Change From The Bottom Up On Transit

The passage of the Nadler amendment restoring $3 billion in transit funds into the stimulus is a big deal, and not because of the amount. There are still more funds for corporate tax cuts in the bill than transit, which is pathetic. But in this case, the online community (led by Chris Bowers at Open Left and leaders on this issue in the Congress like Peter DeFazio used a public/private strategy to get this passed. In public DeFazio went on Rachel Maddow's show and others to decry the pittance given to transit in the bill. In private Congresscritters and constituents whipped members of the Rules Committee to get the amendment placed on the calendar for the full House. It was a true citizen lobbying effort, and it had nothing to do with "Obama's list" or any other such thing. It was engaged citizens, mature enough to navigate the corridors of power, identifying and working toward a progressive goal. We also see progressive House members willing to buck their leadership on battles they can win, and drive successful policy.

Thing is, spending on infrastructure like rail and transit cannot end with the stimulus package. Indeed, mass transit projects require long-term funding and not random moments like an economic crisis to get a quick infusion of funds. The latest report by the American Society of Civil Engineers is out, showing historic neglect to our nation's infrastructure, and massive funding needed to fix it:

Because decades of underfunding and inattention have endangered our nation's infrastructure, $2.2 trillion in repairs and upgrades is needed over the next five years to meet adequate conditions. That's the conclusion of ASCE's new 2009 Report Card for America's Infrastructure, released today, which assigns an overall grade of D to the nation as well as individual grades in 15 infrastructure categories. Since ASCE's last assessment in 2005, there has been little change in the condition of America's roads, bridges, drinking water systems, and other public works. With the nation's infrastructure receiving renewed attention from the White House, Congress, and the public as a vital part of an economic stimulus package, the Report Card offers informed guidance from professional engineers on where funds would best be spent.

I would modify that to say "decades of conservatives telling you that 'your money' shouldn't be spent on waste," not "decades of underfunding and inattention," but I like to be specific. The report card is here, and the assessment is stark.

If we're going to both provide a long-term boost to the economy and create a more sustainable and clean energy infrastructure, we're going to need more than $3 billion dollar amendments. We need to create a National Infrastructure Bank to ensure attention is paid to this crucial sector over time. And we need to use the transportation fund and rework the formula, so that more than 20 cents on the dollar from the fund goes to transit. There are a host of things we can do, and I think the progressive movement is learning how to do it.

The Rise Of Big Rail

Elena Schor reports that mass transit got lowballed in the Senate markup of the stimulus as well.

The House's stimulus bill, which is slated for a final vote on Wednesday, included only $10 billion for rail and other public transportation projects, compared with $30 billion for roads. (According to House transportation committee chairman Jim Oberstar (D-MN), the decision was made to leave enough room for tax cuts.)

But what about the Senate, where the second- and third-tanked leaders are blue-state mass-transit boosters Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Chuck Schumer (D-NY)? As it turns out, the upper chamber of Congress is doing even worse.

The Senate Appropriations Committee's draft stimulus includes just $9.5 billion for mass transit projects -- "very frustrating," in the words of Adam Terando, who's done great work on this issue.

This is really frustrating. While I don't think progress on mass transit and rail ends with the stimulus, clearly the outer edges of those tax cuts could be scaled back to accommodate for spending which would simultaneously create jobs, improve quality of life and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. As Atrios rightly notes, these spending priorities often come down to who yells more in the halls of Congress, and passenger rail doesn't have an effective set of town criers, otherwise known as lobbyists. That may change:

The newly minted OneRail coalition markets itself as a first time assembly of disparate groups representing commuter rail lines, freight rail lines, public transportation and the environment.

The goal, according to Anne Canby, a spokeswoman for the group, is to “make sure people are aware of the benefits of rail.”

Trains “are not always part of the public dialogue,” Canby, a former Delaware transportation secretary, said.

The group has yet to settle on specific policy goals other than the shared belief that more federal dollars should be spent on things like inner city rail lines that encourage people to get out of their cars or to pay for construction to ease freight choke points around cities.

Several trade and issue advocacy groups are part of OneRail, including the Natural Resources Defense Council, Amtrak, the American Short Line & Regional Railroad Association, the Association of American Railroads, and the Surface Transportation Policy Partnership.

Notice the inclusion of the NRDC. We've seen blue-green alliances in California pushing through the Clean Trucks Program at the Port of Los Angeles. This kind of alliance has the potential to be very powerful, and I'm glad to see both sides stepping out of their issue silos to work together. It may be too late for the stimulus, but there will be other fights down the road.

Robert Cruickshank has more on the stimulus package fight in the House.

Boyz In The LaHood

So the second Republican has been tapped for President-elect Obama's cabinet - former Illinois Congressman Ray LaHood as Transportation Secretary. In past Administrations, the Transportation Secretary hasn't been that powerful a job and has been a dumping ground for the inevitable token member from the opposite party. Heck, even Bush had Democrat Norman Mineta installed there. However, with the focus on infrastructure improvements being central to Obama's economic recovery platform, and with a lot of that going to rail and transit, DOT might be more important this time around. And it's being handed to a Republican. Of course, there's an open question about how involved LaHood would be on those infrastructure issues, rather than the normal work of DOT, a lot of which involves air travel.

The reception has been mixed. Streetsblog is not impressed.

We've been calling around to Congressional staffers, advocates and insiders to get a better sense of what Obama's appointment of Ray LaHood as transportation secretary means for those pushing for sustainable transport, smart growth, livable streets. While no one is giving up hope on the Obama administration a month before the inauguration, the general consensus is pretty clear. As one insider summed it up: "It's a real read-it-and-weep moment."

The selection of a downstate Illinois Republican with close ties to highway lobby stalwart Caterpillar Inc. is being taken by many as a clear sign that progressive transportation policy is, for now, nowhere near the top of the Obama's agenda.

"Obama still hasn't made the transportation - land use - climate connection," Petra Todorovich, director of Regional Plan Association’s America 2050 program said. "It's clear he's thinking about these things in separate categories." For Todorovich and other advocates, the LaHood pick was the second shoe to drop this week. The first piece of bad news arrived on Monday when Obama trotted out his "green dream team," his appointments to key environmental, energy and climate posts, and the transportation secretary was nowhere to be found.

Friends of the Earth is a little more hopeful:

“Congressman LaHood’s challenge is great. He must ensure U.S. transportation policy supports, rather than undercuts, the Obama administration’s goals on energy and climate change. This means he must work closely with Obama’s nominees for the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection Agency, and with Obama’s new energy and climate czar, Carol Browner.

“While his overall record on energy and environment issues is poor, LaHood has in recent years broken with many in his party to support crucial investments in passenger rail and public transportation, and he is a member of the Congressional Bike Caucus. These are reasons to hope that he may be open to the visionary transportation policy that is needed to move our country forward.

“Friends of the Earth looks forward to working with Congressman LaHood to bring about such a policy.”

I think it's clear that Obama doesn't connect green policy and transportation policy, but it's probably because his green thinking outweighs the thinking on transportation. I don't think LaHood will have much of a power center. He is moderate for a Republican, and he has promoted expanded rail and transit funding in recent years, so I don't think he'll be an obstacle to that either. At some point, however, Streetsblog is right: to truly remake our energy future we need to provide options to alter the way we live - with smart growth, proper land use and livable streets. The era of suburban sprawl cannot continue because our efforts on reining in greenhouse gas emissions will collapse. DOT actually could play a valuable role in setting that policy, but Obama doesn't want to go there. His urban background, however, suggests he understands the importance of it, both for the economy, the environment and quality of life. So we'll see.

...just to round out the cabinet, there's former Dallas mayor Ron Kirk as US Trade Representative. I think it was clear with Xavier Becerra's remarks when he turned down the job that Obama didn't really think trade was a first- or second-order priority, and he didn't connect trade to our larger economic problems, so this may be another area where the pick doesn't entirely matter since that policy will be attacked from a different angle.

McCain vs. Obama on Energy and Transportation

The Jeddah conference began and ended with nary a word of hope for anyone suffering through high gas prices, and it's clear that they will continue in the near term. In the medium term, the Republican robots calling for more domestic drilling are trying to play the country for suckers. Everyone knows (and I'm including the Republican Speaker of the Florida House on this list) that snapping your fingers and yelling "Drill!" won't immediately alter the price of oil. Moreover, Big Oil already has millions of acres of leased fields that they refuse to bring online, and industry analysts have finally figured out this shell game. Plus, talk of "environmentally safe" drilling is disingenuous, especially considering that the Interior Department - George Bush's Interior Department - is right now suing a company for damaging the environment on a field in Wyoming.

Now, John McCain did something right today. He advocated for an X-Prize type of solution: $300 million dollars for any company that can build a superior car battery. In general I think these are well-spent endeavors; the company that receives the prize can plow that money into assembly and distribution, and they have an incentive to deliver the goods quickly. He also called for bigger fines on any carmaker who violates current fuel efficiency laws, and a large tax credits for purchasers of zero-emission vehicles.

Of course, this is completely askew with his call for more offshore drilling, and maybe that's because he's taken more money from Big Oil than any other Presidential candidate. But it's also because McCain has become the Sybil of this Presidential election, with a sop to moderates one day and the hard right the next. Of course, on the important issues, he's going to stay with the Bush-Cheney agenda.

But what I really notice about McCain's proposals, even the decent ones, is that they exist on a narrow field where the car-based economy remains prominent. All of his ideas have to do with making cars more efficient, stretching the gallon of gas out of existing structures of transportation using technological advancement and market forces. That's maybe a part of the solution, but if we're going to reduce the cost of transportation and mitigate global warming, we have to find different ways to commute. And those solutions are readily available; in fact, people are already taking advantage of them:

Record prices for gasoline and jet fuel should be good news for Amtrak, as travelers look for alternatives to cut the cost of driving and flying.

And they are good news, up to a point.

Amtrak set records in May, both for the number of passengers it carried and for ticket revenues — all the more remarkable because May is not usually a strong travel month.

But the railroad, and its suppliers, have shrunk so much, largely because of financial constraints, that they would have difficulty growing quickly to meet the demand.

Many of the long-distance trains are already sold out for some days this summer. Want to take Amtrak’s daily Crescent train from New York to New Orleans? It is sold out on July 5, 6, 7 and 8. Seattle to Vancouver, British Columbia, on July 5? The train is sold out, but Amtrak will sell you a bus ticket.

“We’re starting to bump up against our own capacity constraints,” said R. Clifford Black, a spokesman for Amtrak.

I rode the bus to work twice last week. There's a public meeting about light rail coming into my town this week. People are ready for mass transit solutions that improve stress, quality of life, their personal budgets and environmental damage. The problem is the investment in rail and bus and subway lines is just not there. It won't surprise you to know that John McCain is a longtime opponent of Amtrak.

Barack Obama, however, has lived in a city, has served constituents who mostly commute by train and bus, and understands the external benefits to mass transit. His speech at the US Conference of Mayors stressed all kinds of innovative transit solutions.

Let’s invest that money in a world-class transit system. Let’s re-commit federal dollars to strengthen mass transit and reform our tax code to give folks a reason to take the bus instead of driving to work – because investing in mass transit helps make metro areas more livable and can help our regional economies grow. And while we’re at it, we’ll partner with our mayors to invest in green energy technology and ensure that your buses and buildings are energy efficient. And we’ll also invest in our ports, roads, and high-speed rails – because I don’t want to see the fastest train in the world built halfway around the world in Shanghai, I want to see it built right here in the United States of America.

The entire heading of the speech was a "Metropolitan Strategy" for America. I don't think there's been one before, and it's important that the connections between cities and their outlying metropolitan areas are made. By allowing those who live outside the city center a transportation option outside their cars, we can reduce oil dependence, clean the air and water, mitigate global warming and most importantly improve people's outlook.

Now, Obama isn't perfect on this front. As Ezra Klein noted he mentioned filling the Federal Highway Fund before investing in intercity rail, and his position on ethanol is dispiriting, although inevitable given that winning Iowa was the difference between his winning or losing the nomination. But clearly, the fact that he's at least THINKING about high-speed rail and metro development and mass transit puts him light years ahead of McCain. Then there's the answer to this question.

What do you see as the gravest long-term threat to the U.S. economy?

Obama: If we don't get a handle on our energy policy, it is possible that the kinds of trends we've seen over the last year will just continue. Demand is clearly outstripping supply. It's not a problem we can drill our way out of. It can be a drag on our economy for a very long time unless we take steps to innovate and invest in the research and development that's required to find alternative fuels. I think it's very important for the federal government to have a role in that process.

McCain: Well, I would think that the absolute gravest threat is the struggle that we're in against Islamic extremism, which can affect, if they prevail, our very existence. Another successful attack on the United States of America could have devastating consequences.

McCain is a caricature about anything outside of his military comfort zone. Obama understands how energy issues threaten our long-term survival, and is going to be aggressive in coming up with alternatives.

LA Transit Ridership At An All-Time High

People have a funny way of adapting. They know that the oil companies are as far from committed to lowering gas prices as possible, so they'll look to lower the cost of commuting rather than search for useless answers to drop gas prices like offshore drilling, which would do absolutely nothing. The Metrolink rail system in LA isn't perfect and doesn't work for everyone, but people are making it work more than ever before.

Commuter rail ridership broke an all-time record this week, and Caltrans reported a dip in freeway traffic as commuters across California struggled with record gas prices.

Metrolink recorded its highest number of riders in a single day ever Tuesday - 50,232 - a 15.6% increase over the same amount of business last year on June 17. Metro Rail ridership last month shot up 6 percent over May 2007, said Dave Sotero, a Metro spokesman.

Meanwhile, Caltrans officials said today that traffic on California freeways dropped 1.5% compared with last year - or the equivalent of a billion fewer miles traveled, said spokesman Derrick Alatorre.

Just that miniscule drop is the difference between gridlock and a relatively smooth ride. Not to mention the fact that hundreds of thousands of gallons of gas are being saved. Between all that and not having to be constantly confronted by idiots driving while holding their cell phones, the LA commuting story is a little less bleak.

This is all happening under a BROKEN transit system. Imagine what could happen with a little investment.