Phineas Baxandall and Lizzi Weyant
Last week, the U.S. House introduced bills to fund our nation’s transportation system for the next five years. The new rules for spending $260 billion would be significantly tilted toward highways with less going to buses rail, biking and pedestrian trails. Given the nation’s urgent need to reduce our addiction to oil, that in itself would have been a tragedy.
But later in the week, tragedy turned into a dangerous farce. The House introduced additional legislation proposing that new revenue for the Transportation Fund would come through increased volumes of oil drilling and that public transit would be entirely kicked out of the transportation fund. Not only does this break with three decades of public transit support from the federal gas tax, it also comes at a time when our own state is facing a $161M budget shortfall at the T. The House measure would funnel all federal gas tax funds to highways, highways that we don’t need here in Massachusetts, while mass transit is forced to beg for scraps from a Congress that’s already making massive cuts to the general budget.
If you were trying to make America as addicted to oil as possible, you might design legislation like this.
The agenda advanced in the House flies directly in the face of clear trends in how Americans are choosing to travel. Right now, the number of vehicle miles driven is lower than any point since 2004, and transit ridership here in the Bay State is at an all time high, even in the wake of proposed fare hikes and service cuts.
While the House is characterizing its legislation as a “jobs bill,” past studies consistently show that spending on highways creates fewer jobs than the same dollars would invested in public transit.
Paying for highways through commitments to drill for more oil is both preposterous and perverse. The potential drilling revenue just doesn’t add up and would be delayed for several years before the new wells and exploration could even move forward. More broadly, America needs a transportation system that uses less oil. You don’t accomplish that by committing to drill more. It’s akin to funding a program to reduce smoking by lowering the tobacco age limit to generate more cigarette taxes.
While the drilling proposal met knowing disapproval, the move to defund transit has ignited a firestorm of protest. Over 600 groups including the Chamber of Commerce and AARP mobilized over the course of twelve hours to denounce the move in a joint letter. The U.S. Secretary of Transportation, a former Republican legislator, declared the House legislation to be the worst transportation bill in history.
The House has dangerously breached the past precedent which has long supported public transportation; but it may also have created a Paul Revere type rally to arms for transportation advocates roused across American. Let’s hope so.
Phineas Baxandall is a senior analyst at the U.S. Public Interest Research Group and Lizzi Weyant is a staff attorney at the Massachusetts Public Interest Research Group.
Wow, the information in this post is quite troubling, especially in light of the recent announcement of the plan for drastic cuts to the MBTA.
As a Cambridge resident, two questions immediately come to my mind.
First, where does Rep. Capuano stand on this issue? He is a member of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, so surely he should have some insight…
Second, and also pertaining to Rep. Capuano, I see that Oil and Gas is #4 industry on the list of the top financial contributors to his 2011-2012 re-election campaign. Will this legislation benefit those contributors?
I just did some looking, and I’ve learned that Rep. Capuano voted “No” in committee. Too bad the committee is run by Republicans.
However, I’m dismayed by the anti-road tone I’ve heard in these discussions. Unless we are going to lay track to everyone’s driveway or apartment parking lot, roads will always be the premier way to get around. Rather than vilifying the whole concept of driving we should be pushing for cars that are more fuel efficient and ultimately run clean. I do not see this as mutually exclusive with increased funding and opportunities for mass transit, which I also very much support.
it’s a bill that isn’t balanced at all.
Being strongly opposed to this bill hardly makes one “anti-road”, as you say.
The absolute insanity of what’s happening right now defies belief.
and vetoed again, until it contains comprehensive public transit funding.
couldn’t then the money generated from states taxes and fees be redirected from highways to the MBTA? Still, overall, the funding is less than in years past, which doesn’t surprise me since we must protect tax cuts for the rich at all costs, and so far, they’ve been successful in transferring costs to middle America through regressive taxes. They are going to try it again, apparently. Please don’t raise regressive taxes in response to this.