Could Ending the ‘War on Drugs’ Help Ease Urban Budget Crises?
Despite talk of a
nascent economic recovery, the brutal toll exacted on state budgets by
the recession continues -- with palpable consequences for transit riders and already lower-income urbanites. Could the cure for cities' fiscal woes be a dramatic shift in drug policy?
August 17, 2009
Could Electric-Car Tax Credits Become the Next “Cash for Clunkers”?
The White House's commitment to electrified cars, fulfilling an Obama campaign promise to put 1 million plug-in hybrids into service by 2015, is bound to have serious ramifications for the nation's already-crumbling system of paying for transportation.
August 14, 2009
Report: Boxer ‘Sympathetic to’ Backers of More Climate Money for Transit
As Senator Barbara Boxer works on her upcoming climate
change bill, the Senate environment committee chairman is "definitely
looking at" a plan
to give green transport 10 percent of the revenue generated from carbon
emissions caps, according to a new report from BNA's Transportation
Watch.
August 14, 2009
Obama Administration Touts Nation’s First All-Electronic Toll Road in N.C.
The U.S. DOT dispatched Federal Highway Administrator Victor Mendez to North Carolina yesterday to kick off construction of the $1 billion Triangle Expressway, the state's first toll road and the nation's first to use per-mile electronic tolling.
August 13, 2009
Transport Construction Industry Mobilizes for Oberstar’s Bill
Acrimonious opposition to health care reform has become
the biggest political story of an otherwise sleepy August, but that
doesn't mean grassroots lobbying on the House's transportation bill has evaporated.
August 12, 2009
Ed Glaeser’s Rail Fail
The story so far: Ed Glaeser recently began an effort to assess the costs and benefits of constructing high-speed rail lines at the New York Times' Economix blog. Last week, he posted
his first substantive take on the issue, an attempt to estimate direct
costs and benefits from a hypothetical line between Houston and Dallas.
August 12, 2009
A Progress Report on State-Level Oil Dependence
America's oil addiction is readily acknowledged, even by its biggest enablers. But what is the nation actually doing to kick the habit and embrace a safer, healthier, more realistic energy future?
August 11, 2009
Senate’s New DOT Spending Bill Eases One Transit Funding Barrier
During the lengthy process
of pursuing a "New Starts" funding agreement with the U.S. DOT, local
transit officials are often at the mercy of cost-benefit calculations
that have failed to keep pace with evolutions in transport planning.
But one aspect of that slog could soon change, thanks to Sen. Patty
Murray (D-WA).
August 11, 2009
The Peculiar Federalism of Transit Safety: No National Standards Exist
The recent crash of two D.C. Metro trains has laid bare a glaring
lack of authority at the obscure local committee that is supposed to
ensure transit riders' safety, as the Washington Post reported today.
But the problem is bigger than the nation's capital: The Federal
Transit Administration (FTA) has not issued broad safety rules for rail
transit, leaving the issue in the hands of state oversight agencies.
August 10, 2009
Senators Propose $4 Billion for Transit-Oriented Development Grants
Making good on a vow first reported
in Streetsblog Capitol Hill, Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris
Dodd (D-CT) and three colleagues today offered a bill authorizing $4
billion in grants to help states and cities pursue transit-oriented
development, bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure, and other green
transport projects.
August 6, 2009