Transportation Funding

With memories of last spring's budget battle still fresh in mind, the MTA announced in a mid-year budget presentation [PDF] today that it now faces a $45.1 million deficit and plans to cut 250 positions across the agency as part of its plan to help close the gap.

Although the MTA is facing a growing budget deficit that some estimate at $25-30 million or higher, the agency has not publicly talked about how it intends to close the gap, nor has it embraced revenue generators like expanded parking meter hours in commercial districts. An update of the FY 2010 budget was agendized last Friday for today's MTA board meeting, but the item was subsequently removed, MTA spokesperson Judson True confirmed.

Former Transportation Secretary Mary Peters, who served for eight years in George W. Bush's DOT, sat down with Streetsblog Capitol Hill this week to urge that Congress add a dedicated funding stream of $1 billion each year for transportation technology to the next long-term infrastructure bill.

The Board of Supervisors today approved a five-year, $30 million umbrella purchasing agreement between the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency and Thales Transport & Security, Inc. for Advanced Train Control System (ATCS) "improvement services and upgrades." The ATCS system controls the speed, location, and routing of Muni's light rail vehicles when they're underground between Embarcadero and West Portal stations. The MTA says the upgrades are necessary to keep the ATCS in working order for the coming decades.

When lawmakers failed on Wednesday to reach a deal on avoiding the cancellation of $8.7 billion in transportation spending authority, the consequences of Congress' inaction weren't immediately palpable to most voters -- but the loss is sinking in on the local level.

It has become one of the most enduring anecdotes surrounding the Obama administration’s $787 billion economic stimulus law: Democrats’ contention that White House adviser Larry Summers sliced transit aid by more than half, to $8.4 billion, out of concerns that projects were not “shovel-ready” enough. (Photo: DMI Blog) Has Summers been vindicated by the data? … Continued

A bipartisan bid to extend existing federal transportation law for three months — and tap the TARP bailout fund to avert the cancellation of $8.7 billion in contract authority — was rejected on the Senate floor last night after GOP senators insisted on using stimulus money, rather than bailout cash, to fix the problem. Was … Continued

One day after Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger tooted his own horn on climate change and carbon reductions mandated under AB 32, another California transit operator is taking drastic steps to stop the hemorrhaging of its operations budget by cutting back on future innovation, in no small part due to the fact that the governor and the state legislature zeroed out the State Transit Assistance (STA) fund.