2009 Transportation Bill

Speaking to members of the National Retail Federation earlier today, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood sidestepped what's becoming one of the peskiest unanswered questions on the Hill: Will Congress delay the federal transportation bill until next year?

The details of Rep. Jim Oberstar's plans for the next federal transportation bill are starting to come into focus. Last Friday, The Infrastructurist ran an item about a document on the subject that has made its way into the public eye:

Another must-read from last week's Reuters Infrastructure Summit: Barbara Boxer, the California Democrat who will be responsible for shepherding the next transportation bill through the Senate, says she's open to a mileage tax and to indexing the gas tax to inflation to generate new revenue.

Today Transportation for America is releasing a 100-page document called "The Route to Reform," in which they outline policy recommendations related to the upcoming reauthorization of federal transportation funding legislation (download the executive summary here or the full report here). 

Reuters just wrapped up a two-day "Infrastructure Summit" and published a great collection of stories about the state of transportation policy in the U.S. I especially like this piece, featuring Robin Holzer of the Houston-based Citizens' Transportation Coalition, who does a great job illustrating some of the major deficiencies that the federal stimulus bill failed to address:

Editor’s note: This year’s reauthorization of the federal transportation funding bill will be one of the most important opportunities in history for the nation’s advocates of livable streets, sustainable transportation and smart growth. But it’s going to be a complicated process. We’d like to demystify it for you, and to that end we’ll be featuring regular posts from Yonah Freemark, an independent researcher currently working in France on comparative urban development as part of a Gordon Grand Fellowship from Yale University. He is also the author of Streetsblog Network member blog The Transport Politic.

While President Barack Obama promoted wind power and cap-and-trade legislation, VP Joe Biden spent Earth Day talking up transit. Public radio's "The Takeaway" reports that Biden held a presser at a bus maintenance facility in Landover, Maryland, to tout a $300 million investment in hybrid buses and other municipal vehicles as part of the federal stimulus package. Said Biden:

The news coming out of Washington last week jacked up expectations for national transportation policy to new heights. Cabinet members Ray LaHood and Shaun Donovan announced a partnership to connect transportation and housing policy, branded as the "Sustainable Communities Initiative." The second-in-command at DOT, Vice Admiral Thomas Barrett, told a New York audience that "building communities" is a top priority at his agency.

AARP announced today that it will join the Transportation for America campaign to advocate for a "broad restructuring" of national transportation policy. In a letter sent to Congressional leaders last week [PDF], AARP said that it is "working to enable older adults to live independently in their homes and communities throughout their lifespan, and transportation is critical to maintaining the community connections that make that possible."