Infrastructure in the News: Issues abound during Infrastructure Week
May 20, 2016
With Infrastructure Week raising awareness of the important role our roads, bridges, transit and water infrastructure play, this week’s news headlines have been powerful reminders of our need for further action. ASCE’s Failure to Act economic report continues to garner news headlines, emphasizing our infrastructure investment needs. CNBC, and C-SPAN covered the economic impact of......
Infrastructure in the News: Invest Now or Pay Later
April 15, 2016
Water and transit have each had their fair share of media attention this week. Water Week has highlighted our nation’s water infrastructure conditions and transit hearings and incidents are reinforcing investment needs. Water Week highlighted diverse needs across the country as more than 100 water and wastewater utility managers, operators and engineers visited Washington, D.C.......
Underinvestment Led to Transit Woes
April 07, 2016
Washington D.C.’s Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) and San Francisco’s Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART)—initially opened around the same time in the 1970s—are facing challenges of being underfunded and ill-equipped to handle the needs of the populations they serve today. In their own ways, each is drawing attention to the negative effects of deferred......
Infrastructure in the News: Transit, Aviation
April 01, 2016
Massive transit repairs, aviation reform and increased desire for innovation mark this week’s infrastructure headlines. After discussion about the D.C. subway system’s much-needed maintenance, Metro’s top officials warned the public that they may shut down entire rail lines for as long as six months. While this situation could cause inconvenience and frustration, it stands as......
Infrastructure in the News: Transit issues escalate, water needs rise
March 25, 2016
The past two weeks have been packed with infrastructure crises and attention—as our nation’s water and transit have received both media attention and public scrutiny. Last week, the nation’s second busiest subway system, the D.C. Metro, shut down for one full day in order to undergo thorough inspection due to electrical malfunctions. CBS reported that......
Department of Transportation Celebrates 50 Years of Safety Innovation
February 08, 2016
Established by President Lyndon Johnson, the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) is now celebrating 50 years of making transportation safer for the traveling public. This month marked the 50th anniversary, where USDOT Secretary Anthony Foxx and six former USDOT Secretaries gathered together in D.C. to share the changes they’ve seen in transportation since the department......
D.C. Infrastructure Report Card Gives C- Overall, Lowest Grade to Levees
January 14, 2016
The 2016 Report Card for D.C.’s Infrastructure is an independent review of the current state of infrastructure needs, capability and funding in D.C. by the National Capital Section of the American Society of Civil Engineers. The Report Card was written over the past year by ASCE members from the D.C. region who assigned the grades......
FAST Act Summary Part Three: Transit
December 14, 2015
This is the third in a series of summaries over the next few weeks on the contents of the newly-passed five-year federal surface transportation authorization law, Fixing America’s Surface Transportation (FAST) Act. The first part explored the law’s funding and the future fiscal health of the Highway Trust Fund. The second part described the highway......
Alabama’s Infrastructure Grades Are In
December 10, 2015
The inaugural Report Card for Alabama’s Infrastructure, released today, reveals that Alabama’s aging infrastructure needs attention, especially its dams. As the only state without a dam safety program, Alabama does not have a complete inventory of all the dams in the state. Without this, Alabama is unaware of its dam safety risk. At the last......
FAST Act Summary Part One: The Funding
December 06, 2015
This is the first in a series of summaries over the next few weeks on the contents of the newly-passed five-year federal surface transportation authorization law, Fixing America’s Surface Transportation (FAST) Act. The next sections will focus on policy changes to highways, transit, and federal passenger rail programs. The backbone of federal transportation funding is......