Climate Change

The U.S. DOT announced today that 43 local transit agencies from more than two dozen states would share the $100 million in competitive clean-transport grants included in this winter's $787 billion economic stimulus law.

Policymakers and private-sector players seem to be struggling to agree on how -- and whether -- to set national performance targets for America's transportation system, as evidenced by today's debate at a high-profile infrastructure conference.

Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) announced this afternoon that he would stay on at the helm of the Banking Committee, which also has jurisdiction over federal transit issues, rather than move over to lead the health panel previously led by his friend, the late Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA).

With Congress returning to work next week after a month away from Washington, a national dialogue long dominated by health care is about to open to the long-awaited Senate debate on climate change.

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.

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.

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? 

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.

The Washington lobbying firm of Bonner & Associates is facing protests and a possible wire fraud probe after it was revealed to have forged at least a dozen letters to Congress this summer that claimed to represent local grassroots groups opposed to fighting climate change.