A Record-Breaking Thanksgiving
November 21, 2017
Thanksgiving week marks the official start of the holiday season, and therefore the official start of the infamous winter travel season. According to AAA, Thanksgiving weekend in 2017 will be the country’s busiest travel season since 2005. With an estimated 50.9 million people traveling 50 miles or more this weekend, you will likely see overcrowded......
Infrastructure Wins on Election Night 2017
November 08, 2017
On November 7, voters across the country approved infrastructure investment ballot measures. In Maine, a resounding 72% of residents across the state voted yes on Question 3, allowing the issuance of $105 million in bonds for transportation projects around the state. $80 million will be provided to state highways and bridges, $20 million for multimodal......
Kelly Barnes Dam Failure: Dam Safety Then and Now
November 06, 2017
Today marks the 40th anniversary of the Kelly Barnes Dam failure: an event that acted as a catalyst for improvement in dam safety. On November 6, 1977, Toccoa Falls Bible College was nearly swept away as high water erupted through the defects in the Kelly Barnes Dam, sending 25-foot waves through the campus. This tragedy......
GAO Examines Economic Impact of Extreme Weather Events
October 25, 2017
This week the US Governmental Accountability Office (GAO) released CLIMATE CHANGE: Information on Potential Economic Effects Could Help Guide Federal Efforts to Reduce Fiscal Exposure, a report detailing the cost to the federal government of climate-related impacts that have already occurred, and how that cost is expected to rise. Over the last decade, extreme weather......
Bipartisan Legislation Introduced in the House and Senate to Enhance Infrastructure Investment
October 24, 2017
The Move America Act, bipartisan legislation has been introduced in the House and Senate introduced (H.R. 3912 and S. 1229) to enhance America’s infrastructure by strengthening public-private partnerships. ASCE supports the legislation and has been working to advance it in both the House and Senate. The House bill was introduced this October by Congresswoman Jackie......
Outdated Gas Tax Rate Still Propping Up America’s Transportation Infrastructure
October 23, 2017
This month marks the 24th anniversary of the federal gas tax’s outdated 18.4-cent rate enacted on October 1st, 1993. First established in 1932, the gas tax goes toward the Highway Trust Fund (HTF) – the federal fund that pays for bridges, roads, and transit. The federal gas tax rate has been raised numerous times since......
September 27, 2017
Within the past month, major hurricanes hit Florida, Texas, and Puerto Rico, two earthquakes only days apart, led to the loss of over 100 lives and the destruction of massive amounts of infrastructure in Mexico, and hundreds of thousands of acres of land have burned in the Pacific Northwest from wildfires. These events coincided with......
ASCE Supports Legislation to Reduce Deferred Maintenance Backlog at National Parks
September 14, 2017
ASCE’s 2017 Infrastructure Report Card gave our nation’s public parks a grade of “D+.” Despite the growing popularity of public parks and lands, chronic underfunding of our parks infrastructure continues to plague the system. The National Park Service’s (NPS) 2016 centennial anniversary generated a new wave of excitement for our nation’s public parks. In fact,......
Earthquake Program Bill Introduced in Senate
September 12, 2017
Senators Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) and Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) have introduced the National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program (NEHRP) Reauthorization Act S.1768, a bill to reauthorize the national program to improve the nation’s earthquake preparedness, which was last passed by Congress in 2004. NEHRP plays an important role in preparing earthquake-prone communities for seismic events. First created......
President Trump Release Executive Order on Infrastructure
August 16, 2017
On Tuesday, President Trump signed an executive order (EO) on infrastructure permitting, titled Presidential Executive Order on Establishing Discipline and Accountability in the Environmental Review and Permitting Process for Infrastructure. The EO aims to reduce permitting time, which in the past took an average of seven years, and will now be condensed into an average......