Apr
14
Thursday, April 10, 2008
Congress created a commission in 2005 to look into the state of the nation’s surface transportation, which includes highways, freight, and public transit. After 22 months of deliberation, it released its report in January.
A couple of the more controversial recommendations are raising the gas tax and creating public-private partnerships to fund the building of more roads and transportation infrastructure.
Rose stressed that when it comes to transportation, we can not continue under-investing without severe economic and environmental costs. He said President Eisenhower quadrupled the gas tax to raise the money to build a national highway system. It is time we re-invested in our transportation system to bring it to where it needs to be, he said.
Regarding how soon we can expect the commission’s recommendations to translate to action, Rose said, “Well of course anyone who’s ever been asked to be on a commission, the biggest concern you have is whether or not your commission’s paper will become a doorstop in some congressman’s office. So we outsmarted them this time— we didn’t publish the report, we put it on the internet.”
You can check out the report online at http://www.transportationfortomorrow.org/final_report/