Highways, Bridges and Roads

“That’s for community to decide, not for our federal government to sit up here in Washington and decide,” says lawmaker.

The $260 billion transportation bill released this week by House Republicans to spur highway construction in the United States would make roads in the country less safe, AAA argued a day after the GOP announced the legislation.

The proposal from House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman John Mica (R-Fla.) to spend $260 billion over five years on road and transit projects includes a provision that would increase the weight of trucks allowed on highways from 80,000 to 97,000 pounds.

AAA said the increased shipping capacity is not worth the risk of accidents involving bigger trucks.

“With a nine percent increase in truck related fatalities in 2010, traffic safety is a significant concern,” Jill Ingrassia, AAA’s managing director of government relations and traffic safety advocacy, said in a news release. “Additional research is required to demonstrate exactly how bigger and heavier trucks would impact traffic safety. Absent this research, we cannot take the chance — there is simply too much at stake.”

The proposed federal highway bill released this week by Republican leaders in the House has been met with skepticism by many lobbying groups, but it has drawn praise from the National Retail Federation.

NRF Vice President for Government Relations David French said the five-year, $260 billion bill that was introduced Tuesday by House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman John Mica (R-Fla.) should be approved quickly by members of Congress.

"We urge members of Congress to work quickly on this critical issue affecting U.S. job growth and competitiveness," French said in a statement. "Our neglected transportation system has created bottlenecks and inefficiencies in the supply chain that stifle U.S. companies’ ability to grow and create jobs that are so badly needed in today’s economy.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said Tuesday that a Congressional Budget Office report that the highway trust fund would be empty by fiscal year 2014 shows President Obama has been right to call for increased funding for transportation projects.

The CBO predicted Tuesday that the deficit will rise to $1.08 trillion in 2012. Under the non-partisan agency's calculations, the highway trust fund, which funds road projects using collections from the federal gas tax, will be running on empty just two years after that.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said Tuesday that the projection was not a surprise.

"We've known for a long time that people are driving less and they are driving more fuel efficient cars," LaHood told reporters after a speech to the Washington Aero Club.  

Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) is pushing back against House GOP plans to tether approval of the Keystone XL oil sands pipeline to major transportation and infrastructure legislation.

Inhofe, who backs the pipeline, is the top Republican on the Environment and Public Works Committee and GOP co-author of the Senate’s big transportation programs bill.

“My preference is, since I have strong feelings about the Keystone, put it on something that is a must-pass bill,” Inhofe told reporters in the Capitol Tuesday.

“But to put it on an infrastructure bill that is not a must-pass bill — it is one that we want to pass, but I would hate to lose it because we are putting other things on it,” added Inhofe.

The bill is expected to offer states millions of dollars in incentives for tough penalties on first-time drunken drivers.

An environmental group is criticizing the House Republican plan to tie a new federal highway bill to increased offshore oil drilling.

The New York-based Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) said in a memo to reporters Monday that its message to lawmakers this week could be compressed to one sentence: "Don't drill and drive."

GOP leaders in the House are planning to use revenue from increased offshore oil drilling to pay for their version of a new surface transportation bill that would last four years and cost $260 billion. Transportation advocates have sought a long-term reauthorization of highway and transit programs, which currently expire on March 31, but the NRDC said it should not come like this.

"America’s transportation infrastructure is falling apart for lack of funding to repair and improve our vast network of bridges, roads, rails, runways and ports," the organization said in a memo to reporters.

"Unfortunately, Republican leaders in the House are heading down a partisan path, as they have so often," the NRDC memo continued. "They are doing this even though the transportation bill is way behind schedule; funding has been kept alive through eight short-term extensions over the past three years." 

If the halls of the Capitol were highways, the number of hearings needed to mark up a new federal highway bill that are likely to take place this week would cause traffic jams.

After months of little movement to reauthorize highway and transit programs that expire March 31, at least three committees are expected to mark up a new multi-year surface transportation bill.

Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairwoman Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), whose committee has already approved a measure, said the Senate Finance and Banking committees were expected to hold hearings this week to clear the new bill, which in the Senate is a two-year renewal costing $109 billion.

At the same time, House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman John Mica (R-Fla.) has promised to unveil his chamber's version of the bill this week. Republican aides have said the measure would be a five-year, $260 billion bill.

Mica is expected to unveil the bill Tuesday, and sources have said the committee will mark it up Thursday. 

The speaker said legislation advancing the pipeline would be part of a major infrastructure and energy bill.

The bills would open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling, a nonstarter for the White House and most Democrats.