Photo: The North Iowa Journal

The traffic crash and fatality rates in this country are indeed at historic lows, especially given the staggering amount of driving Americans do on a yearly basis. In 2005, the most recent year to have shown an increase in highway fatalities, there were 14.7 traffic deaths for every 100,000 U.S. residents. In 2010, that number had fallen to 10.7 deaths, a difference of approximately 10,000 fewer fatalities annually. (USDOT measures the death rate not by population but by vehicle miles traveled, also showing a dramatic improvement, from 1.5 deaths per million VMT to 1.1 over the same period. Interestingly, while total VMT rose in 2010, per-capita driving declined.)

The news was grimmer for people outside of a car than for drivers and passengers. Improved motor vehicle safety features were likely a factor in the lower fatality rate, according to the Boston Herald, but those same features mean little to non-occupants. After several progressively safer years, 2010 saw a 4.2 percent increase in pedestrian deaths—to 4,280, a difference of 171 human lives—and a whopping increase of about 11,000 nonfatal injuries. Bicycle deaths decreased 1.6 percent, but bike injury rates didn’t change at all. Clearly, safety gains for motorists have not extended to more vulnerable road users.

Furthermore, while it is certainly good news that traffic is claiming thousands fewer lives each year, 32,885 is a staggering number. It is roughly equivalent to 70 full jumbo jets crashing and leaving no survivors, or equal to the population of Juneau, AK or Dover, DE. There is enormous room for improvement: The fatality rate in the U.S. still pales beside leading countries like Japan (3.85 traffic deaths per 100,000) and Germany (4.5), which also happen to have much lower rates of driving than the U.S.

Arrows indicate direction of change since previous year. Source: BTS, NHTSA

In an effort to further reduce the number of roadway deaths and injuries, National Highway Traffic Safety Administrator David Strickland announced at yesterday’s press conference that his agency was introducing several new measures to track distracted driving. NHTSA introduced a new metric, to be included in future highway fatality reports, called “distraction-affected crashes.” This figure differs slightly from the current “distraction-related” category — for example, “cell phone present in vehicle” will no longer count under the new metric, while “dialing a cell phone” will.

NHTSA will also initiate a two-year naturalistic study of driver behavior to clarify the relationship between distracted driving and road injuries, fitting 2,000 cars with cameras and other equipment. Ideally, the results of that study will be able to draw a straight line between driver behavior and non-occupant injuries.

The NHTSA could take many more steps to better understand what is causing the decline in traffic deaths and determine how to make the U.S. a global leader in street safety. Fewer Americans are dying on the roads than 20 or even 10 years ago, and that could be a reflection of any number of factors: improvements in emergency care, car safety features, road design, driver behavior, or changes in the amount Americans drive. We can’t allow ourselves to become complacent in the face of 32,885 deaths that might have been prevented.

Multiple protests have been held in Portland in opposition to the CRC Bridge project, which Federal Transit Administration officials yesterday praised as "forward-leaning." Photo: Stop the CRC

But many state and regional transportation agencies continue to operate as if it were still the 1980s, when highway budgets were flush, gas was cheap and the destructive impacts of auto-centric planning were less well understood.

It’s especially discouraging to see those old-fashioned attitudes prevailing in greater Portland, which enjoys a reputation as the country’s most progressive transportation city. The fact that the $3-plus billion mega-bridge project known as the Columbia River Crossing remains a regional transportation priority is a testament to the pervasive grip of highway-building interests.

Just yesterday, this “highway boondoggle in disguise” passed another milestone when it was given environmental clearance from U.S. DOT, opening the way for land acquisition and construction. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood announced yesterday that the project has been granted a “record of decision,” a disappointing endorsement from an administration that has made “livability” a key issue.

Federal Transit Administrator Peter Rogoff even praised the project as a break from carbon-intensive traditions, saying, “This is the type of forward-leaning project that will greatly benefit the entire region well into the future.”

It’s true that the project does include a transit component. About $800 million will be spent on light rail through this corridor between Portland and suburban Vancouver, Washington. But project opponents like David Osborn, head of the community group Stop the CRC, point out that a much greater share of the money will be spent widening the highway to 10 lanes and adding a number of interchanges. This is fundamentally at odds with Portland’s professed emphasis on environmental stewardship and sustainability, Osborn told Streetsblog in April.

“If we build transportation infrastructure that supports single-occupancy-vehicles, it will increase low-density sprawl,” he said. “There’s a tremendous amount of opposition to this project in the community.”

Joe Cortright, a consultant with Impresa and one of the project’s most vocal opponents, says he is disappointed but not surprised by the U.S. DOT announcement. “This has been clearly in the pipeline for some time,” he said. “It reflects kind of the internal consensus of the state DOTs.”

But he added that the federal government has yet to award the CRC any funding — and the project plan assumes a $1.2 billion contribution from the federal government. Nor has either state DOT committed any money, he said. He added that legal challenges to the environmental impact statement were likely forthcoming.

So the fight certainly isn’t over yet in Portland.

Earl Blumenauer takes the podium at Rail~Volution, while moderator Grace Crunican of BART, APTA President Bill Millar, and Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood (not pictured) stand by. Photo by Clarence Eckerson, Jr.

“We should make some adjustments to a gas tax that hasn’t increased since 1993,” Blumenauer said. “Half the people think the gas tax goes up every year.”

He said he’d like to see it indexed to inflation:

In an ideal world, I would not raise the gas tax this year or next year. Come out of this recession, but put in place increases that are going to occur over the next 10 years; have that revenue stream. I would borrow against the revenue stream to take advantage of record low interest rates and a bidding climate like we’ve never seen, fund the president’s infrastructure bank to help move some of these forward, and work toward replacing the gas tax.

He reminded the audience that his state was the first to institute a gas tax, and now Oregon is working to get rid of it and replace it with a vehicle miles traveled fee.

Bill Millar, the outgoing president of the American Public Transit Association (“on Halloween, I turn into a pumpkin!”), said that before switching to a VMT fee, Congress needs to eliminate the federal guarantee, called “equity bonus,” that states will get back at least a certain percentage of what they pay in gas tax receipts. (The GAO recently found that every state actually gets back more than it puts in, thanks to infusions from the general fund, but that hasn’t stopped a lot of states from complaining that they don’t get their fair share.)

“States that encourage more travel get more money back [under the equity bonus system],” Millar said, “so we’ve got to break that cycle too, to make sure instead it’s an inverse relationship and states that give people more choice, more ways to travel, get more federal aid, not less federal aid.”

LaHood, flanked by NYC Transpo Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan and Oregon Rep. Earl Blumenauer, lauds the NACTO bike guide. Photo: Darren Flusche, League of American Bicyclists

If Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has anything to say about it, every transportation planner in the country should have a shiny new engineering guide on his or her bookshelf.

It’s been six months since the National Association of City Transportation Officials released the Urban Bikeways Design Guide in an online format. Yesterday, LaHood was among the first to hold the print edition in his very-excited hands, providing a ringing endorsement for its widespread adoption.

It would have been a bittersweet moment, coming only hours after LaHood told reporters that he would be a one-term transportation secretary – if the attendees had heard the news by then, which most of them hadn’t.

Before the most bike-friendly transportation secretary in U.S. history took the podium, another groundbreaking policymaker — Janette Sadik-Khan, New York City Transportation Commissioner — set the stage. Sadik-Khan is more than the architect of NYC’s next-gen bike infrastructure; she’s also the president of NACTO. So, she proudly raised a copy and called the guide a compendium of “everything you need to know to bring world-class bikeways to city streets.”

With American cities constantly struggling to implement cycling facilities that have long been the norm in Europe, NACTO created the guide to speed adoption of bicycling infrastructure by speaking directly to planners and engineers in their specialized technical lingo. By compiling a manual written by American city officials, for American city officials, Sadik-Khan said, the guide will give cash-strapped municipalities the certainty they need to view cycling facilities as proven traffic applications, not costly experiments. By putting all the engineering specs on paper, she added, it will help cities move beyond the rigid design standards that have limited bike infrastructure in the past.

Beyond the ease of reference, the guide breaks new ground by detailing bicycle infrastructure that has yet to be officially embraced by the old guard of transportation engineering institutions. The current versions of the AASHTO Guide to Bikeway Facilities or the Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD) directly reference only five of the 21 treatments outlined in the NACTO guide, according to the Association of Pedestrian and Bicycle Professionals. Looking for design guidance on bike boxes? Best practices for protected bike lanes? Thanks to NACTO, now there’s a reference guide for that.

What will that sleek techno-manual mean for the average cyclist? A blossoming of bike infrastructure that will help mainstream bicycling, make streets safer for all users, and finally bring American transportation into the 21st century, said Sadik-Khan. “This is a design guide for streets that work today and in 2050; streets that aren’t designed for 1950,” she said.

Secretary LaHood seconded that emotion. The first words out of his mouth were a direct recommendation that every community use the design guide as a means to promote more and safer cycling. “This is an extraordinary piece of work that’s long overdue,” the secretary said.

True to his reputation, LaHood touted the importance of “providing cycling opportunities that are safe, convenient and available.” The new guide, he said, should serve as a resource in that effort.

“This is a big deal,” he said of the proliferation of urban bicycling. “And this guide is a big deal.”

LaHood stood behind NYC Transpo Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan at a bicycling event today in DC. Photo: Darren Flusche, League of American Bicyclists

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood told the LA Times today that he’s a one-term secretary. Don’t expect him to serve during President Obama’s second term, if there is one, or to run for any other public office in the future.

Todd Zwillich of Transportation Nation suggests that partisan gridlock may be to blame. “A lot has changed in this town since I arrived more than 35 years ago,” LaHood told an audience at the National Press Club today, “but nothing changed more than the evolution of a culture in which elected officials are rewarded for intransigence… For too many, compromise has become a dirty word — for many, compromise isn’t even in their dictionary.”

As we mentioned yesterday, LaHood’s support for bicycling has continued to blossom as his tenure as secretary has gone on. From the tabletop speech to his declaration of “the end of favoring motorized transportation at the expense of non-motorized” to last weekend’s affirmation of rail-trails as good health care policy, LaHood has been the darling of the biking community. He’s also been a high-profile advocate for the TIGER program and high-speed rail, as well as countless active transportation initiatives like Walk to School Day, and bike sharing.

In October, TIGER II granted $47.6 million to Atlanta for a modern streetcar system. Here, Transportation Secretary LaHood presents the check to Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed and several area members of Congress. Photo: The White House

It’s TIGER III time. The first round was $1.5 billion. The second round was $600 million. And now, get ready for round three. After surviving countless threats by budget-cutting Republicans in Congress, TIGER is back, granting $527 million for innovative transportation projects.

The “Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery” program lets cities, states and regions compete to show that their project will have a significant impact on the nation

“Through the TIGER program, we can build transportation projects that are critical to America’s economic success and help complete those that might not move forward without this infusion of funding,” said Secretary LaHood in a press statement. “This competition empowers local communities to create jobs and build the transportation networks they need in order to win the future.”

The announcement comes right on time. We found out in April that the money had been appropriated, and knew that a call for applications couldn’t come any sooner than 60 days after that. Applications will be due in the fall.

As we reported earlier, this round of TIGER will be all for capital investments, not planning or project design, and, as in TIGER II, applicants will have to provide at least a 20 percent match.

The TIGER program has been hugely successful, attracting more than 2,500 applications requesting more than $79 billion in the first two rounds. It’s also helped re-shape the discourse around transportation policy, proving the efficacy of competitive grant processes and encouraging a shift away from strictly formula-based funding. By having states and regions compete, the focus shifts to outcomes and performance, which forces decision-makers to use funds more wisely.

According to USDOT, “Projects will be selected based on their ability to contribute to the long-term economic competitiveness of the nation, improve the condition of existing transportation facilities and systems, improve energy efficiency and reducing greenhouse gas emissions, improve the safety of U.S. transportation facilities and improve the quality of living and working environments of communities through increased transportation choices and connections. The Department will also focus on projects that are expected to quickly create and preserve jobs and spur rapid increases in economic activity.”

Since March, I’ve been doing a monthly video series called “On the Go with Ray LaHood,” where I respond to questions from the public. I want to thank Streetsblog readers for supplying the bulk of the questions we received this month.

But in my latest “On the Go” video, I was only able to answer a few of them. Since you provided so many great questions, I thought it would be nice to answer a few extra ones right here on Streetsblog.

On my Fast Lane blog, Josef Szende asked, “Does the USDOT consider its job on creating a sustainable transit system to be over once the majority of the country is using electric vehicles?”

Josef, it’s true that I’m excited about Electric Vehicles. They’ve got a lot of potential to help reduce our dependence on foreign oil, and they really help solve the problem of tailpipe emissions. But many people don’t want to own cars–electric or otherwise. And, with transportation costs as the number two item in most household budgets, we know Americans need access to affordable transit options.

So this DOT is pushing forward to continue growing innovative transit systems across the U.S. For example, our Federal Transit Administration (FTA) has a very popular Urban Circulator program and a successful New Starts program that, on Monday, announced nearly $1.6 billion for 27 projects nationwide.

And earlier this week, to support President Obama’s emphasis on sustainability, the FTA announced more than $100 million in competitive grants for emerging clean fuel and hybrid or electric propulsion technologies for transit buses.

On Facebook, Kyle Merville asks, “How could DOT encourage a more even spread of transportation money to cities? How can the DOT invest in urban infrastructure and modernize it to better serve the citizens who depend on these systems daily?”

Well, Kyle, the answer is that DOT awards a number of grants to America’s urban areas. The FTA has a specific Urbanized Area Formula program for transit capital investments — including the kind of system maintenance you ask about. In addition, FTA also offers a Bus and Bus Facilities program, a Metropolitan and Statewide Planning program, and several other programs that make awards to cities.

We may not have a road program dedicated to urban areas, but that doesn’t mean the state departments of transportation don’t balance urban, suburban, and rural needs appropriately. In fact, many of the largest highway and bridge improvement projects our Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) funds are located in urban areas. The FHWA also has programs to improve air quality, and most of those awards end up in our nation’s cities.

Then we have our very popular TIGER I and TIGER II discretionary programs, where cities and regions applied directly for support. Our competitive TIGER awards funded many creative projects to solve problems across America — multi-use paths, transit systems, road and bridge projects — and many of these were in urban areas. And, if you look at the transportation recommendations the President has sent to Congress for 2012, we’ve made sure to include programs where cities and regional partnerships can come directly to us.

The last question comes from Clarence Eckerson, Jr., who asks, “Would you go for a bike ride with Streetfilms?”

I’m sorry to tell you this, Clarence, but Washington, DC’s Jay Mallin has beaten Streetfilms to the punch on this one. Earlier this month, Jay joined us for a DOT bicycle commute and produced this video. I hope everyone enjoys his video, and, once again, thanks for the terrific questions. Please keep them coming!

Note that LaHood had Facebook on in the background during his last video chat. (And he says he's not a hipster.)

Got a question for Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood? He’s all ears.

LaHood has been doing a series of video chats where he responds to questions from the public, and a DOT official told me they would like to “explicitly invite Streetsblog readers to submit their questions to the Secretary” for the next episode of “On the Go with Ray LaHood.”

There are three ways to submit questions. You can leave a comment on the Secretary’s blog, go to his Facebook discussion page, or tweet a question using hashtag #q4ray.

Go ahead, give him your best shot.

Ray LaHood says everyone who needs the White House bill already has it. Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

So while we reporters have been busy poring over draft bills that, it later turns out, don’t accurately reflect the administration’s plans for the transportation reauthorization, the final bill has already been out there?

Not exactly. Committee staffers say they’ve received “technical assistance” from the White House but not a final bill. “Technical assistance” is Congressional jargon for getting a sneak peek at relevant sections of the president’s draft of the bill. But it looks like the White House is only releasing it like that – piece by piece, as needed, and only to Congressional staff.

Even that technical assistance was slow in coming, said one staffer. The leaked versions that were floating around probably helped convince the White House to be more forthcoming with their guidance, just so staffers could have an accurate idea of what the administration has in mind.

It’s unusual for Obama to publicly release his own draft of a piece of legislation – he generally leaves that to Congress. LaHood clearly seems to think that the people who need the bill have it, and I take that as a sign that we won’t be seeing any more from the White House.

Meanwhile, the action alerts we’ve seen today indicating that the EPW Committee in the Senate is getting close to finalizing their language are only partly accurate, according to inside sources. Committee staff seems to be getting done with their draft, but that’s just at the staff level. Apparently that conversation has barely begun at the level of the senators themselves, and the staffers in their offices haven’t seen the committee draft yet. So it looks like there’s still a ways to go before we see a final bill.

Both the House and the Senate have recently stepped back from earlier talk of finalizing a bill by Memorial Day and are now shooting for “sometime in June.”

Photo: Joe Burbank/Orlando Sentinel

As he’s said before, Mica doesn’t have a bill in his “back pocket.” It’s hard to say if he was praising or criticizing his predecessor, Rep. Jim Oberstar, when he told the APTA audience, “He had waited 32 years to become chair. He knew exactly what he wanted in the bill, and he hand-wrote it out and projected it up on a screen and everyone was to march, and I did, until we started to get picked off by the administration and other folks who had other ideas, and it never happened.”

Mica also announced a series of stakeholder meetings to be held in the last week of March to supplement the field hearings the committee has been holding around the country. The meetings will help lawmakers craft a transportation reauthorization bill. Mica told the APTA members that they will be among those invited. It will include “all the Washington folks that haven’t been heard.”

Then he’ll “buy beer and pizza” (and fruit smoothies, as requested by Sen. Barbara Boxer) and lawmakers will sit down and hash it all out, he told reporters after his speech.

As for the broader budget fight, Mica alluded to the current deal to pass another extension for three more weeks – “Then, my advice and counsel would be, grab a hold of your shorts and hang on,” he said. “It might be a wild ride.”

He said it’s “above his pay grade” to guess whether more extensions will follow. “It’s not the way to fund the government, but a lot of people were sent here with a mission to cut spending.”

Mica got in his usual jabs at Amtrak, which he likes to call a “Soviet-style” train operator, incapable of developing real high-speed rail. It’s a sad time for high-speed rail proponents, like him, who were excited about the president’s vision, he said, “It’s like trying to celebrate and you’ve got a box of cigars and the first three cigars explode in your face.”

In his opinion, Florida was a bad choice for a high-speed corridor, but he and other advocates should “dust ourselves off and move forward.” He said all future inter-modal centers will be built in downtowns (and not leave passengers “at a gas station outside of town”) with consideration given to transit connections, which Tampa doesn’t have.

Mica drew on his own personal history as a “transit-dependent” to explain his support for a strong public transportation system – and one with reliable service at all hours, not just rush hour.

“I became a fan [of public transportation] when I was young, and I didn’t always have the money for a car,” he said. “I took public transportation. I used to take the last bus out, when I worked all night at the Miami Herald in the mail room, and I took the first bus out in the morning, at 6:30. And over the weekend, I had two other jobs. So I personally know many people depend on the service you provide.”

In response to a question about the new inter-city rail caucus, just founded by Sen. Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey, Mica said he’s “not a big caucus-joiner” and encouraged people to put their energy into the committee process instead. He told them this is their chance to influence legislation – “you’ll never have a more open process than what I’m providing” – and told them that if the final bill is missing something, “it’s your fault” for not providing input.

LaHood also addressed the gathering, speaking only briefly before taking questions about transit safety, including the Public Transportation Safety Act, which he said was a priority for him this year. He said he was stunned, after Washington, D.C.’s metro crash, that DOT has no jurisdiction over transit safety. The Banking Committee passed the bill last year, and they’re still tweaking it. “If you look at the bill, which we hope will be reintroduced, and if there are some things you don’t like about it, let us know.”

He paid homage to the inter-agency Partnership for Sustainable Communities, and listed the benefits it provides, like collaboration on a TIGER grant to build affordable housing and sidewalks near transit in Kansas City, Missouri.

Not surprisingly, LaHood was asked (not by me, this time!) how the administration plans to pay for its transportation proposal, and not surprisingly, he said he looked forward to working with Congress on that, but a gas tax hike is off the table.

One attendee said that people in London are paying $12 a gallon for gas and perhaps our gas tax could go up a bit more, as it did under President Ronald Reagan, for the dual purpose of deficit reduction and transportation. But LaHood balked at the questioner’s cajoling for a candid answer “just among us friends in this room.”

“I wish that were the case,” LaHood joked back. “Do you know how many media people are sitting in the back, just waiting for me to say something? Do you want me to keep my job? (“Yes, sir, I do, very much!”) Then don’t be asking your question.”

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood immediately after addressing the Bike Summit. Photo: Clarence Eckerson

New York City politicians may have had their feathers ruffled by Janette Sadik-Khan, but on the national stage, New York City’s transportation commissioner is getting nothing but love from the Obama administration for her innovative leadership.

Streetsblog Capitol Hill’s Tanya Snyder reports that at the National Bike Summit last night, US DOT Secretary Ray LaHood had this to say about Sadik-Khan:

A quite extraordinary lady as all of you know. She has really put New York on the map when it comes to making New York a livable, sustainable community with lots of opportunities for walking, and biking paths, and you can live in New York and not own an automobile. So Janette, thank you for your leadership. Thank you for your leadership.

New York City is a liberal bastion and the least car-dependent city in the country. But our senior senator seems intent on halting the progress of innovative street designs here in NYC, while representatives from Maryland and Oregon carry the banner for bike infrastructure in Congress. One of our mayoral hopefuls makes wisecracks about ripping out bike lanes, while the next mayor of Chicago has pledged to install miles of bikeways, with an emphasis on physically-protected lanes, each year he’s in office.

What does it say about the political class in this town when changes to make our streets safer leave our electeds hyperventilating, while a former Republican congressman from Peoria touts their safety and environmental benefits?

Sec. LaHood immediately after addressing the Bike Summit. Photo by Clarence Eckerson.

Last year, he captivated the Summit crowd with his famous “Tabletop Speech” and his declaration that “this is the end of favoring motorized transportation at the expense of non-motorized.”

Last night, League of American Bicyclists President Andy Clarke introduced LaHood with the high praise, “He talks about bikes -– not just with us -– but with other people too!”

LaHood encouraged the attendees, who will be going to Capitol Hill to lobby their representatives on Thursday, to “talk to your member of Congress about the importance of making communities cycle-friendly.” He reminded them that Ohio Congressman Steve LaTourette went from ridiculing cycling to supporting it after hearing from committed advocates. (LaHood was polite enough to not mention LaTourette by name, but everyone in the room knew who he was talking about.)

“I want you to work hard on your members of Congress,” LaHood exhorted the crowd. “We really need your help more now than, maybe, ever before. Because you know that a new crowd is in town and they have a little different agenda and it’s being played out in a way that maybe doesn’t reflect the kind of values many of us believe in.”

He didn’t talk much about the “big, bold” transportation plan proposed by “that fella I work for” (President Obama), other than asking attendees to “charge up to Capitol Hill” and push members to support cycling.

LaHood bolstered his own cred with the room full of cyclists by telling stories of how he and his wife go cycling on the C&O Canal trail every weekend (though I think he meant the Capital Crescent), and recounting his own early years riding a Schwinn all around town, and how he bought bikes for his four kids and his nine grandkids to make sure cycling was part of their lives.

“You have a full partner -– many more than one partner -– at DOT,” he told them.

After LaHood’s speech, participants migrated a few blocks away for a reception honoring Bike Pittsburgh as the Advocacy Organization of the Year, Jackie Douglas of Boston’s LivableStreets as Advocate of the Year, the New Belgium Brewing Company as the Business Advocate of the Year, the Michigan Complete Streets Coalition as Winning Campaign of the Year, the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition for Best Practices, the Willamette Pedestrian Coalition’s Stephanie Routh for the Susie Stephens Joyful Enthusiasm Award, and the Fairfax Advocates for Better Bicycling got the award for Innovation.

Tomorrow, the Bike League will announce this year’s Bicycle Friendly Businesses and Universities (a new category). NACTO will release its Urban Bikeway Design Guide, written to bring bicycle innovations long ignored by AASHTO and the FHWA into roadway design. And NYCDOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan, seemingly unfazed after being named in a lawsuit by anti-bike-lane plaintiffs yesterday, will address the gathering, along with Congressional Bike Caucus founder Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar. A representative from the First Lady’s Let’s Move! Campaign will be the lunchtime keynote.

Photo credit: Joe Burbank/Orlando Sentinel

Later in the morning, Republican staffers argued for a Highway Trust Fund devoted just to highways (“back to basics,” they call it) but Mica stands firm in calling for “not just a highway bill, but a transportation bill.” He told AASHTO that he wants the bill to cover all modes. When he talks about finding money in underused programs, like the Railroad Rehabilitation & Improvement Financing Program, he made it clear that he would keep that money for rail and not shift it to other modes. Somewhat opaquely, he said the rail section of the transportation bill “will be anywhere from one paragraph to 20 pages.”

Mica made it clear he didn’t have a bill in his back pocket and couldn’t answer any questions about its size. He grumbled that he and then-committee chair Jim Oberstar were ready to pass a bill back in 2009 but the administration wanted to wait 18 months, and even that 18-month hold has been a patchwork of six extensions. (It’ll be seven by the time this week is over – the House is voting this afternoon on the seventh extension, to keep the program going at current levels until September 30.)

Meanwhile, Mica called unemployment insurance just another “cockamamie” idea for putting people back to work, saying if we had just put that money toward infrastructure we’d have six percent unemployment by now.

He, and Secretary Ray LaHood, who spoke after him, reiterated for the umpteenth time that while the transportation system has to “spend within its means” (because “that’s the directive of the House of Representatives”), the gas tax is decidedly “off the table,” to the great frustration of many state DOT officials. They wondered how he would achieve his goal of “stabilizing the highway trust fund” without a gas tax hike.

State officials also expressed that Mica’s directive of “doing more with less” rubbed them the wrong way. One official stood up in a later session and said she finds that departments usually end up doing less with less and doesn’t really know how it can be otherwise.

They do, however, find common ground on the need to speed up project delivery, especially when federal money (and federal requirements) are involved. Mica said this was one of the most prominent issues the committee heard about on its listening tour.

“We can deliver projects faster without running over environmental rules or eliminating rights for redress,” Mica said. “We can do things concurrently; we can shorten timeframes.”

For his part, Secretary LaHood spoke mainly in soundbites about the president’s “bold” plan, “the boldest in the history of transportation.” He trumpeted the achievements of the stimulus plan and said criticism that it didn’t work is just “baloney.” He asked audience members for specific proposals for saving money, raising new revenues, and speeding up projects but had nothing of his own to offer about how the administration plans to do any of those things. Indeed, the administration has made it clear that it plans to leave those thorny questions to Congress.

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.”

FocusDriven's Jennifer Smith, at left, with Ray Lahood at an event held earlier this month. Photo: UPI

A year ago, the Department of Transportation helped launch FocusDriven, an advocacy group for victims of motor vehicle crashes involving drivers using cell phones.

“In one year, we’ve made progress – but at least 5,500 people still die every year in crashes,” said FocusDriven president Jennifer Smith, who lost her mother in a collision involving a distracted driver. Vulnerable road users like pedestrians and cyclists are especially at risk when drivers aren’t paying attention.

“I am noticing a lot of pedestrians and cyclists getting killed,” Smith said. “They’re at most danger. They don’t have the car to protect them. And these people are hitting them and not even realizing that they hit someone. That’s how engrossed in the conversation or the text message they are.”

At a press conference at the DOT headquarters in Washington, Secretary Ray LaHood listed the accomplishments of the relatively young campaign against distracted driving.

“In 2010, legislators in 43 states considered more than 270 distracted driving-related bills,” LaHood said. “Because of our collective efforts, 30 states have outlawed texting behind the wheel, and eight states have banned handheld cell phone use for all drivers.”

The Obama administration has also banned federal employees, commercial truckers and bus drivers from texting while driving.

Now he’s taking his message to the automakers. He’s already had talks with top officials at GM, Toyota, Nissan, Honda, and BMW. Tuesday, he’ll be in Detroit to talk to the chairmen of Ford and Chrysler. He applauds Subaru’s recent commercial featuring a father admonishing his daughter not to use her cell phone while driving.

And that’s the message he’s taking to the automakers: “devote some of your money that you’re devoting to advertising for your products to the idea that distracted driving is very dangerous.”

Automakers have made their attempt: GM and Saab vehicles now feature Onstar systems that allow drivers to answer the phone on their dashboard and talk without a handheld device. But Jennifer Smith says that’s not enough. “There are more than 25 credible research papers that show no safety improvement while using a hands-free device, yet we are continuing to be told that hands-free technologies are a safe alternative,” she said. “If our brains cannot process what our eyes are seeing, then we are at risk.”

Will LaHood settle for automaker efforts that include “safety” technologies that don’t keep us safe? He declined to answer whether these technologies are the answer.

Meanwhile, he wants to see a federal bill like ones that were introduced, but not passed, in the last Congress. “I think a national law is a good idea,” he said. However, with 30 states already banned some cell use while driving, the states appear to be well ahead of the feds on this one.

Still, the secretary rests most of the responsibility with the driver who either decides to leave the phone in the glove box or doesn’t. Much of the language of the campaign against distracted driving is about choice. “Each day I get another reminder that someone made a choice that a phone call or a text message was more important than someone’s safety,” says Smith. “It was more important than someone’s life.”

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.

The parties have mapped out a two-week process for U.S. DOT and New Jersey officials to review different options to move the ARC project forward. The Star-Ledger has the story.

If you’re an optimist about these talks, I think the relevant question now is: What conditions will LaHood have to meet? Share your scenarios in the comments.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood (Photo: Getty Images)

"If we didn't have a lousy economy, a lot of these issues would bubble up more quickly," LaHood told transit planners who lamented the lack of progress on new federal legislation and the tough budget choices brought on by the recession.

"Part of the solution," LaHood added, "will be when the economy comes back" and the White House is more open to discussing tax increases as part of the financing mix for long-term transport funding.

But in the meantime, LaHood's remarks served as a friendly warning to the transit industry that, given the capital's current political reality, its $8.4 billion haul from the stimulus should be considered a victory.

One exchange in particular epitomized the state of play between the administration and transit agencies: When an APTA conference attendee from Grand Rapids, Michigan, asked the packed audience of local officials to raise their hands if they had raised fares or cut service during the past year, a sizable number of hands rose into the air. Minutes later, Federal Transit Administrator Peter Rogoff leapt up to ask how many officials would be cutting more or laying off more workers if not for the stimulus.

Even more hands went up in response to Rogoff's query.

"The big sticking point of all of this is money," LaHood said. "That money [to pay for a new federal bill] just doesn't exist right now."

Despite that grim news and the long line of transit planners who shared their fiscal woes with LaHood during a question-and-answer session, one opening emerged for the industry to make headway on its Washington agenda. The U.S. DOT chief signaled openness to expanding urban transit agencies' ability to use federal capital grants to cover operating costs.

That capital-to-operating flexibility now sits at 10 percent, a level set soon after the stimulus law's passage. "Maybe that's not the right percentage," LaHood said. "Maybe we need to work with Congress to allow you to do more when the economy is bad." He floated the idea of a "sliding scale" for federal operating aid that would vary based on economic growth.

On two other big-ticket federal transit issues, however, the federal outlook appeared hazy following LaHood's appearance.

Asked about the so-called "CLEAN TEA" plan to give transit a dedicated share of the revenue from climate change legislation, LaHood touted his work in the president's Green Cabinet before admitting, "I can't say [CLEAN TEA] has been part of our discussions. But it possibly could be in the future."

Another questioner brought up the stimulus law's provision increasing the monthly pre-tax transit benefit for commuters to $230 -- equalizing the tax-free funding for transit and parking -- which is set to expire at the end of 2010. LaHood replied that he had not the "slightest idea" of the issue's status, though Rogoff explained that the tax question is under the Treasury Department's purview.

"We intend to talk to our partners at Treasury" about the value of keeping the pre-tax transit benefit equal to that for employee parking, Rogoff said.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood made a surprise visit to the closing reception of the National Bike Summit last night, speaking to a record crowd of bicycle advocates and industry representatives, many of whom spent the day swarming the halls of the Capitol as part of the League of American Bicyclists (LAB) annual lobby day.

"People get it. People want to live in livable communities," LaHood told the crowd, after hoisting himself atop a table in the Dirksen Senate Office Building room so the large gathering could see him. "People want streetcars that are made in Portland, Oregon. People want walking paths, biking paths, and opportunities for families to really do the things they do best, which is to hang together and have fun. You all created an opportunity for America with all of your hard work."

"I’ve been all over America, and where I’ve been in America I’ve been very proud to talk about the fact that people do want alternatives. They want out of their cars, they want out of congestion, they want to live in livable neighborhoods and livable communities." He added, to thunderous applause, "you've got a partner in Ray LaHood."

"Ray, we've got your back," said Congressman Earl Blumenaur, the founder of the Congressional Bike Caucus, who told attendees that they have made a difference but there are "a lot of people who don't get the big picture yet."

The reception ended the league's 10th annual summit, which saw a record number of attendees: more than 700 advocates from all over the country took part.

"From my perspective what has changed most dramatically is not just the numbers over the years, but our own belief in the ability we have to convince others this stuff actually works," said Andy Clarke, President of the LAB. "We've got examples in the field now in San Francisco, in Portland, in Chicago, New York City, where you can document a real change in behavior, and we've got mode shift going on and we can see why it's happened." 

The underlying theme, as it has been in years past, was the reauthorization of federal transportation law. Bike advocates also asked lawmakers to expand programs like Safe Routes to School and adopt new legislation to improve conditions for walking and biking.

"It's a challenging time to be asking for more funding," said Clarke. "But this isn't new money, first and foremost. There's money in the system that can be used that isn't being used on safety programs or bridges or congestion relief programs that can very legitimately be used for biking and walking."

That message, said Clarke, is what advocates were urged to tell their representatives.

"I was rather impressed with some of the speeches our people made," said bicycling pioneer Gary Fisher, who attended the summit for the first time. "We keep coming and coming and coming and it keeps getting bigger and bigger."

For more on the National Bike Summit, visit Bike Portland. Jonathan Maus cranked out some excellent coverage.

We've also got video of most of LaHood's speech to the bike summit, but a warning that the quality isn't the best:

Congressman Earl Blumenaur. Photo: Jeffrey Martin, courtesy of the League of American Bicyclists. 

A large crowd of advocates packed a room for the National Bike Summit closing reception in the Dirksen Senate Office Building. Photo: Bryan Goebel.

Cycling pioneer Gary Fisher meets Transportation Secretary LaHood. Photo: Bryan Goebel.

Sen. Kit Bond (R-MO) (Photo: Politico)

But Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood's visit with Senate appropriators today was anything but humdrum, as Sen. Kit Bond (R-MO) challenged him repeatedly to defend the White House's efforts on sustainable development and high-speed rail.

Bond cited a recent Wall Street Journal editorial by Wendell Cox, a conservative pundit who has penned laudatory literature for road lobbying groups, in accusing the Obama administration of frittering away taxpayers' money on high-speed rail.

LaHood fired back, remarking wryly that Bond's home state sought high-speed rail grants and publicly celebrated its $31 million haul. "I got calls on this every day from senators and governors" clamoring for an opportunity to build inter-city passenger rail, LaHood said.

Answering Bond's charge that the rail funding process was less than transparent, the U.S. DOT chief threw in a bold claim: "I don't know of one lobbyist that darkened our door with an application … that came to our door with the idea they were going to have some edge."

A November investigation by the nonpartisan Center for Public Integrity found that more than 50 government entities and private companies have hired high-speed rail lobbyists, including the AFL-CIO, the Mayo Clinic, and overseas train manufacturers such as Siemens and Bombardier.

The sharpest exchange between Bond and LaHood came on the topic of walkable local development, which the U.S. DOT has worked to promote through $150 million in 2010 grants and an inter-agency partnership with housing and environmental protection officials.

"What is livability?" Bond asked LaHood, minutes after comparing the task of defining the term to defining pornography. (The origins of that reference are explained here.)

"Communities where people have access to many different forms of transportation, and affordable housing... maybe they don't want a car, so they can walk to work or take mass transit to work," LaHood said, using the newly built-up neighborhood surrounding his office as an example.

Bond's reply summed up the challenge of crafting new federal transportation policy in an era marked by rural-urban-suburban culture clashes. "I've got a lot of constituents for whom livability means having a decent highway," he said. "They've got to drive between one town and another town."

LaHood gamely tried to put Bond's criticism in perspective, noting that highways received the lion's share -- $27 billion -- of the transportation funding in last year's economic stimulus law.

Yet Bond only dug in his heels, arguing that Americans had shown their eagerness to use roads and bridges but would not embrace rail or walkable infrastructure. "When did it become the responsibility of the federal DOT to build sidewalks?" the soon-to-retire senator asked, before LaHood that reminded him Congress set up dedicated funding for pedestrian improvements nearly 20 years ago.