2015 State Government Relations Year in Review
January 06, 2016
2015 once again proved that states are where the action is! Gavel to gavel, ASCE kept a watchful eye on legislative sessions in all 50 states, worked on ballot initiatives in 4 states, and travelled coast to coast educating members on how to engage elected officials, and reaching out to legislators to spread the message......
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 Two: Highways
December 09, 2015
This is the second 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 next sections will focus on......
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......
Obama Set to Sign 5 Year, $305 Billion Transportation Bill
December 04, 2015
Yesterday, the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate both approved a five-year, $305 billion highway, transit and railway authorization bill. The overwhelming, bipartisan vote was 359-65 in the House and 83-16 in the Senate. President Obama is expected to sign the bill into law later on today. Thank you, infrastructure supporters, for contacting your......
Tell Congress to Go Big on Transportation
November 17, 2015
The House and Senate are currently meeting to decide a big question when it comes to the future of the nation’s surface transportation program: Should funding levels be increased in order to improve and modernize the nation’s roads, bridges and transit system, or should funding levels stay flat for the next six years while the......
Five Year Highway & Transit Bill with Funding Increases Better Option
November 16, 2015
Last week, transportation stakeholders sent a letter to the House and Senate surface transportation conference committee in support of a robust five year highway and transit bill that would increase investment levels. The House-passed bill includes a $40 billion offset which could help increase investment levels if the duration of the bill were reduced from......
House Unveils Surface Transportation Bill
October 19, 2015
On Friday, the U.S. House of Representatives’ Transportation & Infrastructure Committee unveiled a six-year surface transportation reauthorization bill. The bipartisan legislation, titled, the Surface Transportation Re-authorization and Reform Act (STRRA) of 2015, contains three years of flat-level funding for highway and transit programs and will be marked-up......
New York Infrastructure Report Card
September 29, 2015
In the inaugural 2015 Report Card for New York’s Infrastructure released today, the state received an overall grade of “C-” from the New York Council of the American Society of Civil Engineers. Assessing nine categories, the report finds that the state’s roads and bridges are among the categories most in need of repair, receiving grades......