A summary of the bill was released Thursday, but the full text of the legislation is yet to be made available to the public. What we do know is that the $230 billion package is less than half of what the Obama Administration would like to be spending on transportation over the course of the next six years, and also less than than SAFETEA-LU, the surface transportation bill that was authorized in 2005.

While the bill’s summary lists few specific programs that would be cut, Chairman John Mica (R-Fla.) announced in a press conference Thursday that the bill will eliminate funding for several bicycle, pedestrian and transit programs, including Transportation Enhancements, the Recreational Trails Program and Safe Routes to School. It also aims to cut Amtrak’s federal funding by a quarter through the 2013 fiscal year, which should be no surprise: Mica and Representative Bill Shuster (R-Pa.) co-authored a bill that would privatize Amtrak last month. Advocates for non-highway alternatives like trails and bikes have already begun to speak out against the proposal.

The proposed bill, which has a working title of “A New Direction,” is decidedly pro-highway and anti- just about everything else, especially red tape (there were no less than 10 mentions of the stuff in the 22-page summary). One key feature of the proposal, is that states will no longer be required to use federal funds for non-highway projects. If states do, however, choose to prioritize any non-highway projects, they “will be held accountable for those choices through performance measures and transparency requirements.” Other highlights in the bill include a mechanism for states to toll new capacity on Interstate Highways (but not existing lanes), increased funds for transit programs in suburban and rural areas (but not in urban areas), a new definition of what qualifies as “high-speed” rail (125 MPH, up from 110 MPH) and a requirement for states to spend federal dollars in areas where safety performance goals are not being met.

A New Direction also prioritizes stabilizing the Highway Trust Fund and maximizing existing revenue, but does not seek to increase the gas tax, which has been sitting pretty at 18.4 cents per gallon since 1993.

Photo: Washington Post

Yesterday, details leaked of Congressman John Mica (R-PA) proposed bill for funding the U.S. government’s transportation priorities through 2018. Over at Streetsblog, Tanya Snyder explains that Mica’s bill represents a 40% spending cut compared to current levels, while many pro-transit, pro-density priorities, such as high-speed rail and “complete streets” programs, are totally ignored. High-speed rail and sustainability programs usually involve massive government spending, social engineering or both—and are typically supported by the political left. But Mica axes an important and seemingly bi-partisan proposal that would neither increase the deficit nor impose the government’s will on an unwitting citizenry: the creation of a national infrastructure bank.

Mica’s justification is that many states already have their own infrastructure banks, so the creation of a centralized one in Washington would only saddle projects with more bureaucracy than need be:

Instead of establishing a national infrastructure bank, the legislation will provide state infrastructure banks with more money, committee Chairman John Mica, a Republican, said on Wednesday. A little less than two-thirds of the states — 32 — have infrastructure banks.

“They don’t have to come to Washington to get approval. They don’t have to go through the red tape,” Mica said about the banks. “We’re looking at evolving that for the states.”

This sounds like an excuse. Almost by definition, a national infrastructure bank would fund projects that no state could individually undertake—things like highway improvements, rail lines and the construction of new roads and bridges. And it would fund projects from which more than one state would benefit. Mica assumedly realizes that a national infrastructure bank, which would be both privately and publically capitalized and give out low-interest loans for major infrastructural projects, wouldn’t replace the state banks, but supplement them by providing a rational means for both funding and authorizing major projects at the national level. So his opposition must be ideological. Mica, who also introduced last month’s Amtrak privatization bill, probably disagrees with any centralized control over infrastructure—even if it’s the relatively soft control of a privately-capitalized government bank.

Streetsblog also compiled a list of reactions from Democrats opposed to Mica’s bill. Rep. Corrine Brown (D-FL) blames the bill’s weaknesses on the toxic atmosphere in Congress:

“I’m finding that if any proposal doesn’t go the way the chairman wants, he wipes it out,” added Rep. Corrine Brown (D-FL). “We’ve always been able to sit down and talk and work through issues in the past, but it is just not the way we’re working now. It’s like we’re under a new regime.”

Brown added that the deep cuts and unwillingness to work together is “all about politics for 2012.”

Perhaps “politics” are partly to blame for this. But Snyder notes that Mica’s 40% in cuts exceeds the 30% cut in transportation spending included in Sen. Paul Ryan (R-Il) proposed federal budget. His bill exceeds the already highly-political recommendations of the most hawkish of all congressional budget hawks. Mica seems motivated by the ideological conviction that infrastructure is simply too important to be entrusted to the federal government.

Image via Wikipedia

Earlier this summer, a deadly strain of E. coli made it dangerous to eat salad or other uncooked vegetables in Germany throughout most of Europe. It’s because of that scare it may come as a surprise to hear scientists are working to engineer E. coli to become a source for biodiesel.

Scientists presented findings on the subject at the Aspen Ideas Festival last week. Jay Keasling, chief executive officer of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Joint BioEnergy Institute, spoke about E. coli as a source for biofuel to attendees of the festival.

E. coli, along with most microbes, make and process fatty acids. This produce is a necessary ingredient in biodiesel. To produce the desired ingredient, scientists must engineer the bacteria to produce fatty esters, the primary components of biodiesel.

The bacteria already produces such a component, but scientists plan to engineer the E. coli to remove the enzymes in some competing pathways to enhance the fatty acid production. The advanced esters “make better biofuel material,” according to an article on Ars Technica.

According to Keasling, several companies are at work on the technology. A Reuters article states a five-year timeframe before E. coli becomes available, and even longer before biofuels become mainstream and outpace petroleum.

“It’s going to be a long time before biofuels are a serious challenge to petroleum,” Keasling said in the Reuters article. He went on to say reaching critical mass was likely to take at least two decades.

Photo by Thomas Hawk via Flickr

AltTransport readers have already done the math and know that mass transit systems that allow commuters to bring their bicycles on board add up to something more than the sum of their parts. But if that’ s the case, why don’ t more cities make it easier for commuters to bring their bikes on board?

That’ s the question Felicity Barringer asks in the New York Times while discussing Christine Haughney’ s recent Times article on gender inequality in New York City’ s bicycle commuters (an article that you should go read right now if you haven’ t already. Go ahead, I’ ve got nothing but time here.) Barringer notes that the two biggest reasons women say they don’ t ride their bikes to work are fear of being struck by vehicles, and fear of arriving at work all sweaty…two fears that are certainly not gender-neutral (as someone who used to live in NYC before the city began installing bike lanes, I’ ll admit to feeling the same way on both counts) and could be greatly alleviated if it were easier for NYC bike commuters to get an assist from mass transit. She also points out that cities in which more women ride their bikes to work are cities in which the local transit has been designed to accommodate a certain number of cyclists. Caltrain for example, devotes two whole cars on every train to nothing but bikes, and each car can hold up to 40 cyclists and their bikes. As a result, 9% of Caltrain’ s riders are bike commuters. Minneapolis and Portland trains have at least two spaces for bikes on each car. On the other hand, many cities only allow bikes on board when it’ s not rush hour, such as Washington D.C., Chicago and Boston.

So where does this leave NYC? Somewhere in the middle. Cyclists are free to take their bikes on the subway, if they don’ t mind navigating their bikes through turnstiles, service doors, staircases, and then enduring the stink-eye from a car full of subway riders for taking up so much room. Metro North conductors can let cyclists on during rush hour at their discretion, but on the vast majority of trains the only place to park a bike is in one of the designated handicapped spots. And if you park your bike in the one handicapped spot on board in Poughkeepsie, and someone in a wheelchair gets on four stops later at Garrison, then what?

Adding train and subway cars dedicated to bikes may seem like a massive expense, but if Metro North riders on the New Haven line can have a bar car, there’ s no reason why cyclists couldn’ t be accommodated as well. The MTA could even save money by combining the two. After all, cyclists who brave the streets and tunnels of New York on their way to work deserve a gin and tonic on the ride home.

The Los Angeles Police Department, leaving no electronic stone unturned, asked Lady Gaga to post a warning on her Twitter feed, which has 11.4 million followers and is usually more concerned with promoting “Born This Way” than a highway. There is a Carmageddon Facebook page and an all-things Carmageddon Web site, with maps, videos, a Twitter feed and local businesses offering deals to people who stay home. (The tagline: “The Price You Pay to Live in L.A.”) And there is an ever-growing list of hashtags to help Twitter account users track the impending crisis….

… “If you think the 405 is gridlocked during the week, you haven’t seen anything yet,” Mayor Antonio R. Villaraigosa said by telephone last week. “My message is to stay home. Or go on vacation. Walk. Go on a bike. But do not get in your car and go anywhere near the West Side. It’s going to be a mess.”

As humorous in tone as this all is, the Interstate 405 shutdown should be a teachable moment, rather than an opportunity to revel in the LA region’s plight. The “carmageddon” is the result of insanely poor urban planning—indeed, it’s sobering to reflect on the fact that one of the country’s most important metropolitan areas will basically be paralyzed by the closing of 11 miles of highway. How did it get to this point?

The 405 is a major north-south route connecting the center of Los Angeles to a number of its large, densely-populated suburbs, including Irvine. While the Los Angeles area’s exurban sprawl makes it an easy target for new urbanists, the area is also as densely-populated as some major U.S. cities. Indeed, Los Angeles’s core area density is greater than New York City’s. Planners have forced to build more freeways (or widen existing freeways) in order to accommodate the area’s density and sprawl, while also trying to promote even higher-density development closer to the metro area’s center.

There are intermittent attempts at centralizing the LA area’s already quite dense population, or at least in gauging the public’s interest in higher-density, downtown living. But these have resulted in some notable failures, and as the National Journal explains, a high-profile attempt at building high-rise condos in Korea Town was hardly a success. The project’s failure was a startling reminder that high-density development just might not be that attractive in some places:

So what do Southern California homebuyers want? To judge by the places where price declines are least severe, upper-middle-class buyers have flocked to established neighborhoods or cities with modest, but attractive, older houses, typically with three bedrooms and two baths. Much of Beverly Hills has housing like this. So does the Miracle Mile, a neighborhood a few miles west of the Solair. Given more choices, buyers want single-family homes that are not in sprawling suburbs. They want to live close to town centers but not in dense high-rises. In short, they want to live in the year 1925.

As the article goes on to explain, when everyone wants to live in the year 1925, no one can:

The trouble is, we’re approaching 2025. By then, California is expected to add 7 million to 11 million people, about a quarter of its current population. (By 2050, the U.S. population is projected to reach 400 million, a 30 percent increase.) These new people will need homes, which can’t all be three-bedroom bungalows close to downtown. They’ll also need transportation. Automobile traffic and air pollution—already bad—stand to get worse.

The clogging of the Interstate 405 corridor is the result of understandable market forces—but they’re forces that could have some truly scary consequences if they aren’t counterbalanced by smart growth policy. The chaos coming to the LA area in mid-July is certainly easy to mock, but it reveals some very serious infrastructural and planning challenges.

Detroit-area’s Wayne County Airport Authority (WCAA), which includes Detroit Metropolitan Airport (DTW for those who live by airport codes) and Willow Run Airport (YIP), partnered with Michigan State University (MSU) Extension Office to grow such plants. The Michigan Energy Office awarded a grant of $476,000 to support the AgriEnergy Technology Demonstration project.

While DTW and YIP airports have approximately 1,700 acres of property potentially suitable for bioenergy crops, an initial trial began with three acres of airport-owned land dedicated to biofuel crops. WCAA leased MSU Extension those three acres, where biofuel crops are already growing and will soon be harvested, refined and tested. The crops include canola and oriental mustard seed. Other crops being used for biofuel include the non-food plant Camelina, which Honeywell is using for its Green Jet Fuel.

The project has potential to spread to more acres, and to provide new businesses opportunities for the Detroit metro area.

“WCAA has been interested in exploring the potential of developing airport-owned property around both airports for bioenergy production for some time,” said WCAA Interim CEO Genelle M. Allen. “If successful, this project could attract businesses to the vicinity of the airports that would produce alternative fuels for use in aircraft and other vehicles. This project has possibilities for not only bringing economic development to Southeast Michigan, but also protecting land around our airports from further encroachment.”

The grant also includes bioenergy sites on other types of land not traditionally used for growing biofuel crops such as vacant urban lots and highway right-of-ways. Detroit has several projects proposing to use empty lots around the city for gardens and farmland.

“This grant provides Michigan an opportunity to transition into the green energy sector with the potential to reduce our dependence on foreign oil imports and create needed jobs,” said MSU Extension Project Manager Dennis Pennington. Pennington’s expectations are to be able to determine the economic impact of growing, refining, storing and transporting the biomass as a “drop in” fuel alternative, which is compatible with existing fuel systems.

Refined biodiesel can be added to fuel in current fuel tank farms at the airports without modification.

Photo via hudson-river-park.com

With employment flatlining stateside and at least one major western economy on the verge of collapse, it’s worth asking whether there are any surefire means of stimulating the economy. Nancy Folbre, an economics professor at the University of Amherst, thinks she’s found one: bicycles.

In a blog post at the New York Times, Folbre argues that there’s a “dividend” on public sector spending on bike infrastructure. She doesn’t give an exact number, but her implication is that for every taxpayer dollar spent on bike lanes, the public receives X amount in residual economic benefits, in the form of a healthier citizenry, decreased pollution and less traffic. And she implies that the relationship between public spending and residual economic benefits is non-linear—in other words, social and economic benefits will actually accelerate after certain capital costs (for things like bike lanes, bikeshare subsidies, cycle tracks, etc.) are cleared and people begin biking en masse:

For bicyclists, increased numbers often lead to increased safety. As bike paths on roads attract larger numbers of cyclists, the chance of car-related accidents declines, promoting further use. Safety appears to be a major factor for women in particular.

As more people ride to work, cultural norms shift — bike commuting begins to seem less quirky. Businesses begin to recognize the benefits of providing facilities for showering and changing clothes (cheaper per person than car-parking spots).

These changes, in turn, can promote more biking. Build it and they will come: increased supply can increase demand.

So a small amount of public spending can yield tangible benefits that vastly exceed their costs. Bike infrastructure is a sound investment. But how sound? Folbre’s analysis comes with some major caveats. The very idea of a “cycling dividend” is based on two assumptions: firstly, that at least some cycle commuters bike instead of driving, and secondly, that pro-bike policies will necessarily take cars off the road. The first assumption is shaky at best—in a place like New York, car ownership per household is already quite low, and few people have the luxury of deciding whether they want to bike or drive to work (in fact, Streetsblog says that New York car ownership might actually be increasing, despite the growth of New York’s bike infrastructure). And in a sprawling megalopolis like Washington, DC, biking to work from the suburbs isn’t really an option. If cycle commuters do take cars off the road, they do so within a high-density context that doesn’t reflect urban realities in much of the United States.

The second assumption works off of a European-style model whereby car and bike use are necessarily in opposition to one another. But are they? Folbre quotes a study by Rutgers University’s John Pucher that found that “40 percent of all automobile trips in metropolitan areas are less than two miles – a distance easily biked.” That proves that a lot of car-owning city dwellers really shouldn’t be driving as much as they do. But it doesn’t prove that they’re willing to stop driving just because bike infrastructure reaches a certain level of development.

Of course, cities benefit from their bike networks in ways that aren’t easily quantifiable. Portland’s reputation as America’s bike Mecca has certainly helps the city’s image, as well as outsiders’ perception of its quality of life—which is just the kind of thing that helps attract new residents. And more cyclists means more business for bike retailers and repair shops, as well as more jobs for people building biking networks:

Construction of bike paths offers more job creation per infrastructure dollar than investment in roads. (For more details, see this recent study by my University of Massachusetts colleague Heidi Garrett-Peltier, who analyzed 58 projects in 11 cities, using an input-output model to measure employment impact).

There is a “biking dividend”—but it might have more to do with a city’s prestige and reputation, as well as its local biking economy, than with any unproven ability to take cars off the road.

Photo from Andre Alforque via Flickr

Hybrid owners in Los Angeles haven’t just been saving gas and money thanks to their choice in cars: They’ve also been saving time. That’s because of a law that allows hybrid cars to ride in the carpool lanes, even when there’s only one person in the car. But the Los Angeles Times reports that the law was changed last Friday, forcing hybrid owners back into the regular lanes. Conventional car owners couldn’t be happier, as evidenced by one carpooler who was interviewed:

“I figure it’s cheating—like, ‘Why do they get the special pass?’ Plus there’s a gazillion hybrids on the road now,” he said. Carpoolers are “the ones really making an impact by relieving traffic and saving mileage by having three people in the car. We figure we’re doing the admirable thing and those guys are kind of cheating.”

Although his estimate of the number of hybrids on the roads of L.A. is off by a few (it’ s actually 85,000, not a gazillion) it’ s hard to argue with the logic that three people in a car that gets 30 MPG. is actually a greener alternative than one person in a car that gets 60 MPG. Carpoolers are also happy to see the hybrids go because they claim that hybrid owners tend to drive slower in order to increase fuel efficiency. Combine the high number of hybrids on the road and their supposedly slow driving speeds, and it’s easy to see why hybrids are the first to get the blame when carpool lanes are clogged to a crawl at rush hour.

But will removing the hybrids really make a difference? Marco Ruano, chief of freeway
operations for L.A., doesn’t think so:

“To have a measurable impact on traffic, you really need to talk about significant changes in volume or demand, and this isn’t big enough to really create any significant change one way or the other to either the [high-occupancy vehicle] lanes or the general-purpose lanes,” Ruano said.

The hybrid’s carpool passes are being revoked to compensate for 40,000 new passes that will be issued next year to owners of plug-in hybrids and electric cars, to encourage commuters to purchase the latest fuel efficient vehicles. That means that any drop in traffic now will be corrected in 2012 when the next generation of sustainable vehicles nudge their way back into the lanes. Not to mention the fact that roads, like nature, abhor a vacuum; if the carpool lanes really do get less crowded then more carpoolers will appear to pick up the slack.

Carpool commuters in L.A. shouldn’t expect their drive to get smoother any time soon. But at least some of them might then be encouraged to switch to mass transit, right?

Um, maybe not.

After voting 5-4 to approve a drastically weakened third version, the plan will undergo a final reading in August, at which point council members could still change votes. The reduced plan proposes to add 59 miles of on-street bicycle lanes and routes for $230,000, 64 miles of off-street paths for $40 million, and 149 miles of sidewalks for $15 million.

Voting against the plan, councilman Mel LeBlanc said “The city of the future is not the city that puts bike paths in, It’s the city that has a very low tax rate.”

Also voting against it, “clean-air champion” mayor Robert Cluck thought the plan seemed too recreational. Ironically, the weakened plan removed more on-street facilities and left the infinitely more expensive recreational trails in place. A relative bargain, the 59 miles of on street facilities cost only $3,898 per mile. Despite his vote against it, the mayor took fire from the opposition who accused him of having socialist, extreme green agendas.

The opposition in Arlington comes in contrast to the wildly popular Complete Streets initiatives pursued in DFW cities by the Bike Friendly Oak Cliff and Better Block groups. Events like last weekend’s Ross Ave Better Boulevard bring national attention to DFW by redefining urban spaces to prioritize people over automobile traffic. Just next door, Fort Worth’s mayor cut the ribbon this week to commemorate new bike lanes going in.

According to Arlington’s Planning Director, Jim Parajon, parking will be allowed in the bike lanes, presumably to appease opponents of the plan.

Washington DC Metro Subway

After the Red Line crash of 2009, which killed nine people and brought untold humiliation to the Washington Metro Area Transit Authority, senator Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) requested a Government Accountability Office report on the capitol region’s public transit system. It’s not hard to see why Metro is a matter of federal concern. Much of the system runs through the District of Columbia, which is (at least partially) under the direct jurisdiction of the federal government; Metro itself receives $391 million in federal subsidies. Tens of thousands of government employees use the Metro each day. And perhaps most importantly, the Red Line disaster revealed glaring infrastructural failings just a few miles from the seat of American government. In that respect, the crash was a small-scale national embarrassment, and it’s well within the government’s responsibility to ensure that that sort of thing doesn’t happen again.

The GAO report was released early this week. And while its language is bureaucratic (as GAO reports tend to be), it gives the unmistakable and damning impression that the WMATA board basically has no idea what it’s doing. From page 30 of the report:

Following the fatal June 2009 rail accident, WMATA board members and management have been tasked by NTSB and other stakeholders with making WMATA a safer system. However, the absence of a clear delineation of the board’s roles and responsibilities for providing oversight of management as well as the absence of a board-driven strategic vision raise concerns about WMATA’s ability to systematically and effectively confront its many challenges.

WMATA currently has some elements of effective governance in place. However, board members and WMATA senior officials described a culture in which there is a lack of clarity about the roles of the board and individual board members, which has resulted in their overreach into management responsibilities.

To recap: not only does WMATA leadership lack any kind of long-term strategic outlook—it also barely knows what it’s supposed to be doing and what purpose it serves. The Washington metro area is home to around 7 million people, and includes the capitol of the world’s only remaining superpower. How was its public transit system even allowed to get to this point?

The report offers a partial answer. Because the Metro runs through two states and the District of Columbia, it is structured so that all four of its major public-sector stakeholders have roughly the same institutional clout. For instance, Maryland, Virginia, DC local government and the federal government all have an equal number of representatives on Metro’s governing board. But each stakeholder has vastly different regional and political interests—for instance, a General Service Organization-appointed federal representative might care about cost overruns more than a gubernatorially-appointed board member from Maryland.

Things like the dizzyingly confusing process for electing board members (which is vastly different jurisdiction-to-jurisdiction), and the report’s chapter on the system’s organizational structure gives the impression that WMATA is overly-bureaucratic and incredibly slow-moving. In reality, WMATA is exactly that. This blog post from Greater Greater Washington explains in some detail how the system’s deterioration is due to the Metro board’s total lack of assertiveness in solving Metro rail’s maintenance problem. A lack of organizational competence and strategic foresight can have very real and very expensive consequences.

Like many other American cities, the capitol region needs a safe, affordable and well-maintained public transit system. The GAO report paints a relatively dire picture of the state of the WMATA. But now that its problems are a matter of non-partisan public record, it can hopefully begin a long and constructive process of institutional reform.