(The Virginian-Pilot posted the following article on its website on July 30.)
WASHINGTON — Congress on Friday passed sweeping highway and mass transit legislation that will send nearly $300 billion to the states to build and fix roads, create thousands of new jobs and – lawmakers hope – save lives and cut hours wasted in traffic jams.
The bill “will affect every American in some way,” said Sen. James Jeffords, I-Vt. “The impact of this bill will be felt for decades to come.”
The 91-4 vote in the Senate came hours after the House approved the measure, 412-8.
The bill would channel about $4.7 billion to Virginia over the next five y ears for highway projects – up from about $3.6 billion in the previous five-year period.
Virginia transportation officials were elated at the increase. “We have so many needs. This just means we’ll be able to address them sooner,” said Mary Lynn Tischer, a transportation adviser to Gov. Mark R. Warner.
Among local projects for which lawmakers earmarked money are improvements to Dominion Boulevard in Chesapeake and a study of potential upgrades to U.S. 460 between western Tidewater and Petersburg.
Besides the increase in highway money for Virginia, the bill includes money for mass-
transit and freight-rail projects.
Tischer said she had not been able to determine how much transit and rail money would flow to Virginia under the bill. But she said Congress did approve $90 million to modify tunnels and make other changes to rail routes in Virginia, West Virginia and Ohio, so that Norfolk Southern Corp. would be able to increase the number of double-stack container trains it runs from Hampton Roads to the Midwest.
Sen. John W. Warner, a member of the House-Senate conference committee that worked out the final details of the bill, said in a statement that the measure provides “record funding” for the state’s transportation needs.
President Bush, in a statement, promised to sign the bill that “will strengthen and modernize the transportation networks vital to America’s continued economic growth.”
After the bill passed both houses, lawmakers streamed out of the Capitol, heading home for their summer break carrying promises of new highway and bridge projects, rail and bus facilities, and bike paths and recreational trails .
Under the legislation, each state would receive a share of federal highway money depending on their contributions – through the federal gas tax – to the Highway Trust Fund. The bill, running more than 1,000 pages, also specifies thousands of projects requested by individual members.
The projects range from two bridges in Alaska, one named for House Transportation Committee Chairman Don Young, R-Alaska, paid for at more than $450 million, to $72,000 for a bus in Cornwall, N.Y.
Taxpayers for Common Sense, which lists 6,361 of these projects valued at $23 billion, and other watchdog groups say such projects are wasteful, handed out as political rewards.
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., cited dozens of what he suggested were questionable projects in a highway bill, including $3 million to pay for the production of a documentary about infrastructure advancements in Alaska.
The bill, he said, is “terrifying in its fiscal consequences and disappointing for the lack of fiscal discipline.”
Joining McCain in voting against the bill were Sens. John Cornyn, R-Texas, Judd Gregg, R-N.H., and Jon Kyl, R-Ariz.
But other lawmakers say the projects are determined on merit and see them as essential to their states and communities.
They say money for infrastructure is well spent when congestion costs American drivers 3.6 billion hours of delay and 5.7 billion gallons of wasted fuel every year. Substandard road conditions and roadside hazards are a factor in nearly one-third of the 42,000 traffic fatalities annually, officials say, and every $1 billion in highway construction creates 47,500 jobs.
“I don’t think there is anything this Congress could do more definitively to put people back to work, to stimulate our economy to increase our efficiency, our competitiveness, both nationally and internationally,” said Rep. Peter DeFazio of Oregon, a top Democrat on the Transportation Committee.
The bill allots more than
$50 billion for transit programs and $6 billion for safety.
The legislation covers 2004- 09 and comes nearly two years after the 1998-2003 act expired. Congress on Friday had to approve the 12th temporary extension of the old act to keep money flowing to the states while it tried to come up with a new bill.