. In it we see candidate Obama tell a crowd in Toledo that the Death and Life of Great American Cities is "a great book" and delve into some talking points about the importance of cities to regional economies. Read into it what you will. To me it says advocates for cities and urbanism should hold our next President to a very high standard, because he knows his stuff.

We've been calling around to Congressional staffers, advocates and insiders to get a better sense of what Obama's appointment of Ray LaHood as transportation secretary means for those pushing for sustainable transport, smart growth, livable streets. While no one is giving up hope on the Obama administration a month before the inauguration, the general consensus is pretty clear. As one insider summed it up: "It's a real read-it-and-weep moment."

The selection of a downstate Illinois Republican with close ties to highway lobby stalwart Caterpillar Inc. is being taken by many as a clear sign that progressive transportation policy is, for now, nowhere near the top of the Obama's agenda.

"Obama still hasn't made the transportation - land use - climate connection," Petra Todorovich, director of Regional Plan Association’s America 2050 program said. "It's clear he's thinking about these things in separate categories." For Todorovich and other advocates, the LaHood pick was the second shoe to drop this week. The first piece of bad news arrived on Monday when Obama trotted out his "green dream team," his appointments to key environmental, energy and climate posts, and the transportation secretary was nowhere to be found.

As President George W. Bush did before him, Obama has chosen to use the transportation secretary slot as a place to show bipartisanship. "This sends the message that the transportation secretary is a throw-away political appointment who doesn’t matter,' said a city transportation official who, like others, asked to remain anonymous to preserve their relationship with the U.S. DOT. "This is the slot for the token Republican. It’s the bottom of the barrel. A bone you can throw."

Progressive transportation policy advocates are also concerned that LaHood will have trouble drawing good people to the agency. "In terms of attracting talent, no one I know is going to want to work for this guy," said a former Federal Transit Administration official. "He's got a horrible environmental record, he's bad on climate change and he's Caterpillar's bag man. Can we get a worse appointment?" Many feel that former F.A.A. chief Jane Garvey would have been the better choice.

For New Yorkers, the LaHood selection is reminiscent of Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s choice in 2002 to retain Iris Weinshall as the city's DOT Commissioner. Like LaHood, Weinshall had no real expertise or background in transportation policy (though, unlike LaHood, she did have actual administrative experience). Weinshall, who is married to Senator Chuck Schumer, was a political appointment and the results spoke for themselves. New York City transportation policy didn't really start moving in a progressive direction until she left office and was replaced by someone with deep experience in transportation policy, Janette Sadik-Khan.

What does LaHood's appointment mean for this year's multi-hundred billion dollar transportation reauthorization? That will largely be up to Obama. "We need to radically change the way we think about transportation," said one Congressional staffer focused on raising more money for urban-oriented mass transit while reducing dependence on the gas tax. "LaHood is not a bold choice. He is not the transportation policy expert we were looking for. But if Obama empowers him to push a progressive agenda, that's what we'll be pushing in Congress."

Down in D.C. the advocates are still hopeful. Said one: "He's not an ideologue and he’ll probably be taking direction from good people." Said another: This is "probably Obama's weakest pick" but people with ties to LaHood "say he is potentially malleable." It ain’t much, but it’s something.

In a funny way, the bad news is good news for progressive transportation policy advocates. Their business will be booming in 2009.