The Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs held a hearing yesterday on how last year’s infrastructure law will “advance” transit. Three of the witnesses represented transit agencies or transit unions and all talked about how the law will fund new transit projects, but none talked about whether those projects would lead to more riders.
In contrast, testimony from the Antiplanner argued that taxpayers have spent well over $1.5 trillion in the last 50 years only to see transit ridership per urban resident decline. The new spending will enrich engineering and construction firms but not lead to more riders. My testimony begins at 55:30; here is my written testimony and here is my speaking text.
Except for ranking committee member Pat Toomey, the only senators in attendance were Democrats. They were less interested in my dire predictions than in hearing from the agency representatives about how excited they were to have more money to spend. Continue reading
