September 12, 2019 – A draft of a stopgap continuing appropriations measure for the opening days of fiscal year 2020 does not repeal the July 1, 2020 rescission of $7.6 billion in highway contract authority but does delay across-the-board cuts in mass transit apportionments for 2020 and makes a key change in appropriations language for the mass transit Capital Investment Grants program.
September 9, 1959 – On this day 60 years ago – September 9, 1959 – the White House announced that President Eisenhower was requesting a bailout of the Highway Trust Fund – a $359 million “repayable advance” appropriation from the general fund of the Treasury. To celebrate this inauspicious anniversary, ETW has published a series of three in-depth articles, based on original documents from the Eisenhower Presidential Library and the records of the Commerce and Treasury Departments, the Bureau of the Budget, and the House Ways and Means Committee at the National Archives. The articles explore how the Trust Fund was spent into near-insolvency and how Congress and the Eisenhower Administration fixed it.
The conclusion of this series examines how the Eisenhower Administration was able to force a gasoline tax increase on an extremely reluctant Congress in July-September 1959.
September 6, 2019 –
September 6, 2019 – The sponsors of the proposed Hudson River Tunnel replacement project on August 23 announced that they have submitted a revised financial plan to the Federal Transit Administration that lowers the cost of the project by $1.4 billion.
September 6, 2019 – The U.S. Department of Transportation on August 29 announced that 20 highway bridge replacement projects would split $225 million in grant money provided by the 2018 omnibus appropriations act as part of a one-time-only competitive bridge grant program for rural states.
September 5, 2019 – Yesterday, the White House issued an official endorsement of a version of language banning mass transit rolling stock procurements from Chinese manufacturers that includes buses as well as railcars, in a blow to electric bus manufacturer BYD.
September 5, 2019 – The White House Office of Management and Budget sent its list of requests for special treatment in the forthcoming stopgap continuing appropriations measure that Congress must enact by September 30 – and that list does not include fixes for pending highway and mass transit funding problems, as advocates had hoped.
Wednesday, September 11 – House Transportation and Infrastructure – Subcommittee on Highways and Transit – subcommittee hearing on congestion pricing for roadways (witness list here) – 10:00 a.m., 2167 Rayburn. Wednesday, September 11 – Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation – full committee oversight hearing on the Transportation Security Administration –…
September 5, 2019 – The Federal Highway Administration has given an additional $4.0 billion in use-it-or-lose-it highway funding authority to state DOTs for fiscal year 2019, which they must obligate by September 30.