NANCY PELOSI

I had a telling conversation with an old friend several months ago, a devoted environmentalist who’s a community college biology teacher living south of San Francisco in a pleasant small town abutting the Pacific. I don’t recall how it came up, but she declared, “We’ve just got to get more people out of their cars.” Then came a pregnant pause, followed by her admission that of course, because of where they lived and worked and their packed daily schedules, she and her husband drove themselves and their children everywhere. I’ve been thinking about this lately because, well, the roads are still chock full of cars and trucks, and despite an uptick in transit and bicycle use, traffic is still congested Read More ›

Funding infrastructure with private capital, a practice widely used abroad, has had its tentative beginnings here at home, but its domestic long-term future is still clouded. We interviewed a diverse group of individuals of varying political persuasion, on public-private partnerships in U.S. surface transportation. They included state legislators, congressional staffers, senior U.S. DOT officials, state and local transportation officials, members of the two congressionally-chartered transportation commissions,  executives of trade and professional associations, and analysts on Wall Street, in think tanks, academia and private consulting firms.   Support for Public-Private Partnerships is Growing Total reliance on public resources and the fuel tax to fund future investments in transportation infrastructure is no longer a realistic option. Such, in essence, is the considered judgment of a great majority of participants in our survey. State officials Read More ›

Clinton, Obama Co-sponsors The problem of infrastructure deficit received prominent attention from the governors and state officials meeting in Washington during the month of February. But aside from agreeing that the needs for infrastructure funding are great, that present resources are inadequate, and that earmarks are a poor way to deal with the problem, few solutions were offered as to how to meet the revenue shortfalls. That’s why a March 11 hearing by the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs took on special significance. The hearing focused on a bill sponsored by Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd (D-CT) and Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE) to create a National Infrastructure Bank (S. 1926). Described by Sen Dodd as a Read More ›