A New Beginning: Transportation reform in the 21st Century

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A New BeginningTransportation reform in the
21st Century

• Mariia Zimmerman,
• Transportation For America Campaign
• The Transportation Funders / Resource Network
• April 17, 2008
• New York City, NY

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Why Transportation Policy Matters at the Federal
Level

• Transportation policy and proper investments are
  cross-cutting and support a range of broad
  national goals
• Advances economic prosperity and competitiveness
• Achieves environmental sustainability
• Promotes equity and social inclusion

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Were Talking Real Money Total 2008 US Budget
Health Human Svcs
699
Defense VA
667
Social Security
655
Treasury
525
Agriculture
89
Transportation
67
Federal Payroll
64
Education
59
Total 2.9 Trillion
Labor
52
Housing Urban Dev.
44
Homeland Security
43
100
200
300
400
500
600
Billions
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Important Stops Along the Road

• Interstate Era (1956) National goals drive
  transportation policy, but things start to get
  bumpy, especially for the environment, cities and
  the poor
• ISTEA (1991) A new direction for transportation
  policy, bringing in other modes, clean air, and
  planning
• TEA-21/SAFETEA-LU (1998, 2005) stay the course,
  play defense, get your slice of pie
• 2009 - 286 billion and what have we got?

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40 Years of Surface Transportation Legislation
(VMT vehicle miles of travel)
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A National Wake-Up Call

• Demographic and market changes
• Oil dependency, and energy security
• Climate change
• Rising gas prices and Growing Traffic congestion
• System is breaking down
• Safety and economic security
• Highway Trust Fund headed for bankruptcy

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Affordability Where the Rubber Meets the Road
Growing number of state campaigns seeking to
address affordable housing and increasing job
housing issues through better transportation
choices. IL, CA, MD, NJ, MA
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Railing for Transportation Alternatives
Source Center for Transportation Excellence
Almost 70 of State Local Transportation
Measures Approved
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Taking it to the Streets
Over 18000 schools now have a Safe Routes to
School program. 43 states are making investments
to support these programs.
Source Thunderbird Alliance
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Growing Climate for Change
Cities that have Signed USCM Climate Protection
Agreement
States with Climate Action Plans
Transportation accounts for ? of all CO2 emissions
Source Pew Center for Climate Change (state
map), US Conference of Mayors (cities map)
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Transportation for America for its people,
communities, environment and economies
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Whats different this time?
Actually, A Lot

• Transportation Fiscal Crisis
• Robbing from Peter (transit) to pay Paul (hwy)
• Recession and stimulus
• Crisis at the states
• Political change in leadership
• House and Senate dynamics
• In the White House and at US DOT
• Trends and Voices for Change
• More at stake economy, climate, population
  growth and demographic changes, energy costs
• Agreement that its broke and broken

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Growing Agreement For Fundamental Reform before
we think about how to inject more money into the
system
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Transportation For AmericaAdvocating for Change
Need to focus resources and efforts in all 4
areas. Federal opportunity is opening now, and
greatest opportunity for change that weve seen
in decades.
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T4AmericaMaking Transportation Work for the
America in the 21st Century

• Launching a new national reform campaign
• Creating Campaign Structure Executive Committee,
  National Advisory Council, Staff and Technical
  Capacity
• Re-energizing, Re-building, Re-engaging the
  Transportation Advocacy Movement to Influence
  Federal Policy
• Coalition building, new partnerships,
  communications plan
• Build and support state, regional and local
  efforts
• Identify critical states for engagement, provide
  communications and information, create national
  network for information sharing, engage in
  platform development and implementation

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Rolling out the Debate

• 2008 let the games begin
• Recommendations from Federal Study commissions
• Bankruptcy of Highway Trust Fund
• Administration position revealed
• Congressional Hearings and Action
• Presidential and Congressional Elections
• 2009 new leadership
• SAFETEA-LU Bill expires
• New Congress and New Administration

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Challenges of Political Inertia and Geography
The House Transportation and Infrastructure
Committee is a potential barrier to real reform
Source Puentes, The Brookings Institution
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Channeling Public Demand

• 93 of respondents feel our country needs to
  reduce its dependence on oil and find renewable
  sources of energy.
• 3/4th of Americans believe that being smarter
  about development and improving public
  transportation are better long-term solutions for
  reducing traffic congestion than building new
  roads.
• When asked how they would invest 100, Americans
  would put 62 towards trains, buses, sidewalks
  and buses.

Less than ¼ of Americans feel current
transportation split is a good investment
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Imagining Success

• Re-envision purpose and outcomes
• The role of transportation investments is to
  reduce our nations dependency on oil, to lower
  household transportation costs, to provide
  mobility options to all, and to reduce our carbon
  footprint
• Many possible ways this could be achieved
• Increase investment in non-auto transportation,
• Reduce VMT growth as Explicit Climate Strategy,
• Restructure and empower metropolitan decision
  making,
• Explicitly allow transportation funding for land
  use and community development programs

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All Aboard! Building a Winning Coalition
Action! For Regional Equity
National Association of City Transportation
Officials (NACTO)
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Aligning Allies Along the Way

• The National Surface Transportation Policy and
  Revenue Commissions recent report (1/08) was the
  kick-off for the debate
• Governor Rendell, as chair of the National
  Governors Association, and along with Governor
  Schwarzenegger and Mayor Bloomberg established
  the Building Americas Future coalition
• Progressive heads of AASHTO (Al Beihler) and US
  Conference of Mayors (Greg Nickels) many other
  groups are all calling for major reform.
• Transportation is finding its way (slowly!) into
  the presidential campaign
• Congress is starting to take action House TI
  Hearings, Sen. Dodds Infrastructure Bank, Boxer
  on Climate, Pelosi / Blumenauer on National Plan

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We Believe Successful Reform

• Is possible with the next bill given perfect
  storm of fiscal, political, and practical
• Requires an aggressive, ambitious and coordinated
  campaign strategy and resources
• Is dependent upon the successful engagement and
  partnership between national, state, regional and
  local organizations to influence political debate