Engineering Inc. - May/June 2007 - 13

Some have suggested cutting federal infrastructure investments to address a possible funding shortfall. I reject this shortsighted view. Instead, we must find ways to generate the revenue necessary to fully fund these critically important infrastructure programs. Raymond: What about looking long term? Do you have in mind a range of funding options that the committee and Congress should consider for reauthorization? Oberstar: public investments by all levels of government are not keeping pace with the growing demands on our infrastructure. The recently issued 2006 Conditions & performance report estimates that the average annual cost just to maintain our highways and bridges at their current condition and performance for the next 20 years is $78.8 billion, 12.2 percent higher than the capital investment by all levels of government in 2004. Comparable capital cost for transit systems is $15.8 billion per year, 25 percent higher than actual investment in 2004. Of course, the investments needed to improve those highways, bridges and transit systems will cost more. These figures clearly indicate the magnitude of our challenge. We must identify ways to improve the long-term financial viability of the Highway Trust Fund in order to support the investments needed to keep our economy competitive in the global marketplace. The Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure has begun a series of hearings evaluating the long-term adequacy of the existing funding mechanisms for surface transportation investment programs. The present system has some obvious flaws. For example, the purchasing power of gas tax revenues has, over time, been eroded by inflation. Over the last decade, the current gas tax has lost more than one-quarter of its purchasing power. Today, one dollar in the Highway Trust Fund is equal to about 46 cents in 1980 and about 21 cents in 1970. In addition, the cost of construction mate- rials has increased dramatically in recent years, further diminishing the purchasing power of Highway Trust Fund revenues. Restoring the purchasing power of the gas tax to the level it equaled in 1993 would require an increase of about 5 or 6 cents a gallon. preserving this purchasing power by indexing the gas tax to adjust for inflation would increase the tax by about .5 cents per gallon per year. We should have done this in SAFeTeA–lU, and we will continue to look at this issue as we address future funding challenges. We need to be very careful when we privatize public assets—whether by sale or long-term concession—that we do not turn functions that are fundamentally governmental in nature over to private operators, which could potentially harm the public’s interests. MacMurray: As you know, there continues to be interest in leveraging private financing through public-private partnerships as a means for putting more funding into transportation needs. What role do you see for such an approach as part of the reauthorization of SAFETEA-LU? Oberstar: Some have recommended that because federal and state governments seem to lack the political will to raise the fuel tax, we should devolve the federal highway and transit programs to the states and local communities, which can tap into the financial resources of the private sector to fund their respective transportation projects. This proposal would supplant the current federal-state relationship, which has been very successful, with stillevolving public-private partnerships. I do not support this approach. It is true that private entrepreneurs can bring technological, managerial and financial innovations to help accelerate the implementation of complex projects. We should encourage such private-sector participation in project financing and construction. However, I am not convinced that 50 states, each pursuing their separate transportation priorities with their respective private-sector partners, will, in the end, produce a coherent, integrated national surface transportation system using numerous public-private partnerships. Such a national system can only emerge with strong federal leadership, just as when the interstate system was proposed and subsequently established. We need to be very careful when we privatize public assets—whether by sale or long-term concession—that we do not turn functions that are fundamentally governmental in nature over to private operators, which could potentially harm the public’s interests. Raymond: ACEC members are very active in lobbying for bills to improve our nation’s water and transportation infrastructure, such as H.R. 720 and WRDA. What guidance can you offer as to what is the most effective way to lobby these types of bills in Congress? Oberstar: We also will soon have reauthorization of FAA and the Airport Improvement Construction program, where your members will do the design and the engineering and oversee the construction to make sure all these projects come into being. As a result, you bring a level of credibility to the issue that members of Congress just do not possess. When ACeC comes in and says that this is important for America, that this is important to rebuild our aging infrastructure, to deliver goods and services and sustain and extend the mobility for people in our society, that is so persuasive and so powerful a message. n MAY / JUNE 2007 ENGINEERING INC. 13
Engineering Inc. - May/June 2007

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Engineering Inc. - May/June 2007
