Streetsblog Capitol Hill

Over the past two days at the Congress for the New Urbanism Project for Transportation Reform conference, attendees have called for reform at local, regional, and national levels. In a panel debate about the future of transportation funding and the role of regional planning through MPOs, several speakers argued that the foundation of transportation and development funding had to be systematically overhauled.

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-MT) may have voted against the Senate environment committee's climate bill yesterday, but The New Republic picked up on some pretty optimistic (for Washington) rhetoric from him on the issue this morning:

(Photo: Baucus '08)

"There’s no doubt that this Congress is going to pass climate change legislation," he said. "I don’t know if it’s going to be this year. Probably next year."

Baucus' Finance Committee became a thorn in the side of progressives during this year's health care debate, holding lengthy talks with Republicans that ultimately proved fruitless and voting down a public option for the uninsured.

But Finance isn't all bad news for clean transportation -- Sen. Tom Carper (D-DE), transit's biggest guardian on the environment panel, is a member of Baucus' committee, as are pro-transit Sens. Robert Menendez (D-NJ) and Charles Schumer (D-NY). Another Finance member, Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL), recently signed on to Carper's plan setting aside 10 percent of future climate revenue for transit.

That said, the witness list for Baucus' Tuesday hearing on climate change and job creation looks oddly devoid of a "green jobs" representative, from the transit industry or elsewhere.

The International Brotherhood of Boilermakers, part of the AFL-CIO, is testifying and did support the House climate bill that passed earlier this year. Another witness comes from Pacific Gas & Electric, a utility that quit the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to show its belief in the need to act on climate change.

The remaining three witnesses hail from the Nuclear Energy Institute, the American Council for Capital Formation -- a clearinghouse of climate critics that has received more than $1.6 million from Exxon since 1998 -- and the American Enterprise Institute, which has taken $2.5 million from Exxon since 1998 and offered cash to scientists who would dispute United Nations findings on climate.

With the U.S. unemployment rate hitting 10.2 percent today, its highest level in 26 years, a palpable shift is occurring on Capitol Hill.

For weeks, we've heard senior Democrats and the transit industry make the case for more transportation spending as a potent job creator, but the lack of funding for a full six-year bill has kept the conversation stalled.

But two things have happened in the week since Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL) floated the idea of a "front-loaded" infrastructure plan that would concentrate investment in the first two years:

• The defeat of two Democratic candidates in Tuesday's off-year elections reinforced that job creation and economic worries are the No. 1 concerns for voters.
• Gross domestic product may be rebounding, but unemployment decidedly is not.

This adds up to renewed interest in fast-tracking a new transportation bill, perhaps with a two-year window. As House transport committee chairman Jim Oberstar (D-MN) told David Rogers of Politico, "The concrete is cracking."

But even if the White House is prepared to abandon its insistence on an 18-month extension of current law, how to pay for new transportation legislation remains a very open question. House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-SC), for his part, told Rogers that he likes the sound of Rep. Pete DeFazio's (D-OR) proposed tax on Wall Street oil speculators:

There are some painless ways to fund the highway bill. Transaction taxes, that’s a painless way ... Where are the shared contributions to all this? If you’re sitting there on Wall Street, if you’re Goldman Sachs, if you’re making all this money, if you got all this federal money [in a] bailout, and you are paying all these big bonuses to your folks, where is your contribution to this recovery? That’s why it’s painless.

Clyburn's reference to the "highway" bill brings up another lingering mystery about the type of transportation spending being envisioned by senior Democrats. If the White House does agree to support a new infrastructure bill after health care is finished, will it include policy changes or just new money?

Continue...

Today on the Streetsblog Network, a story about some kids in Los Angeles who did their research and came up with several good ideas about improving conditions for bicycle commuters. Then they ran up against the reality that the public forums on the city's bike plan weren't so public. But they didn't let that stop them.

Stephen Box at SoapBox LA reports:

These kids from the West Side of LA were determined to let the city know what they think about bike commuting.

The FIRSTteamWestside (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) is a group of kids who prepared a presentation that they intended to give at the Bike Plan (draft) workshops.

Their mission was to develop a plan to improve local transportation. They did the research and they prepared and they discovered that the public workshops were not the robust public arena they desired, so they adapted.

Their coach reports, "The kids were hoping to give a presentation at one of the "public forums" but were badly disappointed when they found out that members of the public would not be allowed to speak so they posted it on YouTube and submitted the link at labikeplan.org."…

The kids gave an amazingly articulate and informed statement, recommending additional bike cars for the region's commuter rail system. The message: the future is coming.

More from the network: The Transport Politic looks at the importance of aligning transitways with walkable neighborhoods. On Transport discusses the concept of "lifestyle centers" and their aspirations to create a sense of community in a suburban mall setting. And Intersection 911 reports on the 38 percent bump in Philadelphia bike commuting during the SEPTA strike.

After three public hearings in one week on the increasingly hot-button issue of distracted driving, Congress appears no closer to answering the question of whether a punitive strategy for encouraging state-level action -- such as threatening to withhold highway funds -- can win sufficient support from conservatives.

In the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Wednesday, Democratic elder statesman Rep. John Dingell (MI) called on his colleagues to "exercise a modicum of restraint" as they considered how to prod states to ban texting and cell phone use behind the wheel. Dingell said (emphasis mine):

Although we share a justified measure of concern about the relationship between use of certain technological devices and driver safety, we have to guard against enthusiastically enacting overly prescriptive statutes and directing creation of regulatory regimes that in the long term may stifle innovation and ultimately show them to be of marginal benefit to the cause of improving driver safety.

Dingell's tepid view of the federal role in limiting distracted driving should not come as a surprise to most, given his stalwart support for the U.S. auto industry. But Ford has already endorsed legislation that takes a punitive approach to banning texting while driving, potentially offering political cover to lawmakers who want to follow suit.

Still, few Democrats offered distinct words of support for pending legislation that would yank 25 percent of highway funding from states which fail to crack down on drivers' gadget use.

Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), Energy and Commerce's chairman, wondered "whether hands-free devices are any safer than hand-held," suggesting that any attempt to entice states into passing hands-free laws might ultimately do little for road safety.

On the GOP side, however, there was no shortage of lawmakers urging Washington to stay out of it and let states go their own way on distracted driving. (Of the 18 states with laws on the books banning texting behind the wheel, four lack basic tools for enforcement.)

"I think that sometimes we grow very weary of the long arm of the federal government telling us what we can and cannot do, and we are at the same time very concerned about what we see as the distraction that is there from utensils, and innovations, and gadgets, and items in our cars that do distract us from watching the road," Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) said.

Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL) disputed the merits of a bill endorsed by three Republican senators that would offer grant money to states which pass anti-distracted driving laws.

Continue...

• Voters told pollsters that "jobs and the economy" were their No. 1 concerns this year, which is keeping discussion of a new infrastructure spending package very much alive in Washington (Bloomberg)

• What's the real lesson of this past Election Day? That ballot measures for transportation investment do well (Morning News)
  

• Blumenauer introduces a bill that would expand Safe Routes to School to high schools (Bike Portland)
  

• For fuel-efficient cars to command the U.S. market, auto executives say they need one thing to happen first: a gas tax hike (Reuters)

• But speaking of the gas tax, hopes for a state-wide increase in New Jersey are looking D.O.A. thanks to the election of GOP gubernatorial candidate Chris Christie (Bloomberg)
  

• You know about the distracted driving debate, but Congress may act more quickly to curb distracted flying (Dorgan Press)
  

• Florida Gov. Charlie Crist (R), facing a conservative challenge in his 2010 U.S. Senate bid, calls for a special state legislative session to consider commuter rail funding -- and with it, a greater shot at federal high-speed rail money (AP)
  

Our latest call for photos was inspired by the picture at right, taking by Streetsblog New York's own Ben Fried. It's an all too familiar scene -- transit riders crammed together, waiting for a bus (or train) that doesn't come when it's supposed to (if you missed the story that went with the picture, it's here).

Crowding is just one indignity transit users have to face. Others include inadequate bus shelters, nonexistent or vandalized seating, blocked entrances -- you know the stuff.

Send us your pictures of crummy transit service and infrastructure where you live and we'll put together a new slide show. You can e-mail JPEGs to me at sarah [at] streetsblog [dot] org, or tag them with "streetsblog" and "transitfail" in Flickr. Get your submissions in by next Thursday.

Our past slide shows have been on bike traffic, space hogs and work bikes. Check them out if you haven't already.

As fans of clean transportation and sustainable development join the push for a strong climate change bill to emerge from Congress, it's worth remembering that not all environmental groups support the approach congressional Democrats have chosen.

Friends of the Earth (FoE) joined Greenpeace in opposing the House climate bill as too weak and deferential to polluting industries, and FoE president Erich Pica has just issued a statement on today's passage of the Senate version that makes clear his view hasn't changed:

While the bill reported out of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee today is in some ways better than the bill that passed the House in June ... it remains a woefully disproportionate response to the tremendous economic, security and public health threats posed by global warming.

The bill’s backbone is a poorly regulated carbon trading scheme that entrusts the Wall Street bankers who brought us the current economic crisis with the responsibility to solve global warming. The bill showers polluting corporations with billions of dollars, but doesn’t require them to reduce pollution fast enough to avoid devastating climate change impacts. And it contains massive carbon offset loopholes that would allow U.S. polluters to keep polluting by paying for often-non-existent pollution reductions overseas. Other loopholes, such as excluding pollution from bioenergy, also undermine the bill’s intent.

Plenty of folks in the green advocacy world are more open to working within the Senate's framework -- the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Environmental Defense Fund, and Al Gore's Alliance for Climate Protection, to name a few. But the lack of a unified front from environmental advocates, which reared its head during the House climate debate over the summer, risks amplifying the lack of a unified front among the very same Democrats who must help bring the bill over the finish line.

The Senate is a singularly cautious place that often seems tousled by the slightest shift in the political winds; witness Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), who hails from coal country and mused yesterday that he doesn't "think people in my state are going to stand up and start cheering about Copenhagen," where global pollution reduction talks will open next month.

Simply put, the more schisms begin to show in the Senate climate debate, the more lawmakers such as Rockefeller may push to de-emphasize the issue.

In a lean season for in-depth transportation debate, the Virginia gubernatorial contest -- won this week by Republican Bob McDonnell -- became a proving ground for nationally relevant questions about how to manage the infrastructure of congestion-plagued but still-growing metro areas.

Which makes Robert McCartney's Washington Post Metro column today worth a read, even for those outside of the D.C. area. McCartney begins with the premise that Northern Virginia, which chose McDonnell after trending Democratic for more than a decade, has earned some "payback" from the governor-elect.

What's the first item on McCartney's list? Sadly, it's "Find money for roads." He seems to be using the "road" frame even to refer to transit projects:

McDonnell should lock in dedicated funding for the Metrorail system and ensure that the Silver Line is built to Dulles Airport and beyond. He should add the proposed high-occupancy toll (HOT) lanes on interstates 395 and 95. He should do something for I-66, too, although admittedly our region is sharply divided on whether to widen it inside the Beltway.

In fact, the region is just as sharply divided over whether to add HOT lanes to those two highway, a project that was put on hold in August and faces legal threats from local residents.

As David Alpert has observed, there's a big difference between constructing new HOT lanes (which ultimately encourages more congestion and has yet to pay for itself) and converting existing lanes to variable tolling (which has shown it can make money). McCartney's column makes no attempt to acknowledge that distinction.

On the subject of Metrorail, the nation's only transit system without a dedicated revenue stream, McDonnell's transport plan is mum about the importance of making sure the federal government follows through on its recent authorization of $150 million in annual matching funds.

Meanwhile, the White House budget for next year did not include money for Metrorail -- Congress later added the money, but the bill has yet to be signed into law. McCartney's urging that the governor-elect "lock in" dedicated transit money is a sound one, but it makes one wonder why the Post waited until after Election Day to press the issue.

Loads of good stuff today on the Streetsblog Network.

Portland Transport has a post on the connection between cul-de-sac development and safety for all street users, as discussed at the Congress for the New Urbanism Transportation Summit in Portland.

What are the dangers of cul-de-sac development? (Photo: TheMuuj via Flickr.)

For me the highlight presentation on opening day…was about the safety effects of different street network types.

The study was based on looking at all cities in California with population of 40,000 or greater. The surprising finding was that cities built before 1950 are safer (in terms of both serious injuries and fatalities for all classes of users: auto drivers/passengers, cyclists and pedestrians) than cities built after 1950.

The differences appears to be in the type of street network. Compact street grids seem to be safer, compared to the arterial-collector-local street 'tree' style of street network popular in post-war development.

No link to the study itself yet, but we're interested in hearing more.

More from around the network: Urban City Architecture launches a series of posts on the pressing issue of pedestrian safety in Miami. Bello Velo reports on a new driver education campaign designed to improve cyclist safety in Huntsville, Alabama. And Copenhagenize is looking for your opinion on the safety of daylight headlight requirements.

The Senate environment committee approved its climate change bill today on an 11-1 vote, shrugging off a boycott by all of the panel's Republicans but missing out on the chance to consider amendments to the lengthy legislation.

The environment panel's chairman Barbara Boxer (D-CA) had offered Republicans several days to abandon their walkout, promising time to consider GOP amendments and a complete Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) modeling of the bill before it comes to the Senate floor.

But environment committee Republicans were unmoved, insisting on an immediate five-week delay for EPA analysis despite testimony from the EPA that such work would produce little new information. Boxer's GOP counterpart on the panel, Sen. Jim Inhofe (OK), seemed to delight in forcing the chairman's hand as he labeled the no-amendments move the "nuclear option."

The question now becomes whether the specific proposals added by Boxer's panel -- including grant programs for transit and clean transportation that nearly triple the funding approved by the House -- can survive a long slog through as many as five other committees.

Boxer insisted this morning that "many things in this bill ... are going to be part of that comprehensive bill" that ultimately reaches a full Senate vote. But others on the committee acknowledged that the bill's one-party approval would not bode well for its political prospects.

Sen. Tom Carper (D-DE), the chief sponsor of efforts to boost the climate bill's clean transportation provisions, described himself as "very, very, very disappointed," particularly given the loss of a chance to amend the legislation.

Carper submitted an amendment that would have added more than $400 million to the bill's annual set-aside of climate money for transit, inter-city rail, local land use planning and other projects.  "I don't like this process," Carper said this morning. "I don't think any of us do."

Continue...

• As Washington goes all-in for electric cars, one automaker places its bets on cleaner diesel fuel (Time)
  

• A local editorial board calls on Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) to push Congress' high-speed rail investment to $4 billion (Merc News)
  

• U.S. DOT and the Federal Communications Commission team up to seek technological solutions to distracted driving ... congressional action, meanwhile, remains up in the air for now (Net World)
  

• Newsweek is "very pleased" to be co-hosting an energy briefing with the chief of Big Oil's lobbying arm?! (TPMmuckraker)
  

• Illinois governor skips meeting with transit officials on possible service cuts and fare hikes, heads to D.C. instead (Trib Blog)
  

Virginia Railway Express (VRE), the commuter network that links northwest Virginia to Washington D.C., today refused a challenge by Amtrak to its decision to switch operating providers to the U.S. arm of Keolis, a private French transit company.

Although Amtrak based its challenge on Keolis' inexperience operating American rail lines, the latter company maintains a sizable transit presence as a subsidiary of SNCF, the French national high-speed railway.

Moreover, Keolis submitted a notably lower bid to take over VRE operations, undercutting Amtrak by $500,000 on first-year transition costs and $300,000 in annual operating costs. The French-owned company's winning bid totaled $85 million for five years, offering VRE workers the option of shifting to another Amtrak line or staying on under the new management.

Looking beyond the local implications of VRE's switch to Keolis, the new contract is part of a larger trend toward transit privatization that has seen recent deals struck in New Orleans, Savannah, and Phoenix. The Obama administration is encouraging greater use of public-private partnerships to help fund and operate transport networks, making these agreements something of a portent.

But substantial hurdles remain to the effective participation of private companies in the business of transit. Independent auditors at the Government Accountability Office submitted a report [PDF] to Congress last week after taking a yearlong look at how the federal transit funding process affects the ability of local officials to join forces with the private sector.

And what the GAO found was a whole lot of hurdles, many of them unique to the cumbersome rules of Washington's New Starts transit program. From the report (emphasis mine):

Continue...

The $8,000 tax credit for new home buyers -- which was wracked by fraudulent claims after its creation as part of the nation's economic recovery effort -- is on the verge of a significant expansion by Congress.

Just how much will the tax credit mushroom thanks to the deal reached in the Senate? As the New York Times explains, it's time to take the "new" off of the credit's name:

The homebuyers’ credit ... would be extended to cover homes under contract by April 30. Also, it no longer would be limited to first-time buyers; people who have owned a home for at least five years could get a $6,500 credit on a new residence. Income limits for eligibility would be raised, making many more people qualify.

Extending and expanding the credit would cost an estimated $11 billion, on top of the $10 billion spent so far.

As Ryan pointed out earlier this week, the higher rate of home ownership in suburbs tilts the credit's benefits notably away from urban areas. But that's nothing new for the federal government, which has lavished subsidies on home buyers while paying much scanter attention to improving rental affordability.

In the fiscal year that ended October 1, Washington's support for home ownership totaled $230 billion, while parallel support for home renters was $60 billion, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) reported yesterday. That nearly four-fold gap is visible in the below chart:

Continue...

Today on the Streetsblog Network, Bike Portland looks at a new review of the scientific literature on the relation between bicycle infrastructure and injuries to cyclists, conducted by researchers at the University of British Columbia. While the study points up the need for more data, it finds that dedicated bicycle infrastructure is associated with a lower risk of injury for people on bikes.

Elly Blue writes:

Multi-use paths like the
Hawthorne Bridge have the
highest injury potential. (Photo copyright Jonathan Maus.)

There’s a constant chorus -- sometimes soft, sometimes overpoweringly loud -- in every conversation about bike infrastructure in America. Its refrain: You’re safer without any bike lanes, separated lanes, cycle tracks, bike boulevards, off-road paths. Just take the lane, follow the rules, wear your helmet, and you’ll be fine.

A group of scholars at the University of British Columbia have found otherwise. They conducted a literature review, looking at all available studies linking bicycle safety with infrastructure. Their conclusions will be counterintuitive for some.

“Results to date suggest that sidewalks and multi-use trails pose the highest risk, major roads are more hazardous than minor roads, and the presence of bicycle facilities (e.g. on-road bike routes, on-road marked bike lanes, and off-road bike paths) was associated with the lowest risk.”

“One of the major advantages of infrastructure-based improvements, compared to personal protective devices such as helmets, is that safe infrastructure provides population-wide protection for all cyclists,” study co-author Meghan Winters said in a press release.

The study's abstract draws these conclusions:

Evidence is beginning to accumulate that purpose-built bicycle-specific facilities reduce crashes and injuries among cyclists, providing the basis for initial transportation engineering guidelines for cyclist safety. Street lighting, paved surfaces, and low-angled grades are additional factors that appear to improve cyclist safety. Future research examining a greater variety of infrastructure would allow development of more detailed guidelines.

I'm sure that many of our network members will want to dig deeper into this one. 

More from around the network: a rant against bike chic from Biker Chicks of West Chester. Extraordinary Observations makes the connection between free burritos and traffic congestion. And the Bicycle Coalition of Greater Philadelphia reports on biking the transit strike in that city.