Oppose a House transportation bill so bad it "defies belief"

Transit

Oppose a House transportation bill so bad it "defies belief"

by Stephen Davis • February 9, 2012 12:07 pm

Today, thousands of people from across the country are calling their representatives in the House to ask them to vote NO on HR 7, the House transportation bill that jeopardizes transit service across the country, makes our streets less safe for walking and biking, fails to put people to work, and does far too little to fix our crumbling roads and bridges.

Photo by TriMet on Flickr.

We do desperately need an updated transportation bill to lay the groundwork for a prosperous 21st Century, but this bill is unfortunately not it.

We're joining with thousands of others and calling on our supporters today to call their representatives to oppose this bill.

You can use that page to look up your representatives and find a short script to use on a phone call, if you need it. Then, if you like, you can fill out the short form and send us a note to let us know how the call goes and join our ranks.

Today, we're just one part of a massive national call-in day rallying opposition to this bill from an unbelievably broad set of groups. The environment, business, labor, transit riders and transit workers, elected officials... the list keeps growing. All of whom agree that the House bill makes two steps backward for every step forward.

For one, this bill would erase a 30-year precedent—signed by President Reagan—of dedicating about 20% of the federal fuel tax into a trust fund for transit systems across the country, jeopardizing the daily rides for millions of people who depend on transit for their commutes or livelihood each day.

Instead, it would shift that money into roads and highways and force transit to go begging before Congress each year for annual appropriations. For three decades until last Friday, Congress subscribed to the wisdom of investing in transit to help address congestion, cut down on road repair costs, provide options other than driving, and power local economies.

This bill also eliminates the tiny bit of dedicated funding that local communities use to make their streets and roads safer for people on foot or bike, as well as the program that helps children walk to school safely in their communities. This is done in the name of "devolving control to states," though it virtually guarantees instead that states will override the wishes of local communities with more highways while ignoring the safety fixes local communities desire to make walking or biking safer and more convenient.

Residents on both US coasts today woke up to strong editorials in their papers of record opposing the bill. The New York Times called it "so uniquely bad" that it defies belief. The Sacramento Bee made it absolutely clear that this bill "gives public transportation the shaft." From the Times editorial this morning:

Ray LaHood, the transportation secretary, rightly calls this the "worst transportation bill" he has seen in 35 years of public service. Mr. Boehner is even beginning to hear from budget-conscious conservatives who believe that relying on user fees is the most fiscally responsible way to pay for all transportation programs. Perhaps the House speaker will listen to these warnings and send the bill back to the relevant committees for the wholesale revision it needs. If he does not, and it passes, then the Senate must stop it.

The Bee makes it clear that in a time when people are looking for more options for getting around each day, this bill takes away exactly what more Americans are so desperately seeking.

If they have their way, the nation's transportation network will take a giant step backward to a "roads only" policy for dedicated funding. The full House votes next week on a multi-year transportation bill (House Resolution 7)—and Americans should urge their members of Congress to reject it. The United States needs a transportation system that gives people a variety of options—roads, rail, bus, bicycle paths and walkways. It needs to find ways to reduce emissions and traffic congestion.

From coast to coast, it's becoming clear that this bill needs to be defeated. We're looking forward to working with the House on a better bill, but this is not that bill.

Join with others, make a phone call, and then spread the word via email and your social networks today if you've already called. Use the #HouseTranspoFail hashtag today on Twitter.

(DC residents, we know your representation plight—most of our staff are DC residents too. But you should still call Delegate Norton and tell her why this bill is dangerous. Though she can't vote on the full bill, she does sit on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee that wrote the majority of this bill and can vote there. And she should still hear about the damage this would do to WMATA and other local-area transit agencies.)

17 comments

Tags: Congress, roads, transit, transportation reauthorization

House transportation bill is "a march of horribles" (Jan 30, 2012)
House GOP moves to decimate transit funding (Feb 2, 2012)
GOP transportation bill's new direction is the same old one (Jul 11, 2011)
When will Oberstar's transportation bill drop? Place your bets now (Jun 10, 2009)
Change? (Dec 10, 2008)

Stephen Davis is Deputy Communications Director for Transportation For America.

Comments
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What's wrong with these Rebublicans?

by Thayer-D on Feb 9, 2012 1:02 pm • link • report

My representative can't vote...

by Patrick on Feb 9, 2012 1:17 pm • link • report

EHN is on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and can vote in committee on this bill so you should still call/e-mail her!

by MLD on Feb 9, 2012 1:30 pm • link • report

This isn't even particularly conservative or right wing. It's just plain stupid.

by Falls Church on Feb 9, 2012 10:20 pm • link • report

For every person who depends on transit for their commutes or livelihood, there are 20 people who depend on cars. The taxes paid by car users should be used to provide infrastructure for car users, not transit users. Transit users should pay their own costs.

by Bertie on Feb 9, 2012 10:49 pm • link • report

Transit users should pay their own costs.

Transit provides many positive benefits to the community that are greater than the benefits other modes provide. Transit users shouldn't be the only ones to pay for those positive benefits. The community should pay for those benefits as well as the community has a stake in them.

by MLD on Feb 10, 2012 7:51 am • link • report

Once car users pay their entire way (ALL infrastructure, pollution externalities, protection of oil supply lines etc, for reference sakes, car users who pay the entire cost in Europe pay about $4 a gallon in tax, give or take) then I think it is fair that transit users pay their entire share.

In the meantime, transit needs to be funded, to keep minimizing all of those negative externalities.

by Kyle on Feb 10, 2012 8:39 am • link • report

Transit provides many positive benefits to the community that are greater than the benefits other modes provide.

Given that cars provide about 100 times as much transportation as transit, it is virtually inconceivable that transit provides more benefit than cars.

Once car users pay their entire way ...

If gas taxes weren't poached for transit, car users would be much closer to paying their own way. It makes no sense to complain that someone isn't paying enough for something they use when you're confiscating a big chunk of what they pay and spending it on something else.

by Bertie on Feb 10, 2012 2:26 pm • link • report

@Bertie: What follows is more extreme than my real views, but you're so easy to parody that I just can't resist:

Given that the negative externalities of cars are hundreds of times greater than those of public transit, it's virtually inconceivable that cars provide more benefit than public transit (except, perhaps to the OPEC oligarchies that supply most of the fuel).

If the true costs of car use were incorporated into gas taxes, rather than requiring the rest of us to pay those costs (both monetarily and in other ways), gas taxes would go up by at least an order of magnitude. It makes no sense to complain that someone is confiscating your money when you're actually paying only a small fraction of the cost of your behavior.

by DSN Post on Feb 11, 2012 1:02 pm • link • report

Your "parody" is such a failure, I just can't resist.

Given that the negative externalities of cars are hundreds of times greater than those of public transit, it's virtually inconceivable that cars provide more benefit than public transit

Negative externalities are costs, not benefits. Perhaps you're trying to refer to net benefit (benefits minus costs). In that case, again, given that cars provide about 100 times as much transportation as transit, it is virtually inconceivable that transit provides more net benefit than cars.

No they wouldn't. No serious estimate of "the true costs of car use" is remotely that high. Direct public subsidies to transit are so enormous that no "true cost" pricing of transportation could possibly offset their enormous distortion of the market in favor of transit. Despite that enormous advantage, including tens of billions of dollars poached from gas tax revenues paid by drivers, transit struggles to attract just a tiny share of urban travel.

by Bertie on Feb 11, 2012 1:46 pm • link • report

Bertie -

Every single rail user equals a car that is completely removed from local roads.

Every single bus user equals 98% of a car that is removed from local roads.

Transit use increases the capacity of roads - every transit user benefits those who drive. But you would just keep paying to expand roads out of sheer spite.

If you think that "transit struggles to attract just a tiny share of urban travel", why don't you try commuting in a city in which the transit system has been shut down temporarily. Maybe you could time-travel to the summer of 1978, when a shutdown of the then much smaller Metro system paralyzed the metropolitan area for several days?

by Frank IBC on Feb 12, 2012 8:40 am • link • report

Frank-

We have a Washington DC where the entire northern portion of the hub and spokes was questionably deleted, with an good WMATA system, and some of the worse traffic problems.

http://wwwtripwithinthebeltway.blogspot.com/2012/01/crafted-controversy-scuttling-of-jfks-b.html

http://wwwtripwithinthebeltway.blogspot.com/2007/02/doctrinaire-anti-new-highways-position.html

We as a nation are being dis-served by those against either.

by Douglas Willinger on Feb 12, 2012 1:07 pm • link • report

Every single rail user equals a car that is completely removed from local roads. Every single bus user equals 98% of a car that is removed from local roads. Transit use increases the capacity of roads - every transit user benefits those who drive. But you would just keep paying to expand roads out of sheer spite.

Your argument here is very confused. A transit "user" does not "remove a car." Presumably, what you're trying to say is that transit trips substitute for car trips, that each transit trip means one fewer car trips. But that's not true, either. Transit, like cars, can induce travel that would not otherwise take place. And removing one passenger from a car with multiple passengers doesn't "remove a car" either.

Transit may relieve road congestion at peak travel times in some places, by substituting for single-occupant car trips (mostly commutes) but the vast majority of roads are rarely if ever congested. Commutes comprise only about 15% of all urban trips. Congestion relief may justify small subsidies to transit in certain places at certain times, but it does not justify the enormous subsidies currently provided to transit in all places at all times.

If you think that "transit struggles to attract just a tiny share of urban travel", why don't you try commuting in a city in which the transit system has been shut down temporarily.

Another nonsequitur. The fact that transit provides a substantial share of commute trips in a few cities does not alter the fact that transit is just a small component of our overall urban transportation system. Urban areas that are substantially dependent on transit tend to be old and dense, mostly designed before the automobile era. Newer urban areas don't suffer from this problem. That's why transit in newer urban areas tends to be so insignificant.

by Bertie on Feb 12, 2012 2:58 pm • link • report

Heh - Bertie, I've no need to parody your screeds any further, since you're now doing a pretty good job of self-parody. Thanks for saving me the trouble :-)

by DSN Post on Feb 12, 2012 5:28 pm • link • report

Bertie,
You seem to forget that all of these United Stated where developed by transit before there even was an automobile. Rail lines made the westward expansion possible and the ability to extract the natural materials that feuled our industrial growth that led to us wining WWII. Every older suburb was laid out via street car, but you know all this. I think the only reason people respond to your comments is that it helps refine their points. So I'll go.

"The fact that transit provides a substantial share of commute trips in a few cities does not alter the fact that transit is just a small component of our overall urban transportation system" There's no need to look at why and how the car overtook public transit in most cities. That would be a nonsequitor.

"Urban areas that are substantially dependent on transit tend to be old and dense, mostly designed before the automobile era." That's right, and it's exactly this density that makes them by far more efficient.

"Newer urban areas don't suffer from this problem."
And it's such a problem that millions of people travel thousands of miles yearly to visit some of the more elegant and dense cities. I think this window into your distaste for being around many people, while totally legitimate, speaks for itself.

"That's why transit in newer urban areas tends to be so insignificant." That and it's a bit harder to lay-out a rational system of transit when one highway interchange takes up more land than most center cities in Europe.

Why car lovers seem to get so defensive when the merits of transit are touted always amazes me, as if it's one or the other.

by Thayer-D on Feb 13, 2012 1:19 pm • link • report

You seem to forget that all of these United Stated where developed by transit before there even was an automobile. Rail lines made the westward expansion possible and the ability to extract the natural materials that feuled our industrial growth that led to us wining WWII. Every older suburb was laid out via street car, but you know all this.

The vast majority of urban development in the United States is car-based, not transit-based. The mass affordability of cars allowed us to suburbanize and sprawl into much larger areas of land, because cars are so much faster, more convenient and more flexible than buses and trains.

That's right, and it's exactly this density that makes them by far more efficient.

Density may increase some kinds of efficiency, but it reduces others. And people obviously value other things besides efficiency anyway.

And it's such a problem that millions of people travel thousands of miles yearly to visit some of the more elegant and dense cities.

I'm not talking about where people choose to visit. Obviously, old, dense cities like New York and Chicago have lots of tourist attractions. I'm talking about where people choose to live. Overwhelmingly, people are choosing to live in suburbs instead of dense cities.

by Bertie on Feb 13, 2012 7:37 pm • link • report

Personally, I don't see much point in trying to engage Bertie in rational discussion. Despite some rather obvious flaws in his reasoning, he seems so desirous to have the last word that I think he'll keep manufacturing new arguments every time someone challenges him.

by DSN Post on Feb 15, 2012 1:02 am • link • report