INTERNATIONAL NEWS
The Globe and Mail: Done right, infrastructure boosts our economy and society
Friday’s Speech from the Throne will unveil the road map for Canada’s new government. Perhaps nothing differentiated the main parties during the election more than the Liberals’ commitment to stimulate our economy by investing in infrastructure. By expanding the scope of what gets built, and adopting an innovative approach to how projects are delivered, there is an opportunity to improve both social and economic bottom lines.
NATIONAL NEWS
The Hill: Lawmakers drive to finish $305B highway bill
http://thehill.com/policy/transportation/261926-lawmakers-drive-to-finish-305b-highway-bill
Lawmakers are driving to finish work on a $305 billion highway bill that would guarantee federal transportation spending for the next five years.
The Hill: GOP, Dems battle over riders as deadline nears
http://thehill.com/policy/finance/261902-gop-dems-battle-over-riders-as-deadline-nears
Republicans and Democrats are locking horns over policy additions to an enormous federal spending package as the clock ticks ever closer to a government shutdown.
The Hill: House to vote Thursday on $305B highway bill
http://thehill.com/policy/transportation/261836-house-to-vote-thursday-on-305b-highway-bill
The House is expected to vote Thursday on the $305 billion highway bill that was introduced this week by lawmakers.
The Hill: WH: Obama will sign $305B highway bill
http://thehill.com/policy/transportation/261831-wh-obama-will-sign-305b-highway-bill
President Obama will sign the $305 billion highway bill introduced this week by lawmakers in the House and Senate, the White House said Wednesday.
The Hill: $305B highway bill limits tolling expansion
http://thehill.com/policy/transportation/261797-305b-highway-bill-limits-tolling-expansio
The $305 billion highway bill that has been introduced by lawmakers in the House and Senate this week would make it harder for states to add tolls to U.S. highways.
Reason.com: Is Infrastructure Spending a Good Investment?
https://reason.com/archives/2015/12/03/is-infrastructure-spending-a-good-invest
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has a plan to jump-start the economy. It would require an additional $250 billion in federal infrastructure spending over five years—on top of the $250 billion over the next five years that Congress already wants to spend—along with the creation of a $25 billion federal infrastructure bank.
STATE NEWS
Bloomberg: The Dumbest Way to Fund America's Infrastructure
http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-12-02/the-dumbest-way-to-fund-america-s-infrastructure
Writing in Fortune in January 2004, my View colleague Justin Fox wrote that the Interstate System was heralded as the greatest public works project ever. That it was. And it did, as promised, lead to an America that is more mobile, less plagued by regional differences, and vastly wealthier than before.
Next City: Mayors Make $5 Billion-Plus Resilience Promise
https://nextcity.org/daily/entry/mayors-resilience-pledge-10-percent-cop21-100rc
More than a dozen city leaders have committed today to dedicate 10 percent of their annual budgets to projects and planning that will make their cities more resilient.
WUSA: DC ranked 4th best city for public transit
http://www.wusa9.com/story/news/local/dc/2015/12/02/dc-ranked-4th-best-city-public-transit/76678494/
WASHINGTON (WUSA9) -- Despite the many headaches D.C. Metro commuters seem to get from using public transit, it turns out Washington, D.C. was ranked as one of the top 10 best cities for public transit by Walk Score.
Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Is Georgia ready to leave its anti-transit past in the past?
“I want to be clear on something with regard to MARTA and transit in general. One of the things about enacting the best policies is the willingness to change your opinion when new data and new facts are presented. I don’t know if MARTA will expand, and if it does, I don’t know what it might look like.
The Stranger: Seattle Subway's Case for "Going Big" on the Light Rail Measure We'll Be Voting on Next Year
On Tuesday morning, the scrappy nonprofit Seattle Subway released a new video laying out their vision for expanding light rail all over the Puget Sound.
Times Free Press: City begins issuing warning citations over blocking bike lanes
A new wrinkle has been added to the Broad Street bike lane saga. The Chattanooga Parking Authority began issuing warning citations Tuesday to those who block the relatively new lanes that stretch six-tenths of a mile along Broad Street downtown.
Houston Chronicle: Bike safety remains elusive goal two years after fatal incident
Chelsea Norman pedaled home from her job at Whole Foods on the warm December night, likely wearing a flashing red light she often clipped to her sweater after dark. But nothing stopped a tan pickup at Waugh and West Gray driven by a woman named Margaret Mayer. Lost after a night of drinking with friends, she fled the scene after striking Norman's bike, shattering her windshield. Threads from Norman's clothing were later removed from the truck's fender.
WABE: Curbed Editor: Atlanta's Walkable Future Means Paid Parking
http://news.wabe.org/post/curbed-editor-atlantas-walkable-future-means-paid-parking
Free parking might be disappearing from intown Atlanta neighborhoods and Michael Kahn, an editor with Curbed Atlanta and architect at Rosser International, says that's a good thing.
POLTICO Morning Transportation
By Jennifer Scholtes | 12/03/2015 05:43 AM EDT
With help from Heather Caygle, Lauren Gardner and Martine Powers
TRANSPORTATION PLAN SET FOR SWIFT ACCEPTANCE: Not to jinx this thing before it's really a done deal, but five years of steady transportation funding seems to be in the bag now. The House plans to easily adopt the conference report this morning, and the Senate is expected to follow suit by next week at the latest.
Buying time?: Sitting through the celebratory House Rules Committee meeting on Wednesday as lawmakers prepped the conference report (H. Rept. 114-357) for floor action, our Heather Caygle noted that lawmakers might have to pass another short-term policy extension before transportation authority expires on Friday night, since the Senate and White House will probably need some extra time to turn the long-term proposal into law. Rep. Peter DeFazio with some real talk: "It's just sort of the mechanics of muddling through the Senate swamp and then getting the president to pull out his pen. So you know, I think it can be as early as Tuesday, but Wednesday might be safer." The Senate swamp might not be such a slow-moving quagmire this time, though. Senate leaders have alerted legislators that the chamber is expected to consider the conference report today.
'A first step': Regardless of when the legislation lands on his desk, the president is definitely going to pull out that pen, White House spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters on Wednesday. "If it's passed, the president would sign it," he said. "We would actually view this legislation as a step in the right direction, but only a first step." Earnest noted that the $305 billion plan doesn't actually fulfill the full funding dreams the Obama administration proposed for transportation projects this year.
IT'S THURSDAY: Good morning and thanks for tuning into POLITICO's Morning Transportation, your daily tipsheet on all things trains, planes, automobiles and ports.
This week we're thrilled to welcome a new reporter to our team: Martine Powers, a formidable journalist with public radio chops, metro-desk cred from The Boston Globe and some exotic new passport stamps from her work as a Fulbright fellow in South America. So start inundating her inbox with transportation-related press releases and networking invites: mpowers@politico.com or @martinepowers.
Reach out: jscholtes@politico.com or @jascholtes.
"There's a port on a western bay, and it serves a hundred ships a day."
NO LOVE FOR RED-LIGHT REVENUE: Congress isn't budging on resistance to red-light cameras. Martine reports that, just as in MAP-21, the multiyear highway and transit bill will prevent states from using federal funds to pay for "automated traffic enforcement systems" that capture traffic light scofflaws or highway speedsters. Still, the new bill will require states paying for their own traffic enforcement tech to conduct biennial surveys on the number and safety effects of all their cameras. From the Governors Highway Safety Association's Kara Macek: "There's an irony there that states are required to study the effectiveness of a program that they're not allowed to implement."
A CALMER COUNTDOWN TO POTENTIAL SHUTDOWN: Federal funding expires in just over a week, but panic isn't setting in the way it usually does as deadline day nears. Even though leaders from both parties are still duking it out over what a catchall spending bill should entail, and a short-term patch may be in order, congressional aides say a government shutdown is unlikely this month. So folks over at DOT, plus those running the rest of the federal government, probably don't need to whip out their doomsday contingency plans just yet. POLITICO's Jake Sherman and John Bresnahan report that "Capitol Hill has entered the deal-swap phase, as Democrats and Republicans trade proposals to fund the federal government for the next year. ... The back-and-forth is certainly late in the game, but it does represent an important development: the two sides are actively swapping proposals and that could help them whittle down their differences."
Taking temps: On the Senate side of the Capitol, Democrats plan to huddle today to discuss just how they want to approach deal-making on the omnibus appropriations plan, as well as pending tax legislation. POLITICO's Burgess Everett explains that "Democrats believe they will have to provide most of the votes for the spending bill and are testing how far their rank and file is willing to go in negotiations with the GOP."
SENIORS REMAIN FASTEST-GROWING DRIVER DEMOGRAPHIC: DOT is out with new data this week showing that there are more licensed drivers in the U.S. than ever before and that a big chunk of that stat accounts for folks 50 or older. In 2014, more than 214 million people held drivers licenses in the U.S., and nearly 96 million (or almost 45 percent) of those were 50+. In 2014, the number of drivers aged 85 or older increase by 2.9 percent over the previous year - a number that makes the age group the fastest-growing driver demographic in the nation.
Safety steps: DOT says the new figures match its predictions of a 77-percent increase among drivers over age 65 by 2045. "FHWA researchers have pioneered a variety of safety enhancements for America's roads - such as cutting-edge retroreflective laminates which make highway signs brighter and more visible from greater distances - to address the needs of older drivers, which range from declining vision to decreased flexibility and psychomotor performance, and changes in perceptual and cognitive performance," the department explained along with the new data.
Teen decline: At the same time, fewer teens are taking the wheel. While teenagers accounted for 8.9 million of the nation's drivers in 2013, that number fell to 8.4 million in 2014.
AMTRAK STILL PLEADS FOR MORE CASH AS RIDERSHIP STEADIES: Amtrak's growth has essentially flatlined this year at 30.8 million riders, which is just a tad below its fiscal 2014 numbers. That data is important, our Kathryn A. Wolfe explains , because "Amtrak regularly uses its robust ridership growth to argue for more money from Congress. ... And now that ridership appears to be holding steady, Amtrak is deploying the same argument with a slightly different tack, saying 'significant and predictable investment is needed to ensure that intercity passenger rail will continue to deliver nationwide benefits including providing safe and reliable mobility and advancing America's economy.'"
U.S. TRUCKS TO TRUMP EU FLEETS ON EMISSIONS: The Volkswagen defeat device scandal has shone a spotlight on one part of the air pollution arena - vehicle emissions standards - where the U.S. is harder on polluters than the European Union. And our Lauren Gardner notes that it turns out the same can be said for the U.S.'s work on cutting carbon from the heavy-duty vehicle fleet, too. The International Council on Clean Transportation is out with a report today showing that CO2 emissions from the U.S. and EU truck fleets are projected to diverge, with American trucks becoming more efficient than their European counterparts thanks to technology-forcing regulations.
Shared efficiency: Many of the dominant truck manufacturers in the EU are also prevalent in the U.S., meaning the technologies American trucks are using now to drive more efficiently could be readily adopted in Europe, where the heavy-duty fleet accounts for one-third of the region's CO2 emissions from the transportation sector. The paper comes as government officials from around the world are hashing out a global agreement to curb the greenhouse gas emissions responsible for warming the planet.
** A message from the Coalition for Efficient and Responsible Trucking: We can dramatically reduce truck congestion and prevent over 900 truck-related accidents every year through a tried and tested five-foot extension in the length of twin trailers. Learn more about the amazing accident-free track record of twin 33s at http://efficientandresponsible.org/twin33s **
SETTING AN EVER-HIGHER BAR: Enactment of a five-year plan to keep the Highway Trust Fund plush means lawmakers will be off the hook for nearly a half-decade before having to do this all over again. But setting these higher funding levels also means Congress will need to scrounge up even more cash next time. Heather thumbed through an enlightening new Congressional Budget Office analysis that says, "beginning in fiscal year 2021, ... revenues credited to the highway and transit accounts of the Highway Trust Fund would be insufficient to meet the fund's obligations" and that congressional inaction in the future could result in a nearly $100 billion shortfall by 2025.
EU NATIONS REACH IMPASSE ON PASSENGER NAME RECORDS DEAL: Across the Atlantic, members of the European Council and European Parliament are still butting heads over how long passenger name record data should be stored, causing talks to break down this week. POLITICO Europe's Zoya Sheftalovich and Florian Eder report that permanent representatives from EU member countries rejected a proposal Wednesday for "unmasked" information to be held for six months. Ministers will meet to debate the issue on Friday.
MARKEY PROBES AIRLINE CYBERSECURITY PROTOCOL: A dozen U.S. airlines, as well as Boeing and Airbus, have just over a month now to respond to a slew of questions Sen. Ed Markey has fired at them about efforts to stave off cyber intrusions and attacks. Kathy's got the lowdown on the letters , reporting that the senator has asked the companies about "any known infiltrations over the past five years ... to detail their attempts to protect passenger data, as well as protections against cyberattacks, testing regimes, and information on who installs and updates their computer systems."
THE HIGHWAY HOOKUP: A proposal that would ensure conduits for broadband cables are built into some federally funded highway projects is now off for full committee consideration in the House. Pro Technology's Alex Byers reports that the discussion draft, which moved through subcommittee on Wednesday, would require installation if federal agencies determine more broadband capacity is needed in a specific area in the next 15 years.
EUROPEAN OFFICIALS PUSH OFF KEY EMISSIONS OVERSIGHT VOTE: Our team in Brussels has learned that leaders of the European Parliament now plan to decide in two weeks if they're going to support the creation of a committee to investigate whether government watchdogging failures let emissions test cheating slip by. POLITICO Europe's Anca Gurzu and Quentin Aries report that "while a draft text obtained by POLITICO does not mention Volkswagen directly, the inquiry committee would investigate the 'alleged failure of the Commission and the member states authorities to take proper and effective action to enforce the explicit ban on defeat devices,' according to the documents."
THE AUTOBAHN (SPEED READ):
- Thanks to safe trucking, Capitol Christmas tree completes journey from Alaska. DOT's Fast Lane blog.
- Carbon dioxide from the air and shipping industries is difficult to count, especially outside nations' borders. The Wall Street Journal.
- Australia says new analysis backs search area for Flight 370. The Associated Press.
- Upton: Vehicle safety provisions protect the public. USA Today.
- UAW betting on big, symbolic win in Volkswagen vote. Detroit Free Press.
- Russian truckers target Moscow to protest road toll. Bloomberg Business.
THE COUNTDOWN: Transportation authority expires in 2 days. DOT appropriations run out in 9 days. FAA reauthorization expires in 121 days. The 2016 presidential election is in 343 days.
NEWS FROM ACROSS THE POND - POLITICO PRO EUROPE BRIEF: Are you engaged in international affairs or responsible for monitoring European policy and politics to determine their influence on the U.S.? If so, Pro's Europe Brief should be on your daily "must read" list. Written through an American lens, the Europe Brief draws on POLITICO resources in both Brussels and D.C. to track and translate key policy and regulatory developments and their impact on the U.S. Bonus: Try it for free! Download a complimentary issue of Europe Brief today.
THE DAY AHEAD:
9 a.m. - The FAA holds a special committee meeting on navigation information and electronic maps. RTCA Inc., 1150 18th St. NW, Suite 910.
9 a.m. - The Dulles Corridor Advisory Committee meets. The Center for Innovative Technology, 2214 Rock Hill Rd., the briefing room (level P-1), Herndon, Va.
10 a.m. - The Senate Judiciary Committee marks up the Nuclear Terrorism Conventions Implementation and Safety of Maritime Navigation Act (S. 1318). 226 Dirksen Senate Office Building.
11 a.m. - Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan holds a press conference to make an announcement at the Port of Baltimore. Badging Center, 2001 Broening Hwy., Baltimore, Md.
Noon - Mark Dunkerley, Hawaiian Airlines' president and CEO, speaks at an Aero Club luncheon. Capital Hilton Hotel, Presidential Ballroom, 1001 16th St. N.W.
8 p.m. - The Northern Virginia Transportation Commission holds its regular meeting. 2300 Wilson Blvd., Main Floor Conference Room, Arlington, Va.
Did we miss an event? Let MT know at transpocalendar@politicopro.com.
** A message from the Coalition for Efficient and Responsible Trucking: As more consumers than ever rely on Internet shopping and efficient package delivery, it¹s time to make our highways safer by reducing the number of large trucks on the road. Over the next decade, the Less-Than-Truckload (LTL) freight trucking sector is expected to grow by 40% unless steps are taken to make trucking more efficient. Through a modest five-foot extension in the length of twin 28-foot trailers, we can economize 6.6 million truck trips every year, significantly reducing highway congestion preventing over 900 accidents per year. Fewer trucks would significantly extend the life of our aging infrastructure, while saving 204 million gallons of fuel and reducing carbon emissions by an astonishing 4.4 billion pounds every year. Learn more about the benefits of twin 33s, including the amazing five-year, 1.5 million mile, accident-free track record of twin 33s at http://efficientandresponsible.org/twin33s **
Stories from POLITICO Pro
House tees up Thursday vote on transportation conference report Back
By Heather Caygle | 12/03/2015 05:43 AM EDT
The House is on track to pass a five-year highway and transit bill Thursday, the first truly long-term transportation package to pass the chamber in a decade, after the Rules Committee settled on debate guidelines this afternoon.
"The FAST Act represents a bipartisan, bicameral agreement. It's the first time in 10 years that we've had a long-term bill," House Transportation Chairman Bill Shuster said during the Rules meeting.
"This is a major effort that has yielded a good product," added Rep. Peter DeFazio, top Democrat on the House Transportation Committee.
The rule allows for one hour of debate before lawmakers vote on passage of the conference report.
The five-year bill (H. Rept. 114-357) is expected to easily clear House hurdles but given the tight deadline - current policy expires Dec. 4 - lawmakers might have to also pass another short-term extension to give time for the Senate to take up the bill.
"There will be one," DeFazio told reporters when asked about the possibility of extension.
A House leadership aide said there are currently no plans to do an extension but DeFazio and other sources said lawmakers are mulling a short patch, until the middle of next week.
"It's just sort of the mechanics of muddling through the Senate swamp and then getting the president to pull out his pen. So you know, I think it can be as early as Tuesday but Wednesday might be safer," DeFazio said.
Obama to sign five-year transportation bill, spokesman confirms Back
By Heather Caygle | 12/03/2015 05:43 AM EDT
The five-year highway and transit plan unveiled Tuesday is all but certain to become law after a White House spokesman confirmed President Barack Obama will sign the measure once it clears Congress.
"If it's passed, the president would sign it," spokesman Josh Earnest said during a press briefing today.
"We would actually view this legislation as a step in the right direction but only a first step," Earnest added, noting that the $305 billion plan falls far short of funding levels the administration proposed in its transportation bill earlier this year.
The House is expected to vote on the bill Thursday and then action turns to the Senate, where staffers in the upper chamber hope to shepherd the legislation through before current policy expires Friday.
But given the sometimes glacial Senate pace, Congress might have to push through one last extension before the long-term bill becomes law.
"We certainly applaud Congress' bipartisan efforts to develop a long-term surface transportation bill," Earnest said. "If passed, this legislation would be a real step forward for our transportation infrastructure after years of short-term patches."
House Dems reject first GOP government-funding bill Back
By Jake Sherman and John Bresnahan | 12/03/2015 05:43 AM EDT
House Democrats have roundly dismissed the first Republican government-funding bill, decrying it as an "unacceptable and not serious" offer, multiple sources said.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi is meeting Wednesday morning with her close inner circle and will convene a full-party meeting later in the morning. Several Democrats told POLITICO the party will not counteroffer, and will try to force the GOP to go back to the drawing board to come up with an offer more acceptable to the bipartisan majority that will be needed for passage.
The government runs out of spending authority in nine days, and the disagreement between Pelosi's Democrats and Speaker Paul Ryan's Republicans is beginning to become more pronounced. The apparent stalemate - which started yesterday - raises the odds that the House will need to pass a short-term stopgap bill to fund the government for anywhere from a few days to a week while the two parties iron out their differences. Ryan and House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy had hoped to unveil a spending package next Monday in advance of a late-week vote to avert a government shutdown. That timeline is still possible, but negotiations would need to speed up significantly. Top aides in both parties do not expect a government shutdown this month.
The yearlong omnibus spending bill that Appropriations Chairman Hal Rogers (R-Ky.) sent to Democrats Tuesday night included several policy riders the minority found unacceptable. One such provision is language that would beef up oversight of Syrian and Iraqi refugees. That bill passed the House with essentially a veto-proof majority, but Democrats are balking at including it in a must-pass yearlong government-funding bill. Some language addressing the Syrian refugee crisis will be included in the bill, as lawmakers fret about homeland security in the wake of the terrorist attack in Paris.
The GOP is mulling adding language to step up regulations on travelers in the so-called Visa Waiver Program. That program allows some travelers to remain in the U.S. for upwards of 90 days without a visa.
The legislation also lifts the oil export ban, and includes several environmental riders that the Democrats find objectionable. There are also changes to U.S.-Cuba foreign policy, and the Department of Labor's fiduciary rule.
Republicans did drop several riders Democrats did not like, including controversial immigration provisions.
If Ryan's 246-member GOP conference stuck together, Democrats would have far less sway. But dozens of Republicans typically vote against funding bills. And this legislation includes an increase in spending, due to a budget deal cut by John Boehner before he left Congress.
Senate Dems will meet for special strategy session Back
By Burgess Everett | 12/03/2015 05:43 AM EDT
Senate Democrats will hold a special caucus meeting on Thursday to hash out their end-of-year strategy, a senior Democratic aide told POLITICO.
The discussion, which will be held before a bipartisan Senate lunch, will focus on how to handle pending tax legislation and the Dec. 11 deadline for passing an omnibus spending bill.
A main point of discussion is whether the minority party can leverage the GOP's quest to end the oil export ban as a way to keep conservative riders off the spending bill or possibly expand tax credits for working class Americans. Democrats believe they will have to provide most of the votes for the spending bill and are testing how far their rank-and-file is willing to go in negotiations with the GOP.
The Senate's regular partisan lunch schedule will be interrupted by a joint lunch hosted by Sens. Tom Udall of New Mexico (D) and Roger Wicker of Mississippi (R) on Thursday.
Amtrak ridership at hold steady for first time in years Back
By Kathryn A. Wolfe | 12/03/2015 05:43 AM EDT
For the first time in years, Amtrak's ridership has stopped growing - a key statistic it has regularly used to highlight the need for greater federal investment in the national passenger railroad.
Amtrak's growth in fiscal 2015 was essentially flat, with 30.8 million riders, .1 percent below fiscal 2014, according to the railroad - though traffic in the Northeast Corridor continued to grow with 11.7 million riders, up .5 percent from fiscal 2014. Amtrak attributed the slowed growth to "service disruptions on the Northeast Corridor, significant weather events and lower gas prices."
The last time Amtrak's ridership didn't grow was in fiscal 2008, according to an Amtrak spokeswoman.
Amtrak regularly uses its robust ridership growth to argue for more money from Congress. In Amtrak's fiscal 2014 ridership report, it noted that "meeting future growth in passenger demand requires investing in the infrastructure that supports intercity passenger rail and resolving unacceptable congestion delays caused by freight railroads that own the tracks."
And now that ridership appears to be holding steady, Amtrak is deploying the same argument with a slightly different tack, saying "significant and predictable investment is needed to ensure that intercity passenger rail will continue to deliver nationwide benefits including providing safe and reliable mobility and advancing America's economy."
CBO: More funding now means bigger HTF bailout later Back
By Heather Caygle | 12/03/2015 05:43 AM EDT
The multiyear transportation bill expected to become law within the next week gives a funding boost to federal highway and transit programs but that means lawmakers will have to round up more cash to prop up the program down the road, according to the CBO.
While lawmakers signed off on higher spending levels in the final agreement, they also failed to offer any long-term, sustainable solution to fund federal highway and transit programs. That means Congress will have to pony up even more money for the Highway Trust Fund in five years, the Congressional Budget Office said today in its analysis of the bill.
"Beginning in fiscal year 2021, CBO projects, that revenues credited to the highway and transit accounts of the Highway Trust Fund would be insufficient to meet the fund's obligations," the agency wrote,
Without an influx of additional dollars down the road, the Highway Trust Fund could be facing a nearly $100 billion shortfall come 2025, CBO added.
A large chunk of the offsets in the current bill, about $60 billion, comes from tapping into the Federal Reserve's coffers, including about $53 billion that's siphoned away from the central bank's surplus fund. Another $7 billion would be funneled into the Highway Trust Fund by reducing Federal Reserve dividends.
At the end of fiscal 2020, just months before a presidential election, the Highway Trust Fund is expected to have a $10 billion balance, CBO said - $8 billion for highways and $2 billion in the transit account.
EU passenger name record talks break down Back
By Zoya Sheftalovich and Florian Eder | 12/03/2015 05:43 AM EDT
The European Council and European Parliament failed to reach agreement on a deal on the passenger name record system today, after EU member countries' permanent representatives rejected a proposal for "unmasked" data to be retained for six months.
The Parliament and Council remain divided over the length of time data that has not been stripped of details to protect the passengers' identity should be available to authorities. The Council wants so-called unmasked data to be kept for nine months (down from earlier demands of at least one year), but the Parliament's civil liberties committee, LIBE, insists on six months.
LIBE's lead negotiator on the issue, the U.K.'s Timothy Kirkhope (European Conservatives and Reformists), indicated earlier in the day that he was hopeful a deal would be struck overnight. Kirkhope said he would be ready to put the proposal to a LIBE vote if the Council agreed to further reduce the period for unmasked data storage.
To do that, the Luxembourgish presidency needed agreement from EU countries' permanent representatives. They didn't get it. France was the strongest opponent, with several others, including Belgium, Italy, Germany, Spain, the U.K. and the Czech Republic, also expressing reservations, according to an EU source.
Ministers will meet to discuss the passenger name record system on Friday.
Markey wants airlines to cough up cybersecurity info Back
By Kathryn A. Wolfe | 12/03/2015 05:43 AM EDT
Sen. Ed Markey, who's looked into information security practices with automakers, is now turning his attention to aircraft, firing off letters to a dozen U.S. airlines as well as Boeing and Airbus asking about how they safeguard their computer systems.
Markey cited incidents where a passenger claimed to gain access to critical flight systems by hacking into a plane's in-flight entertainment system and another where hackers stole passengers' information, along with a GAO report on the increasing risk of unauthorized access to airplanes' control systems.
He asked the airlines and manufacturers a host of questions, including details about any known infiltrations over the past five years. He also asked airlines to detail their attempts to protect passenger data, as well as protections against cyberattacks, testing regimes, and information on who installs and updates their computer systems.
Responses are requested by Jan. 11. Beyond Airbus and Boeing, letters were sent to American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Southwest Airlines, United Airlines, JetBlue Airways, Alaska Airlines, Spirit Airlines, Frontier Airlines, Hawaiian Airlines, Allegiant Air, Virgin America and Sun Country Airlines.
House panel passes two broadband bills Back
By Alex Byers | 12/03/2015 05:43 AM EDT
The House telecom subcommittee approved a pair of bills today designed to boost investment in wired and wireless broadband networks.
The panel greenlighted a broad discussion draft that includes the so-called "dig once" bill, which would ensure that a conduit for broadband cables is built into any federally funded highway project if federal agencies determine more broadband capacity will be needed in the area in the next 15 years.
Separately, the subcommittee approved the Federal Spectrum Incentive Act (H.R. 1641), which is designed to push federal agencies to give up some of their wireless spectrum by giving those agencies some of the money earned by auctioning off the airwaves.
Both bills passed unanimously by a voice vote and will next be considered by the full Energy and Commerce Committee.
European Parliament leaders to decide on car emissions inquiry Back
By Anca Gurzu and Quentin Aries | 12/03/2015 05:43 AM EDT
BRUSSELS - Leaders of the European Parliament's political groups will decide on December 17 whether to back the creation of an inquiry committee to look into possible failings by the European Commission and national oversight authorities in preventing cheating on emission tests like that done by Volkswagen, POLITICO has learned.
While a draft text obtained by POLITICO does not mention Volkswagen directly, the inquiry committee would investigate the "alleged failure of the Commission and the member states authorities to take proper and effective action to enforce the explicit ban on defeat devices," according to the documents.
The German carmaker installed such devices in 11 million of its cars to cheat on emissions tests.
All political group heads were supposed to vote on the matter today during the Conference of Presidents, but the decision was postponed.
The Social Democrats and the European Greens want such a inquiry committee, as do the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe and the European United Left, according to minutes of today's meeting seen by POLITICO.
However, the European People's Party - the Parliament's biggest group - and the European Conservatives and Reformists oppose the plan. They would rather see the EP's environment committee prepare a report on the matter, according to the minutes.
In addition to the group leaders' vote later this month, at least 188 MEPs also need to sign off on the idea in order to be able to put the issue to a vote at an upcoming plenary session.
This article first appeared on POLITICO.EU on Dec. 2, 2015.