Talking Headways Podcast: Giving Away TIGER and Transit Money to Wall Street

This week Beth Osborne of T4America and Kevin DeGood of The Center for American Progress join us to discuss infrastructure and the new administration. We talk about the budget process — “skinny” or “thick”? — the possible benefits and drawbacks of public-private partnerships, and the difference between funding and financing.

Notes on Elaine Chao

Today it was announced that former Labor Secretary Elaine Chao has been nominated to be the next Transportation Secretary.  Many are saying that it's the most normal pick Trump could make though that's not saying much.  But it's also not the promised swamp draining given that her husband happens to be Senator Mitch McConnell.  (An old NYT piece gives us some more general life background)

Her family owns an international shipping business that in the past has had some shady business practices such as flying under the flag of Liberia due to it's easier labor rules.  Ms Chao was also the deputy secretary of transportation under GHW Bush though not much has come up from that time period.  

And Matthew Yglesias at Vox says that while it's a reasonable choice given her experience, it is hyper partisan because of who her huband happens to be.

Henry Grabar at Slate has a few positive notes...

As far as transportation goes, Chao has had a fairly open mind. She acknowledged decades ago that the major era of highway construction was over and should give way to one focused on solving traffic congestion. In George H.W. Bush’s Department of Transportation, she helped fund an early iteration of GPS in Los Angeles. And as secretary of labor under George W. Bush, she praised the potential of public transit. “Coordinated transportation is one of the most important, and perhaps least appreciated, components of a transition from a life of unemployment and dependency for Americans to one of employment and productivity,” she said at a luncheon in 2004.

She's also been a fellow at a number of  conservative think tanks.  Places like The Heritage Foundation and the Hudson Institute.  She also has ties to big banks, was on the board at News Corp (Wall Street Journal) and organizations like the United Way where she was CEO and the director of the Peace Corps. 

The Peace Corps stint was the most interesting to me because of the specific focus of her time in the Baltic States.  Given the Brexit vote and now Trump's election and nationalist sentiments in greater Europe, it seems we are getting closer to a weakening of Europe and its ability to defend against Russia, which coincidentally has its eye on the Baltic states. 

She established the first Peace Corps program in the Baltic nations of Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, and the newly independent states of the former Soviet Union.

According to CityLab, she's always wanted to be the Secretary of Transportation. 

According to a 2001 Newsday article, Chao had mixed feelings about taking the cabinet post for the Department of Labor—which Chao later called “the most partisan of all the departments”—when President Bush initially asked her; she apparently had her “heart … set on leading the Department of Transportation.” Now she’ll get her shot.

When she was at the Heritage Foundation she focused on writing about things like pensions.  She's not a fan of largess in post retirement benefits and notes that unfunded obligations could be trouble for government agencies in the future.  I imagine transit unions aren't fans of this stance.

She is also against Buy America provisions which affect procurement of vehicles for High Speed Rail in California or regular buses and trains. 

The "Buy America" provision ("Dig a moat around America") in the stimulus package did more than squander America's credibility on international trade. It also created bureaucratic hoops that will slow down spending the stimulus funds on projects that are supposed to energize our economy.

In a letter from the Congressional Record in 2003 to Representative Paul Sarbanes, Washington Metro's Lawrence Drake complained that then Secretary Chao was blocking commuter benefits for federal employees at the Labor Department.  It seems the Labor Department under Chao wanted to use the increase from a $65 transit benefit to a $100 transit benefit as a bargaining chip in negotiations with workers.  DC's Eleanor Holmes Norton said at one point during a protest "Who ever heard of the notion that the union has to negotiate for things they are entitled to under the law?"

This was all I could find for the moment, but I'm sure we'll hear more in the coming days as more people have time to do deeper research.  Unfortunately the internet wasn't much of a thing during her first stint in the Transportation department.

The Role of Mayors In Transportation Planning

Last week, Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx announced the “Mayors Challenge for Safer People and Safer Streets.” Foxx, who was the mayor of Charlotte from 2009 to 2013, urges mayors to make pedestrian and bike safety a priority for the next year. While road deaths in other categories have dropped over the last few years, the rate of biking and pedestrian deaths in the US has trended upwards since 2009.

A big part of pedestrian and bike safety is street design, and a major part of the Mayors Challenge is committing to take a Complete Streets approach to making transportation decisions. The Mayors Challenge isn’t a funding solution, but it is an opportunity for mayors to take on the challenge of assessing the current state of their street design guidelines and actively pursue the best practices to transform their transportation networks

A study of over 70 US mayors finds that regardless of city size, mayors often had the same priorities: growing their cities while managing transportation and operations within their limited budget constraints. The three most common policy priorities cited by US mayors for the next year are eco­nomic development, quality of life and infrastruc­ture.

However, mayors can’t transform their cities completely on their own. The mayors of San Francisco and Seattle, in particular, have come out and said that they do need the help of the federal government on transportation issues, particularly infrastructure. As American cities continue to grow, a national urban agenda and support from the federal government is necessary to ensure that our cities succeed.

But it looks like we'll need the mayors of our cities to get it started.

Transportation Bill Downfall Parody

It was only time before this happened. Anyone else tired of waiting for a transpo bill?

If you haven't seen a downfall parody before, you can find some really good ones here. This one, Hitler finds out about the downfall parodies, is quite hilarious as well.

Caution, harsh language.

LaHood on the Silly Juice?

Those poor drivers and suburban apologists (or sprawlagists), they've been neglected for so long...

"We cannot let the cynicism of old ideas get in the way of what people really want," LaHood said about his vision of Americans on foot, on bikes and in trains and buses. How about letting the facts on the ground get in the way of a well-intentioned pipe dream?

They just can't quite understand why people might want alternatives to thier suffocating cancer/asthma causing habits. But transit and biking is only 2.5% of trips they say. There's no wonder people can't take transit or walk, because it isn't offered in a competitive fashion to the automobile trip. When it is, people take it. According to the CTOD database, over 40% of people living near Metro Stations in DC walk, bike, or take transit.

These people all need to wake up and stop throwing around these stupid statistics they don't understand. The newspaper industry and it's "Entitled Driving Journalist Syndrome" is dying a slow death because they don't understand there is a whole other world out there people are craving. I for one am glad that Ray is finally speaking for the other half after being ignored for half a century.

Just Hop On Already

Is it really so hard to just hop on?

Rather than taking BART from the Fruitvale station to the Oakland Coliseum station, which is the next southbound stop on the Fremont Line, LaHood was driven by staff in a black Cadillac Escalade sport utility vehicle.

Not cool dude. Perhaps he had enough money before fare hikes went into effect.

Night Owl Links

Here's a little something to keep you going:

Edmonton planners hope a TOD plan in the suburbs will reduce the need for driving every trip.
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When is Mayor McCrory or Charlotte gonna realize that their transit goals aren't compatible with this loop obsession?
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Crosscut now talks about how to do density right. Hugeasscity links to all the times they were against it.
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The Green revolution in Iran will continue with available subway operations.
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HNTB is part of the dinosaur establishment in transit engineering that thinks the cost effectiveness measure is going to be the end all be all for capital transit funding. Wake up, it's gonna change. Ray LaHood has been telling you over and over and over again.

It's a Shame About Ray

He went all nutty promoting this livable communities stuff!!! Oh the horror. Mr. LaHood has been running around talking to everyone lately. This week it's the New York Times and US News and World Report. He's still talking the talk but needs to push Mr. Oberstar a bit more I think.



It's not about car eradication. However I don't think everyone wants a car.

But if Americans increasingly get around by rail, bus and bicycle, as you’ve planned, who will be buying cars in the future? I think everybody will have an automobile. I think it’s amazing in America when you drive around and look at new homes that are being built, there are three-car garages. I don’t think you’re going to see families with three cars. I think you’re going to see families with one car, possibly two.

We've built out our Interstate System, time to fix other things we've neglected:

So much of why we haven't done these things yet seems to stem from a culture of driving in America. Is that really changeable? We've spent three decades building an interstate system. We've put almost all of our resources into the interstate system. This is a transformational president, and the department is following the president's lead. People haven't really been thinking about these things. They have been thinking about how to build roads, how to build interstates, how to build bridges. People now are thinking differently about where they want to live, how they want to live, and how they want to be able to get around their communities.

BTW, how are people liking the random music associations?

Transportation Bills & Gas Taxes

Looks like the T4 folks have been making some serious headway. They've got the highway lobby all riled up which is a good thing.

“If the bill starts looking more negative on highways, then users that have been supportive of fuel tax increases would turn their back on it,” said Greg Cohen, chief executive of the American Highway Users Alliance. “There is potential that the whole bill could be slowed down here.”

The major sticking point is funding. If more trust fund money is directed to transit projects, then trucking and highway groups will complain about the fairness of using their fees to pay for rail projects. They especially reject a unified transportation trust fund that would pay for all surface transportation out of the same pot of money.

Fairness? You want to talk about fairness? How fair is it to have your mode of transportation subsidized to an uneven degree over the last 60 years. I think Ryan nails it in his Streetsblog post.

In the first place, gas tax revenue comes nowhere near paying for roads. Federal gasoline tax revenues cover barely half of the annual budget of the Federal Highway Administration. Add in diesel tax revenues and you’re still short. And that’s just the federal budget picture.

I think this is an important point. All modes are subsidized, but to the extent that we can put transit on a more even footing we must. The trucking industry has gotten off too easily since the interstate highway system was completed. It was a major reason why rail shipping was killed to almost dead, since the railroads had to pay taxes on their ROW and trucks did not.

But I'm glad Secretary LaHood gets it. As least in words. And the fact that he has a somewhat more receptive president means that this is a totally different ball game. Though in some ways it's similar to that of the Bush and Clinton years that Norm Minetta was in town for:

We returned to the Oval Office, went through the presentation, and afterward President Bush said, "Norm, that's a tax increase. Get that out." So I then took all the unobligated surplus, left $1 billion in the highway trust fund, and used the balance to build a $267 billion surface transportation program that Congress finally passed in 2005. Not long after, the administration asked for an $8 billion infusion of general funds into the highway trust fund so it wouldn't be running a deficit by 2007.

Oh Hai Secretary LaHood!

Thanks to Adam P for pointing out this brilliant picture of Ray LaHood on a TGV train.

Via AFP

Quote of the Day

Ray LaHood says what we've all been thinking and saying for years:

In a question-and-answer session following his remarks, Lahood expressed exasperation with the suggestion from some of his fellow Republicans that redirecting federal transportation money from highways to other modes of transportation amounted to government meddling in individual decisions.

"About everything we do around here is government intrusion into people's lives," he said.

Hitting back at the road socialism that the sprawlagists have been defending for years.

Missing the Point

Blah blah Earmark blah.... Sound familiar? That's the sound of no context. Anyone else want an earmark story that discusses how our transportation funding is so broken that the only way for some places to get federal funding for transportation needs that George Will deems not important is through the earmark process? With a backlog of 50 years or more on the New Starts process, how many legislators are going to try to go through the back door to get something done? We all know what happens when there is an extreme shortage or overpriced good, a black market develops. In transportation funding world, the earmark system is just a black market for goods that are missing from the market. Is there a way to solve this issue? Perhaps if we figured this out, would earmarks disappear? Unlikely, but I believe there would be less need for certain types.

Elections Do Matter

Even in the transit world...

But supporters of the Portland expansion as well as transit advocates nationally said that making the announcement so early in the new administration and allowing the Portland project to leap over other projects sends an unmistakable message of federal support for transit.
...

Wyden and DeFazio, both Democrats, were more direct.

"The real answer is, elections matter," Wyden said. "The priorities are different now, and they are very much more in tune with the needs of the people of Portland."

DeFazio agreed. "The Bush administration had set up a black box test that no streetcar proposal would have ever been able to pass," he said. "They were not following the law, and this administration is."

It's interesting to see how the cost-effectiveness measure will be used by the Obama FTA. Considering the problem is that there isn't enough money for all projects, there will have to be a way to figure out which projects deserve funding and which don't. Will it be now the lack of livability planning with transit?

Mid Week Linkfest

This sure would have been a lot easier if we had some money for a Dunbarton rail bridge no?
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Growing up instead of sprawling out in Melbourne.

The report says just 10 per cent of the existing urban area could be used to accommodate projected growth in Melbourne's population from about 4 million to 5 million by 2030. About 34,000 sites on major corridors could be suitable for multi-level development, it says. These include more than 12,400 sites along tram lines and 22,000 along priority bus routes such as Johnston Street. The sites could accommodate about 500,000 new dwellings in total.

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There's also two big elevated freeways on that side of town.

If you had doubts that air pollution from nearby industries exacerbated asthma in children, this map may quell them.

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I've been harsh on LaHood. Maybe I should give him some slack since he's a runner! Just like me a long time ago.
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I think they need both Smart and Streetcars. Though I still think that ignoring downtown Novato is a dumb move.
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I guess Blago wasn't the only one who likes to block transit in Chicago.

Still Not Getting It

States are still pushing for an 80-20 funding split for highways and transit. If we keep going down this route, nothing will change. LaHood talks a big game, but I'm still waiting to see proof. I think people have been a little too easy on him of late. Yeah he says nice things but what have we seen happen so far? States are still calling for 80-20, which to me is a failure to communicate how important livable communities and alternative transportation really are. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize that highways do not = livable communities. Look what we got from that over the last 60 years. What does ASHTO think they are going to spend that 80% on? If its all highway money, that is a lot of expansion.

MTC Meeting Tonight

It might still be possible to get more money to bikes and transit projects from MTC. Check out Transbay Blog's post about tomorrow's meeting. If you go, tell them to shove the road money.

My annoyance goes far. They have done no modeling to see what would happen with Oakland or San Francisco core BART expansions in terms of land use and green house gas changes. There's no real true modeling as the Streetsblog post mentions to real bike infrastructure and improvements to Muni and other agency bus movement would go a long way as well. Curbing cars with congestion pricing downtown would be good, but only if they improve transit capacity and speeds into downtown and the areas within the cordon. As I always say, it shouldn't take me an hour to go three miles on the bus. That should be the goal, better transit service, not better car service during peak hours.

Thinking Inside the Box Left at DOT

Yonah as usual has a great post up on the confirmation hearing of future Secretary Lahood. There were a few parts that bothered me, including the repackaging of old ideas as innovative. When Senator Klobuchar of Minnesota asked what kind of innovative ways to replenish the highway trust fund, he said:

Public/private programs… Tolling of new lanes, tolling of highways, is a different way of thinking about it… We need to think of those kind of opportunities… Differently than just the gasoline tax… We know that people are still using Amtrak even though gas prices went down, we know people in places like Chicago are still using mass transit.

While I like all the nods to transit that were mentioned, and there were a lot of those, the idea of taxing cars alone as the only way to get things done, even if it is tolling is a bit one sided. What about how the Red Line in Portland was financed by trading property in exchange for Bechtel building the line. Or the Seattle Streetcar where property owners taxed themselves for half of the capital cost.

We need to somehow tie transportation investments to land use and that could mean funding based on true costs and things like tolling for suburban roads, but also other ideas that are floating around out there that could change the way we think about these investments and their value (H+T). Let's start to think harder. It's like we don't know how to be super innovative anymore. Or maybe I'm just hoping for too much.

We're Waiting...

Christof paints a picture of how things can go wrong in getting projects off the ground fast. It's mostly because of the federal funding structure. Too much uncertainty. Though I was heartened by comments made my Ray LaHood that I missed earlier that could remedy this type of situation in Houston.

At the end of his brief remarks, LaHood made a comment sure to endear him to every mayor and county leader who's complained about unfunded mandates and dictates from D.C.

"It's the local folks who know best their transportation needs," he said.

By local folks I hope he means local planning officials and residents, not people like Tom Delay.

A Nice Word

Ray LaHood from today's press conference:

We have a task before us to rebuild America. As a nation, we need to continue to be the world leader in infrastructure development, Amtrak, mass transit, light rail, air travel, and our roads and bridges all play a vital role in our economy and our well-being as a nation.

What no HSR, Walking, Biking and (insert forgotten mode here)?

More LaHood Background Information

I've never seen the word "Really?" on as many blogs or news articles as I did today on this pick. So I did a bit of digging and read a few emails, here's some more background on the nominated Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood.

Yonah covers in detail (as usual) a few of his past transportation details. He covers some Amtrak in LaHood's home town, making a rail ROW into a trail instead of preserving it for future service, and funding for a local road project.

Modemocrat at DailyKos has a bit of background on LaHood from a bit of a political angle for the pick. He discusses why this might be a savvy political move and how his ability to work with republicans could possibly be a boon for big infrastructure projects due to his knowledge of the appropriations process.

In the same vein at the Prospect, Dana Goldstien makes the argument that this appointment could possibly neutralize transit as an urban snob issue.

In my opinion, his appropriations knowledge and closeness to congress might be a strike against him as he is too familiar with the process and could be slow to change it (we know it needs to get deep sixed), or understand the changes that need to be made in say the New Starts program. There are a lot of little details that need changing. Will he know as Robert notes, "...the FRA's weight rules? Does he support 80/20 funding for mass transit?" Things of that nature.

Austin Bike Blog notes that LaHood is a member of the congressional bike caucus. It's quite the long list but he was supportive of Congressman Blumenaur's commuter benefits package. Looking through some back news, he was one of two Republicans that voted in committee to keep funding for bike improvements in the 2003 transportation appropriations bill. It was initially ripped out by Rep. Istook of OK. LaHood even testified on the house floor for the bike and ped enhancements.

He's not without his bad connections as well. He tried along with Rep Culbertson of Houston (who was the target of one of my first posts ever) to keep Rep Chris Bell from filing ethics complaints against Tom Delay. He also praised a member of his constituency on the floor in 1997 who was appointed VP to the Petroleum Marketers Association of America. Though he was in the Pig Book for earmarking green building tech, his environmental record is pretty shoddy.

He also supported (H/T AK) an Interstate connection to Chicago but later pulled back on that, working to fund local freeways instead.

The largest employer in his district is Caterpillar, a heavy machinery company that makes earthmovers and backhoes. He's also earmarked funds for CAT. Yes CAT machinery is used to build roads. Perhaps they should start into the rail machinery now.

A few of the related bills good or bad that he has co-sponsored recently (with a lot of other people):

Commuter Act of 2008 - To amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to allow employers a refundable credit against income tax for 50 percent of the employer's cost of providing tax-free transit passes to employees.

Recognizing Importance of Bicycling as Transportation and Recreation Res

Bicycle Fringe Benefit - To amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to extend the transportation fringe benefit to bicycle commuters.

As for regular transit, after his Amtrak talk and possible anti-HSR stance, there is nothing about buses or light rail anywhere, at least that I could find. I'll keep looking for more information tomorrow.