“The devastating effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and associated lockdowns on various forms of transportation create an opportunity to review the successes and failures of federal transport policies before Congress reauthorizes federal highway and transit programs,” says a report that will be released by the Cato Institute tomorrow. Antiplanner readers can get a preview copy today.
Back in the 1970s, the Carter administration imposed a zero-based budgeting process on first Georgia and later the federal government, requiring that every agency justify every dollar of its budget every year, as opposed to just justifying budget increases. This was probably a good idea once, or once every ten years, but not every year as it required too much bureaucratic overhead to implement.
In the same way, Congress and government agencies shouldn’t have to review transportation policies every year or even every six years when those policies are renewed. But sometimes the reality has changed so much that such a review is necessary. This is one of those times.
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The paper notes that a major change in transportation policy took place between 1970 and 1991. Before then, federal transportation spending focused on extending new technologies, such as railroads, air travel, and highways, to more people. Increasingly since 1970, it focused instead on restoring old technologies such as light rail and intercity passenger trains in an apparently fruitless effort to get people to drive and fly less.
The pandemic should confirm to everyone that this newer policy has been a complete failure. Moreover, it also revealed that, in the face of epidemics, natural disasters, financial crisis, and other unexpected events, our most resilient form of transportation is motor vehicles and highways.
Federal transportation policy, the paper concludes, should focus not on subsidizing transportation but on finding ways to make transportation pay for itself. In turn, this will ensure that infrastructure is resilient and well maintained and that transportation agencies are more responsive to user needs than to political fads.
I would hope policy makers would heed the Antiplanner’s advice but I predict they won’t.
Joe and Pete are not driven by stuff like resiliency, ZBB or benefit to cost ratios. They are controlled by the self serving transportation industrial complex and their unions.
Those who feed on the pork will fight harder to keep the pork coming than the rest of us will to end it. And the Joe’s and Pete’s who dole it out will remain highly compensated for doing so.
The Antiplanner is pissing in the wind.
I understand why Henry Porter feels like he does and the points he makes are very valid. Still, one never knows. Often advocates will fight for seemingly lost causes for many years before they are at least partially successful. In any case, I hope The Antiplanner keeps it up. At least his rational voice makes me feel that there is hope for us.
There’s nothing I’d like more than to be wrong about this, Builder, but I will point out that the last Administration was the best hope any of us had for reversing this downward spiral in more than a generation and look where we are. This Administration has every appearance of business as usual.
O’Toole, Cato and Reason are the loudest voices I hear. I hope they keep it up, too.
Whoa, I don’t agree with that. Donald Trump was almost entirely self serving and had no interest in reforming anything. Joe Biden appears to be his own kind of awful but we need to to be realistic about everybody.
Google “Amtrak funding trump” and “California high speed rail trump”.
A generation is 20-30 years. Which of the presidents since Bush 1 would you say has offered a better opportunity? Which one has put us on a better path to fixing our sick transportation system?
I’m no Trump fan but I think American would have been better off with four more years of him than 4 years of Biden.
I second Builder on this.
Why are conservatives and supposed libertarians extolling Trump’s supposed virtues (“the last Administration was the best hope any of us had for reversing this downward spiral in more than a generation”) when Trump was a Democrat in the 2000s and a statist throughout his presidency?
Trump had no interest in “draining the swamp”; he only cares about himself, and he drastically increased federal spending. I mean, this is the guy who fought to have his signature on the first “stimulus” checks and a letter sent out to everyone with his signature. You know, so you know who bought your vote come November.
There is no hope for reversing the downward spiral, especially through the political process, which is a sham–because if voting changed anything, it would be illegal and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Jefferson knew that the trend was for liberty to yield and government to gain ground. HL Mencken knew that all elections were an advanced auction on stolen goods.
The state will have to collapse under its own weight, but no one person (or administration) can or will reduce the bureaucracy and bloat. If you believe otherwise, you’re haven’t been paying attention.