This Week in Infrastructure: If not now, when?
April 25, 2014
“It is time to fix our roads and bridges,” House Public Works and Highways Committee Chairman Rep. David Campbell, D-Nashua, [New Hampshire,] said. “If not 4.2 cents, what amount? If not today, when?” With those words of encouragement and a vote, New Hampshire’s legislative branch sent a bill to Gov. Maggie Hassan raising the Gas......
Highway Trust Fund 101: What You Need to Know
April 24, 2014
The Highway Trust Fund is set to become insolvent this summer, creating exponential negative consequences for our economy. What? When? Why? Find out how it can be fixed and what you can do to help. What is the Highway Trust Fund? The Highway Trust Fund is how Congress provides federal funding for transportation projects. It......
This Week in Infrastructure: Highway Trust Fund Gets Media Attention
April 18, 2014
On a typical day, a Google news search for the Highway Trust Fund over the past 24 hours results in a page or two of results. But this week Wednesday, the search query garnered nine pages of hits, and the option to “explore in depth” 166 articles. What did these articles say? And why does......
April 16, 2014
Reston, Va. – The following is a statement from Randall (Randy) S. Over, P.E., F.ASCE, president of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) regarding the U.S. Department of Transportation’s report issued yesterday on the future of the Highway Trust Fund: “The report issued this week by the U.S. Department of Transportation outlines an ominous......
This Week in Infrastructure: Reasons to Keep Advocating for Investment
April 11, 2014
The Opinion Pages of The New York Times presented a series of reasons “We Should Be in a Rage” and among them were—you guessed it—because of the state of our nation’s infrastructure. These grievances, along with suggestions and productive dialogue to change it, appeared in print across the country this week. In Mississippi, one writer......
Congress Looks to Learn Lessons from Canada’s P3 Experience
April 10, 2014
This week the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee looked to our northern neighbor Canada for advice on the federal role for public-private partnerships (P3) holding a panel hearing on the International Experience with Public-Private Partnerships, chaired by U.S. Rep. John Duncan (R-TN). Experts from the Canadian financing market were brought in to share their perspective......
This Week in Infrastructure: Continued Cause to Fix the Trust Fund
April 04, 2014
This pothole season is one of the worst in recent memory, thanks to the particularly harsh winter. The freezing, thawing, plowing and salting certainly did not help the D grade roads received in the 2013 Report Card. In the hard-hit Midwestern states, the hope of filled-in potholes and more funding for roads is a daily......
Half of States Have a Gas Tax Policy That’s a Decade Old
April 03, 2014
The Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP) released a new chart this week clearly showing how long it’s been since many states have changed their gas tax policy. In about half the states, it has been a decade or more since they’ve changed their gas tax policy in spite of the changing costs for......
New Report Card for Illinois’ Infrastructure Shows Progress
April 02, 2014
The 2014 Report Card for Illinois’ Infrastructure was released today by the Illinois Sections of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) at the Illinois Statehouse. A panel of professional civil engineers throughout the state graded each infrastructure category according to the following eight criteria: capacity, condition, funding, future need, operation and maintenance, public safety, resilience,......
This Week in Infrastructure: The High Cost of Insufficient Funding
March 28, 2014
On Tuesday, TRIP issued a report on the condition of North Carolina’s roads, bridges and traffic conditions. The bottom line: traffic is bad and the poor condition of roads costly. As the 2013 Report Card for America’s Infrastructure shows us, this TRIP report, along with one released this week in Minnesota, is a microcosm of......