Federal Funding
Streetsblog Basics
Building Cloverleafs Won’t Inspire Americans to Pay More for Transportation
The federal transportation fund is running out of money, threatening the country with potholes, stopped construction, and economic downturn. Congress, which has kept the program solvent with short-term patches for years, now finds itself unable to do more than buy a few months’ time.
July 23, 2014
Dems Grudgingly Approve House Transpo Extension’s Disastrous Timeline
Yesterday, during the one-hour debate period over the House proposal to extend transportation funding through May 31, lawmaker after lawmaker stood up to condemn the bill. America needs a long-term transportation bill, they said. A short-term stopgap only creates more uncertainty.
July 16, 2014
House Proposes 8-Month Transpo Bill in Hopes of a Republican Senate in 2015
While a six-year Senate transportation bill languishes in partisan purgatory, the House Ways and Means Committee has proposed an eight-month patch that would backfill the Highway Trust Fund until May 31, 2015. That would punt the transportation bill debate until a new Congress takes over -- one that’s expected to have Republican majorities in both chambers.
July 9, 2014
Why the Federal Funding Emergency Matters for Transportation Reform
Why does it matter if state departments of transportation get less money?
July 7, 2014
FHWA: Bike-Ped Investments Pay Off By Cutting Traffic and Improving Health
Nine years after launching a program to measure the impact of bike and pedestrian investments in four communities, the Federal Highway Administration credits the program with increasing walking trips by nearly a quarter and biking trips by nearly half, while averting 85 million miles of driving since its inception.
June 26, 2014
371 City Leaders Ask Boxer For More Local Control Over Bike/Ped Money
Last week, 371 mayors and other city leaders wrote a letter [PDF] to Sen. Barbara Boxer, chair of the Environment and Public Works Committee, in support of local control over transportation dollars for bike and pedestrian projects.
June 25, 2014
Senators Murphy (D) and Corker (R) Propose 12-Cent Gas Tax Increase
There are several proposals on the table to stave off the impending insolvency of the Highway Trust Fund (which pays for transit, biking, and walking projects too) in two months. Just now, two senators teamed up to announce one that might actually have a chance.
June 18, 2014
NYC Bike-Ped Projects Get $21 Million in Federal Funds From State DOT
On Tuesday, Governor Cuomo announced that the state DOT is awarding $21.2 million in federal highway safety funds over three years to nine projects in New York City that all include big safety improvements for biking and walking. Advocates welcomed the news, but still have questions about whether the state is allocating enough money to active transportation projects statewide.
June 12, 2014
A Bipartisan Policy Breakthrough That Could Save Local Economies
Beth Osborne was deputy assistant secretary for policy, and then acting assistant secretary, at the U.S. Department of Transportation from 2009 until March, when she joined Transportation for America.
June 9, 2014
Why the Senate Transportation Bill Will Devastate Transit
Transit officials lined up today to make clear that holding transit spending at current levels -- as the Senate’s transportation authorization bill does -- will put transit systems at risk of falling further into dangerous disrepair.
May 22, 2014