If an extension fails to pass, the absence of a surface transportation bill would see the loss of one million construction and related jobs, President Obama warns. Photo via the Miller Center.

Today, President Obama urged Congress to pass a clean extension of the nation’s surface transportation bill. If not extended, the bill will expire on September 30, taking with it funding for mass transit systems, as well as shutting down bridge repair and highway construction projects. The legislation also provides funding for thousands of transportation projects that are currently under construction and authorizes the federal 18.4 cent-per-gallon gas tax.

U.S. Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood explains that the expiration of the transportation bill would cause the loss of 1 million construction and related jobs. Even a 10-day delay of the extension can cost the nation $1 billion in highway funding and furlough 4,000 professionals that work in the Department of Transportation.

Currently, the House and the Senate have differing opinions on transportation funding measures. Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) offered a $109 billion, two-year extension of the legislation. John Mica (R-Flo.), chairman of the House transportation committee, proposed a $230 billion, 6-year extension, which would cut 35 percent of existing transportation money. Though both groups may have opposing views on the amount and extension of the bill, President Obama urged Congress to come to a consensus, expressing that “It’s inexcusable to cut off necessary investments at a time when so many of our highways are chocked with congestion, when so many of our bridges are in need of repair, when so many commuters depend on reliable transit and when travel and shipping delays cost businesses billions of dollars every single year.”

The President also spoke to the need for private funding in transportation projects, in addition to federal funding, and discussed the reforms he would like to add to future transport legislation. “I’m also proposing that we reform the way transportation money is invested to eliminate waste, to give states more control over the projects that are right for them and to make sure that we are getting better results for the money that we spend,” explained the President.  “We need to stop funding projects based on whose districts they are in, and start funding them based on how much good they are going to be doing for the American people.”

Read the transcript from the press conference here.

States should start thinking about leveraging federal transit dollars for infrastructure and policies that reduce GHG emissions. Photo by caribb.

The Natural Resources Defense Council and Smart Growth America released a report, “Getting Back on Track: Aligning State Transportation Policy with Climate Change Goals,” analyzing state-level policies to curb carbon emissions in the transportation sector.  With the absence of a comprehensive transportation bill at the federal level, many are looking to action from states, which have federal transport dollars at their disposal.

The report’s findings suggest that states are doing little to leverage policy tools to reduce transport-related carbon emissions. In most cases, states make policy decisions that “will likely increase emissions” due to a lack of alignment between transportation and emission reduction policies.

Graphs from "Getting Back on Track."

FAILING POLICIES

In the U.S. nearly half of the net increase in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions since 1990 has been from the transport sector and transport accounts for 32 percent of total carbon emissions in the country.Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT) per person grew 151 percent between 1977 and 2001; this figure is expected to grow another 50 percent between 2005 and 2030, likely outpacing innovations in efficient vehicles and alternative fuels, the report says.

According to the study, “No state received a higher grade than ‘B-,’ and most states scored lower than ‘D,’ demonstrating a lack of alignment between transportation and climate policies.”  The analysis goes further: “Most states do not make any effort at all to connect transportation policy with climate change and energy goals, and some put in place systems that effectively sabotage these goals.”

RECOMMENDATIONS

Despite the lack of alignment, there’s “tremendous potential for states to make progress on reducing transportation-related carbon emissions.” The report suggests the following state-level actions to reposition transit policy to address emissions:

• Use state and federal resources to support improvements in public transportation and to support non-motorized transportation, prioritize highway repair and safety as opposed to new capacity, and ensure state fuel taxes can support all transportation modes;
• Develop comprehensive commuter programs to incentivize low-carbon modes and manage traffic through congestion pricing;
• Link transportation and land use in transportation plans (i.e. smart growth and transit oriented development);
• And reduce emissions by setting per capita transportation GHG or VMT reduction targets.

The report also outlines federal policy recommendations, and it ranked California, Maryland and New Jersey as implementing the best policies to curb emissions.  The lowest ranking states are rural areas without major cities.

Beyond failing to address GHG emissions, states are missing broader opportunities to improve public transport, spur economic growth, reduce disparities in transportation and address public health impacts the transport sector.

For the full report, go here.

Is this a bus or a train? Hard to tell! Photo by World Resources Institute Staff.

UPDATE: BeyondDC informs me by e-mail that, although you wouldn’t know it, this vote implies at the very least that Maryland has a strong preference for light rail, as that’s what the state asked the TPB to model the pollution effects of. If light rail is close to a done deal, read this post as an argument that transit advocates should pay more attention to BRT and not always preface discussion of it with “it’s certainly not rail, but it’s an important part of a transit system.” If it’s not—say, if Maryland decides that their budget is just hurting too much and they want to give BRT a second look—so much the better.

As I’ve already mentioned, the Purple Line is rolling forward, having received unanimous approval from the National Capital Region Transportation Planning Board. It is now awaiting Gov. O’Malley’s signature.

There has not yet been a final decision, however, on whether the Purple Line will be light rail (LRT) or bus rapid transit (BRT). This is a critical decision that will apparently be made by the end of the summer.

All the momentum seems to be pushing for light rail. Both the Montgomery and Prince George’s County councils and executives have endorsed light rail, as has the Washington Post. There seem to be two major sets of arguments against BRT.

The first and most prominent is that buses are a second-class transit alternative. This sentiment is perfectly expressed by Del. Tawanna P. Gaines (D-Prince George’s), chair of the House subcommittee on transportation appropriations, who is quoted in the Washington Post saying that “In Prince George’s, our public bus system has fallen short. We don’t have confidence in a new bus system. I think most people think buses aren’t as good.”

The second argument against BRT is that it has less capacity than LRT. You can see that argument in the Post’s editorial and in this post from Greater Greater Washington (read the comments, too). Lower capacity, these opponents argue, means fewer people out of their cars.

On the other hand, the strongest argument in favor of BRT comes from a report by the World Resources Institute, an environmental think tank and the parent organization of this blog. This detailed analysis compares BRT and LRT on two metrics, cost-effectiveness and greenhouse gas emissions.

Let’s start with cost-effectiveness. WRI defines cost-effectiveness as dollars per hour of user benefit, with costs including both capital and operating expenses and benefit including variables such as travel time reduced and the number of users. They have two fantastic graphs that show their findings. The first assumes that the state’s ridership forecasts are accurate; the second assumes that they are overly optimistic.

As you can see, you get significantly more bang for your buck with BRT than with LRT. This is because while capacity is marginally lower, costs are significantly lower (see the report for more graphs!).

Second, WRI finds that BRT will reduce greenhouse gas emissions while LRT will actually increase them. Here’s another graph:

The report goes on to argue that both the BRT and LRT emissions should be lower than these numbers (for BRT, ridership should be higher than in the data this graph uses; for LRT, the system will be drawing from a sub-regional power grid that is cleaner than the Maryland average, which this graph uses). The difference, though, remains quite striking.

So which side has the better argument? It depends.

Specifically, it depends on how closely you think that BRT can substitute for light rail or more accurately, the extent to which Maryland will make BRT a close substitute for light rail.

The low-investment BRT, for example, “is mostly at-grade and operates in shared use lanes on existing roadways,” according to the State of Maryland’s guide to the Purple Line. That’s simply not as good as light rail. It will feel like Metrobus, with fewer stops.

On the other hand, the high-investment BRT travels almost exactly the same route as the high-investment LRT. There are two big differences here. The first is that it looks like a bus, not a train. The second is that it has an internal engine instead of taking power from overhead wires. That’s about it, though. Concerns about it being a second-class mode of transit can basically be ignored. Throw in some good design to make the buses look sleek and attractive and you’re set.

A high-investment (or medium-investment, mostly) BRT would also assuage my personal concern about BRT, which is that it have the obvious permanence of light rail in order to spur transit-oriented development. With investment, a BRT Purple Line would.

One final point. Cost-effectiveness is currently the number one factor in determining which transit projects do and do not receive federal funding under the New Starts program. While this could change if Rep. Oberstar passes his new transportation bill, under current law, a BRT Purple Line has a much better chance of getting federal dollars. That’s another big point in BRT’s favor.

To sum up an overly long post, if done correctly there is no reason for a bus to be seen as second-class nor for there to be less demand to ride the BRT nor for the BRT option to have lower capacity. When the high-investment BRT option is still lower-cost than the low-investment LRT option and reduces, rather than increases, greenhouse gas emissions, this seems like a no-brainer. That said, cheaping out on the BRT seems like a mistake to be completely avoided and building a light rail Purple Line would obviously be a major victory for sustainable transportation advocates, period. In other words, bad BRT,  fine; light rail, really great; good BRT, even greater. Good BRT is, in the ideal world, the goal.

There’s been a lot of big transportation news in the last two days. Between the Purple Line vote and Sec. Ray LaHood and Rep. Jim Oberstar’s competing proposals for the transportation bill (a topic that you should definitely follow over at DC Streetsblog), there are a lot of major political decisions being made about transportation.

At the same time, some of the most important changes needed to create a sustainable transportation system in D.C. have nothing to do with transportation at all. For example, redeveloping the old convention center site downtown would be a major victory for sustainable transportation in D.C.

Read more at The City Fix DC…

Great news today: The National Capital Region Transportation Planning Board, the region’s federally designated Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO), unanimously approved the inclusion of the full Purple Line project in the region’s long-term plan.

Read more at The City Fix DC…

The National Transportation Policy Project of the Bipartisan Policy Center today released its final recommendations calling for comprehensive reform of the U.S. surface transportation bill, which expires at the end of September.

The recommendations were gathered over two years from a group of transport experts, transit users and political leaders. Basically, their report claims our transportation policy has lost its way and needs a sense of direction. The current system is strained to capacity and growing increasingly congested. We need a major overhaul. More specifically, “U.S. transportation policy needs to be more performance-driven, more directly linked to a set of clearly articulated goals, and more accountable for results.”

(The full report, titled, “Performance Driven: A New Vision for U.S. Transportation Policy,” is available for download here.)

GENERAL OVERVIEW:

In general, there are five overarching goals for transportation policy and investment:

1) Economic growth
2) National connectivity
3) Metropolitan accessibility
4) Energy security and environmental protection
5) Safety

To measure how policies, programs or investments achieve these goals, the NTPP proposes a suite of “performance measures” related to economic growth, energy and environment, and safety. In order to receive federal funding, programs must be successful across all of these metrics:

1) Access to jobs and labor
2) Access to non-work activities
3) Network utility
4) Corridor congestion
5) Petroleum consumption
6) CO2 emissions

NOTES FROM THE PRESS CONFERENCE:

Some of the more sweeping reforms include the following proposals, as expressed by the NTPP co-chairs and keynote speaker Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) during this morning’s press conference:

Transport funding should be channeled toward the best projects, regardless of whether they are road, rail or transit (NTPP calls this “mode-neutral.”) At this morning’s press conference, Warner expressed his support for this, emphasizing that “we need to get out of the silo approach to transport funding.”

Because no timetable has been set for the reauthorization of the bill (even though the NTPP report pushes for a lot of “date-certain” measures), Warner suggested first trying out the NTPP’s proposed metrics on the multi-modal transportation programs that are already slated for $1.5 billion from the stimulus package. (Some “beta testing,” he called it.)

Former Senator Slade Gorton said it’s going “very unlikely” for Congress to reauthorize the bill with NTPP’s input by September 30, so in the interim, we should work on “developing good precise data and metrics of measuring success.”

Mayor of Detroit Dennis Archer says current policy is too prescriptive – deciding how and what areas must spend funding – so he hopes for a greater “bottom-up approach” where states and cities have maximum flexibility to achieve national goals.

Another finding: There is a strong need to generate revenue based on performance. This way, dollars will automatically be delivered to the most needy, worthwhile projects.

Revenues could be generated through direct, user-based fees, for example, moving away from the gas tax and considering options like charging commuters for vehicle miles traveled. Or carbon pricing (if legislation for some sort of carbon program is eventually passed.)

Former Congressman Martin Sabo said these types of economic considerations “gives the user some evidence of the true cost of transportation.”

Former Congressman Sherwood Boehlert pointed to environmental arguments. “There is no recognition of the important link between transport investments, energy security and climate change,” he said.

In response to these challenges, the NTPP was launched to bring “new ideas and a bipartisan approach” to a proposal for comprehensive reform. For the first time ever, the bill would link funding to performance, as well as include energy and environmental considerations (namely, measuring petroleum consumption and CO2 emissions.)

HOW TO MEASURE AND ENCOURAGE ACCOUNTABILITY?

As Boelhert says, “We need to change the old way of doing things” by setting goals, measuring progress, and creating a system of accountability.

One way to do this could be through robust and open information technology.

Sen. Warner touched on one online tool that has the potential to not only gauge the progress of federal transport projects, but also to promote more transparency. He calls it a “real-time active dashboard,” (formally known as VDOT Dashboard v.3.0) a system he implemented at the Department of Transportation in Virginia that displays online information about performance, safety, finance and other measures for specific state transportation projects.

Rather than just measuring the amount of asphalt laid down or vehicle miles traveled, Warner says, VDOT now has proof of real results. What’s more, about 90% of projects are meet budget and time goals (only a few years ago, the percentages were drastically lower.)

Warner admitted: “It’s not that hard to do.” So why not take it national?

NOTES FROM THE PANEL:

To quote some of the discussion:

Joshua Schank, Director of Transportation Research for the NTPP

Our nation’s economic vitality depends on the how quickly and reliably people can access jobs, labor and other activities, hence the need for greater connectivity.

There’s a need to redefine the national transportation system — afterall, it’s not just about highways.

Also, the federal government should support and supplement state funding, especially if states demonstrate that they are collaborating with other regions across jurisdictional lines.

Nancy Kete, Director of EMBARQ

Transportation contributes to one-third of greenhouse gases in the United States. And the country is entirely dependent on oil. This situation is not sustainable from an economic, national security, or environmental perspective.

It’s going to take a lot more than CAFE standards and ultra-low sulfur diesel to create real change.

(Kete also issued a formal press statement, available at the World Resources Institute Pressroom.)

Robert Puentes, fellow, Brookings Institution Metropolitan Policy Program

In the absence of federal leadership, we’ve seen a lot of innovations happening outside of Washington. We should continue o look for innovation and best practices that are coming out of states and metro areas.

The federal government should get out the way. It needs to be empowering:

Federal highway, rail and transit programs all have different rules and regulations. It makes it difficult for states and metros to make decisions. Therefore, let innovations and good ideas flourish out there.

Tyler Duvall, Assistant Secretary for Transportation Policy

For the transportation bill to be effective, it’s got to be a lot more tarteted and specific than what we have today. We need the data to implement this approach.

Focus on areas of country where the crisis is most urgent.

Incentives clearly matter to state and local decision makers.

We need a couple champions, for example, Congressman Petri and Sen. Warner.

Congressman Tom Petri (R-WI)

It’s a wonderful thing to spend billions of dollars on renewing rail transport, but it’s still 19th century technology. Meanwhile, in the private market…my wife insisted I take the Vamoose bus to New York. Tickets are between $1 and $40. It’s clean, there’s Wi-Fi, the drivers are neat. It’s a wonderful experience. This is where the market is leading us.

We should look at states, and the local and municipal sector, as our clients, and encourage their innovation to get greater use out of existing system.