Posts Tagged "reauthorization"
Connecting people to jobs and services week: The legislative path to make access the goal of transportation investments
Measuring access—not vehicle speed—is smart policy. But local governments, states, and metropolitan planning organizations need support from the federal government to make this happen. It’s high time for Congress to make robust travel data and analysis tools available to transportation agencies.
The Senate’s first transportation reauthorization bill gets an F
Authorizing federal spending on surface transportation is complicated, with different Congressional committees writing separate portions of the bill. That’s why we’ll score every reauthorization bill by how well it achieves our three simple principles for transportation investment. The America’s Transportation Infrastructure Act fails on all counts.
Why we are no longer advocating for Congress to increase transportation funding
Since our inception in 2008, Transportation for America has always primarily advocated for reforming the federal transportation program. But raising the gas tax or otherwise raising new funding overall has also been a core plank of our platform since 2013. With the release of our brand new policy platform and principles coming this Monday, Transportation for America is no longer asking Congress to provide an increase in money for federal transportation program. Why?
Senate on the verge of passing a multi-year transportation bill
After several contentious procedural votes to keep the bill moving forward over the past week, the Senate is likely to be taking a final vote on their three-year transportation bill at some point before the end of the week. Here’s a short update on where things currently stand.
Support the new plan from a bipartisan duo of senators to send more transportation dollars to local communities
Two Senators championing the cause of giving local communities more control over their transportation dollars have introduced a modified plan to steer more federal transportation dollars directly to local communities of all sizes — reaching a compromise that they want to incorporate into the Senate’s transportation bill as it heads to the floor.
UPDATED: Senate reaches preliminary agreement on a long-term transportation bill
A group of key Senate leaders announced just a few moments ago that they’d reached agreement on a bipartisan six-year transportation bill with three years of guaranteed funding. While it’s encouraging to see this agreement ten days before MAP-21 expires on July 31, forthcoming negotiations over the actual details of the bill will be crucial as most Senators have not yet seen the policy or funding language.
Three changes could dramatically improve the Senate’s draft transportation bill
Ahead of the looming July 31 deadline to pass a new bill (or extend the current law), the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee in late June introduced and marked up a full six-year transportation bill. While we think it’s a good starting point, there are some promising amendments that could improve the bill dramatically as it goes forward in the Senate.
House extends MAP-21 to July 31, aligning it with impending insolvency of nation’s transportation fund
After a short debate, The House of Representatives voted to extend MAP-21 for two months past its May 31st expiration to the end of July, aligning the end of the nation’s transportation law with the projected insolvency of the nation’s transportation fund. The Senate is expected to act Wednesday or Thursday to approve the bill before the Memorial Day recess begins.
Polemics give way to compromise on House rail bill
For the last few years, congressional debate over the nation’s passenger rail system has been a discordant tug-of-war between visions of high-speed rail and moves to privatize popular Amtrak corridors and kill operational support. The logjam appeared to break last week with a unanimous committee vote on reauthorizing passenger rail. The compromise bill recognizes the benefits of a truly national passenger rail system and seeks to improve it rather dwell on drawbacks.
States’ underinvestment in road repair signals need for tough federal standards
Consider a couple of eye-popping statistics: From 2004-2008, states spent 57 percent of available highway dollars to add a little over 1 percent to our already vast highway network, and only 43 percent to maintain the other 99 percent of highway lanes. Keeping our existing highway network in “good” condition would require spending $43 billion […]
It’s past time to elevate the national conversation about infrastructure beyond just the price tag. Learn more about T4America's three simple principles for federal transportation investment.
Read our new principles