With so much attention on permitting reform, both in the context of a surface transportation reauthorization law and a stand-alone permitting law, there are ample opportunities for Congress to enact changes that meaningfully improve coordination, timelines, and outcomes. This paper argues that in the context of transportation projects, outside of a major rethink of how all the resource protection laws and environmental review laws work, the most straightforward and yet meaningful approach would be to focus on the existing authorities already in law that could be expanded or clarified to improve their uptake.

This paper starts with an overview of how environmental review and permitting requirements are often misunderstood and why they can lead to significant delay. Section 2 provides a brief review of the major changes that have been added to permitting processes for surface transportation projects in the last couple of decades. Finally, Section 3 proposes language to expand and clarify, examples in other infrastructure sectors that could be replicated, and provisions that are underutilized for reasons that should be better understood.