Streetsblog Capitol Hill
Las Vegas Monorail Has Few Lifelines After Losing Earmark Cash to Buses
The beleaguered Las Vegas monorail, which filed for bankruptcy in January after repeatedly failing to meet ridership targets, lost a possible lifeline yesterday when the local metropolitan planning organization, known as RTC, said it would not aid the monorail for fear of diverting resources from its own bus expansion.
March 12, 2010
Is 2010 the Year for Federal Bike Aid? The Answer: A Big ‘Maybe’
This week's National Bike Summit culminated in an ambitious new campaign to recruit a million bike advocates and the unveiling of a new Google Maps bike feature. But in a Wednesday session dedicated to the outlook for federal bike investments, cycling advocates hesitated to declare that they could secure new commitments from Washington.
March 12, 2010
Report: Real Estate Interests Spent $5.5M on Transport Lobbying in 2009
In the debate over how -- and whether -- to set measurable performance standards for determining where federal transportation money gets spent, real estate developers are a quiet but powerful player. In a report released today, the Center for Public Integrity (CPI) tracked the broad reach of land-use interests and found more than 100 groups spending $5.5 million on transport lobbying last year.
March 11, 2010
U.S. DOT Cagey on Funding New Transport Bill as Senators Seek Solutions
Senators began searching today for new strategies to connect local planners with an ever-dwindling pot of federal infrastructure dollars, even as a senior U.S. DOT aide declined to say whether the White House's upcoming principles for the next long-term transportation bill would include funding specifics.
March 11, 2010
New House Jobs Bill Dominated by Direct Aid to Cities
Soon after the Senate signed off yesterday on a $150 billion package of tax extenders and unemployment benefits that was promoted as a job-creation measure -- a bill that lacked dedicated new funding for transportation -- Democrats on the House education and labor committee were releasing their own jobs legislation.
March 11, 2010
Goldman Sachs: Yes, Build America Bonds Are Good for Transport — And Us
Goldman Sachs today confirmed that the taxpayer-subsidized debt offering known as Build America Bonds (BABs), which have helped several urban transit agencies and state DOTs pay for new projects since last year, tend to result in higher underwriting fees for Wall Street banks than most tax-exempt municipal bonds.
March 10, 2010
Could Transport Bill Inaction Hurt the White House’s Sustainability Push?
The White House's lack of interest in passing a new long-term federal transportation bill before next spring at the earliest is common knowledge in Washington, but the Obama administration has paid little political price so far for its approach to the issue. That began to change today, thanks to two lawmakers on the House panel that controls the U.S. DOT's purse strings.
March 10, 2010
House Moves to Repay U.S. DOT Workers Furloughed by Bunning Filibuster
The House voted today to compensate nearly 2,000 U.S. DOT workers who were forcibly furloughed last week when Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY) mounted a five-day blockade of legislation extending federal transportation spending for the month of March.
March 10, 2010
U.S. Transit Trips Hit 10.2B in 2009, With Light Rail Up in Nine Cities
The nation's transit systems hosted 10.2 billion trips last year, the American Public Transportation Association (APTA) reported yesterday. While that figure represents a 3.8 percent decline from 2008, APTA's data showed light rail ridership rising in nine cities and the long-term increase in transit use continuing to outpace growth in population and vehicle miles traveled.
March 9, 2010
Study: Clean-Car Subsidies Alone Can’t Meet White House’s Climate Goals
Government subsidies for hybrid and electric cars, while "politically seductive," will fail to achieve the Obama administration's national pollution-reduction goals if they are not coupled with a significant increase in fuel prices, according to a new study by Harvard University researchers.
March 9, 2010