Infrastructure in the News: January 9, 2014
BAF IN THE NEWS
Politico Morning Transportation: LaHood takes over Schwarzenegger seat at infrastructure group
http://www.politico.com/story/2014/01/ray-lahood-platform-to-speak-his-mind-101939.html?hp=l6
Who do you call when the "Governator" says "hasta la vista" to your infrastructure advocacy group? Ray LaHood, of course. LaHood, who stepped down from his job as Transportation secretary last year, will join infrastructure advocacy group Building America’s Future ahead of a contentious debate on how to fund expensive but much-needed upgrades to the nation’s infrastructure.
PBS NewsHour: LaHood, Rendell make bipartisan push to revitalize America’s infrastructure (VIDEO AND TRANSCRIPT)
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/nation/jan-june14/infrastructure_01-08.html
Huffington Post: Ray LaHood to President Obama: Learn to Love the Gas Tax
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/08/ray-lahood-obama_n_4564176.html
President Barack Obama's former top transportation adviser urged him on Wednesday to drop his reluctance and fully embrace a gas-tax increase to help fund the nation's transportation priorities. Former Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood came out in favor of a gas tax, indexed to inflation, during an event where his new role as co-chairman of the nonprofit group Building America's Future was announced.
Chicago Tribune: Ex-transportation chief LaHood named to infrastructure group
WASHINGTON — Former U.S. transportation chief Ray LaHood is taking a top role at Building America’s Future, a bipartisan group that promotes investment in infrastructure.
Pittsburgh Post Gazette: LaHood joins leadership of Rendell's infrastructure advocacy group
Former Gov. Ed Rendell and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg have added a heavy hitter to the leadership of their advocacy group to promote investment in transportation infrastructure.
Former U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood today joined Mr. Rendell and Mr. Bloomberg as the third co-chairman of Building America’s Future.
Trucking Info: LaHood Named Co-Chair of Infrastructure Lobby Group
The Washington, D.C. lobby group, Building America’s Future, has announced that former U.S. Secretary of Transportation and Republican Ray LaHood is joining the organization as a new co-chair.
Better Roads: LaHood joins Building America’s Future as co-chair
http://www.betterroads.com/lahood-joins-building-americas-future-as-co-chair/
Former U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood joins Building America’s Future (BAF) as the organization’s new co-chair, BAF announced Wednesday.
The Hill: LaHood joins infrastructure group with Bloomberg, Rendell
Former Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood is joining a bipartisan group focused on improving infrastructure whose members include Michael Bloomberg and Ed Rendell.
Skift: Former Transportation Secretary LaHood Lands Position with Bloomberg’s Transportation Coalition
Maybe Ray LaHood can do his part to help the country cope better with the next polar vortex. Building America’s Future Educational Fund, a bipartisan group pushing transportation funding that was co-founded by former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and a couple of ex-governors, Arnold Schwarzenegger of California, and Ed Rendell of Pennsylvania in 2008, announced that LaHood would be joining them as co-chairs of the organization.
Transport Topics: LaHood Named Co-Chairman of Building America’s Future
Former U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has been named a co-chairman of Building America’s Future, the group announced.
Politico Morning Transportation:
LaHOOD JOINS BUILDING AMERICA’S FUTURE: Former Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood will join infrastructure advocacy group Building America’s Future as a co-chair, MT has learned. LaHood, with 14 years in Congress and five in the Cabinet under his belt, will step into the Republican seat held by Arnold Schwarzenegger, who is moving on to focus his domestic policy work on his eponymous USC Schwarzenegger Institute (http://bit.ly/1lzCTqL).
Politico Playbook:
FIRST LOOK - LAHOOD JOINS BLOOMBERG INFRASTRUCTURE GROUP: "Building America's Future [will announce today] that former ... Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood (R) will join the organization as a new co-chair. Serving alongside fellow co-chairs former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg (I) and former Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell (D), ... LaHood will help lead BAF's bipartisan coalition of current and former elected officials who are committed to raising awareness about the need to invest in our nation's roads, bridges, airports, rails and ports." http://goo.gl/ZpUjIV
NATIONAL NEWS
Bloomberg News: Taxes Have Congress Avoiding Roads Bill as Money Runs Low
Congress’s partisan divide over tax increases is jeopardizing action on a long-term highway bill backed by industry groups, raising the risk that the U.S. will run out of money to pay for projects next year.
Washington Post: Washington, New York looking to a future without farecards
Transit riders in Washington and New York are inching closer to a world that doesn’t require a paper or plastic farecard to hop on a train or ride a bus.
STATE NEWS
Washington Post: D.C. transportation projects to watch in 2014
The District’s high-impact transportation projects for this year include the start-up of the region’s first modern streetcar, the opening of the M Street NW bike lane and the uncorking — we hope — of a bottleneck on the inbound 11th Street Bridge. But many other projects and programs continue to develop in 2014. Here’s an overview.
Washington Post: Maryland chooses four teams of private companies to bid on Purple Line
Four teams of private companies have been chosen to compete for a public-private partnership to design, build, operate, maintain and help finance construction of a $2.2 billion light-rail Purple Line in the Maryland suburbs, state officials said Wednesday.
New York Times: Support for Metro-North Line in Bronx and to Penn Station
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/09/nyregion/cuomo-supports-metro-north-expansion-in-the-bronx.html
A sweeping expansion of the Metro-North Railroad that would add four stations in the Bronx and connect the New Haven line to Pennsylvania Station has won the support of a significant ally: Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo.
NBC Chicago: Divvy Bike Stations Reopen After Winter Weather Closures
http://www.nbcchicago.com/traffic/transit/chicago-divvy--239233911.html
Divvy bicycle stations reopened Thursday morning after nearly a week of closures due to severe winter weather.
Boston Globe: French firm Keolis wins commuter rail contract
Keolis — a French transit company with experience running rail systems in the United States, Europe, and Australia — will take over operation of the Massachusetts commuter rail system starting July 1, the state Department of Transportation’s board of directors decided Wednesday.
M Live: Options for new Amtrak station in Ann Arbor being explored in new study starting this week
http://www.mlive.com/news/ann-arbor/index.ssf/2014/01/ann_arbor_train_station_study.html
Ann Arbor officials are preparing to launch a major study this week looking at options for a new Amtrak station somewhere in the city.
Politico Morning Transportation
By Adam Snider | 1/9/14 5:40 AM EST
Featuring Kevin Robillard and Kathryn A. Wolfe
CHRISTIE ALLY TESTIFIES TODAY: Former Port Authority official David Wildstein testifies before a New Jersey legislative panel looking at the George Washington Bridge lane closures that snarled traffic in Fort Lee for a week. All eyes will be on his side of the story after news of emails between him and a top aide to Gov. Chris Christie. “Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee,” Christie deputy chief of staff Bridget Kelly wrote in an email to Wildstein (http://bit.ly/1erKXnW). Christie is denying he played a role in the closures: “What I've seen today for the first time is unacceptable. I am outraged and deeply saddened to learn that not only was I misled by a member of my staff, but this completely inappropriate and unsanctioned conduct was made without my knowledge,” he said in a statement. Four emergency vehicles were delayed during the lane closures, a local official said, and one woman who called for help later died (http://bit.ly/1feT78o).
More angles: In true POLITICO fashion, our reporters have been all over the story and its fallout. One of the most-hyped 2016 contenders, the whole mess could spell the end of Christie’s image as a tell-it-how-you-see-it politician who doesn’t play the normal political games (http://politi.co/1agbUMp). New Jersey Democratic Rep. Bill Pascrell says “the worst is yet to come” (http://politi.co/1hwWDv8). And Fort Lee Mayor Mark Sokolich said the politically-motivated traffic jam was “the lowest, most venomous form of political retaliation” (http://politi.co/1krsiQK).
LoBiondo silent: The reaction, or lack thereof and why, from senior T&I Republican Frank LoBiondo, presented as a series of three tweets ...
1) @KateNocera: “Rep. Frank LoBiondo ran from @GingerGibson and I when she tried to ask about Christie.”
2) @RepLoBiondo: “@KateNocera @GingerGibson Couldn't answer your impromptu ??s as exited bathroom, was late for meeting w/ Chairman on committee business”
3) @RepLoBiondo: “Re: GWBridge closures, I only know what read in papers. All facts should come out & confident @GovChristie will take appropriate action” http://bit.ly/1cPFPaD
LaHOOD’S FREEDOM OF SPEECH: Ray LaHood has undergone a transformation of sorts in recent months. But he’s adapted well to his new role, easily moving beyond the years of political maneuvering and administration-written talking points to now say what’s really on his mind. At Building America’s Future, where he takes over for former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, LaHood is best poised to combine his personal skills, vast Rolodex of insiders and knowledge of transportation policy minutiae as the group looks to this year’s highway and transit bill. Free from having to hew to the administration’s strategy, LaHood has been openly pressing for a ten-cent gas tax hike. “I like the idea of being a private citizen,” he said when MT asked about his life outside the Cabinet and Congress. “I think it gives me the opportunity to be an advocate for the things that I think are important.” You can read my story in today’s POLITICO paper, or Pros can get it right here: http://politico.pro/1iilArJ
(INSERT YOUR OWN CREATIVE THURSDAY REFERENCE HERE.) Thanks for reading POLITICO’s Morning Transportation, your daily tipsheet on trains, planes, automobiles and ports, where on this day in 1968, the Surveyor 7 probe landed on the moon, the last of the country’s unmanned rovers sent to explore the lunar surface. I’d love to hear your anonymous tip, scoop or hot rumor: asnider@politico.com. Follow and drop me a line on Twitter: @AdamKSnider.
“There's a war veteran standing by the Interstate on-ramp, yeah, he’s asking for a ride …” http://bit.ly/10RSXwW
TV GUIDE — Surviving a plane crash: “Sole Survivor,” a 90-minute documentary about when only one person survives a plane crash, premieres tonight on CNN. The films largely follows George Lamson Jr., who lived through a crash decades ago but only recently tried to track down other lone survivors and family members of those killed on his flight. But the documentary also gets into some of the reasons for the 2006 crash of Comair flight 5191, which crashed after trying to take off from too short a runway at Blue Grass Airport in Lexington, Ky. The NTSB blamed pilot error, drawing rebukes from some — though the FAA admitted it only had one person working the control tower when there should have been two. The film includes talks with pilots, experts and others, including NTSB Chair Deborah Hersman, who says the agency can’t be blamed for trying to assign blame in a crash. “When the Congress created us, one of the things that they asked us to do was to determine the probable cause,” Hersman said. “That’s been a part of our statute for over 40 years.” The film airs tonight at 9 and 11 p.m. on CNN.
A S(PORT)ING WAGER: We’ve all seen the novelty bets politicians make for big sporting events — a case of candy bars made in my district for a few dozen donuts famous in yours, for example. But here’s a new twist: The ports of Seattle and New Orleans have a friendly bet ahead of Saturday’s NFL playoff game between the Saints and Seahawks. The Port of New Orleans is betting local seafood, including “boiled crawfish, wild alligator and New Orleans-style barbecue shrimp,” on a Saints victory. Seattle is offering up a Washington-based “seafood sampler, including crab, salmon and halibut.” Football has never been so tasty.
NEW GIG: Former NHTSA Administrator David Strickland has joined Venable LLP as a partner in its D.C. office. He led the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration for from 2010 until his recent departure and also spent eight years as a Senate Commerce Committee senior counsel.
HEAR ME OUT: A trio of updates on big hearings for next week ...
—The House T&I railroads panel will hold its California high-speed rail hearing next Wednesday, Jan. 15, with testimony from FTA head Joe Szabo, California HSR Authority Chairman Dan Richard and CRS expert Alissa Dolan. http://1.usa.gov/1dYMfZJ
—The committee also announced witnesses for its big surface transportation reauthorization hearing that was already scheduled for Tuesday. Atlanta’s Democratic Mayor Kasim Reed and Oklahoma Republican Gov. Mary Fallin, each rising stars in their respective parties, will testify. They’ll be joined by a business and a union rep: Caterpillar President Stuart Levenick and ATU International President Larry Hanley. http://1.usa.gov/1cphOH7
—The Senate Commerce Committee announced a Wednesday hearing on privacy and safety issues with drones. FAA Administrator Michael Huerta is among the witnesses at the 2 p.m. hearing. http://1.usa.gov/1dxkunj
TRANSPO BILLS PASS THE HOUSE: Yesterday members voted unanimously for bills to end an auto-dealer paperwork mandate (405-0) and to update the list of reports DOT can file online (406-0). Both now head to an uncertain fate in the Senate.
HOT TOPIC: The NTSB plans have its investigative work involving a 787 Dreamliner battery fire at Boston Logan Airport wrapped up in March, with a final report due later this year, the agency said in a Wednesday update. The fire, combined with other incidents, led the FAA to briefly ground the global 787 fleet. The final report on the battery fire is due in the fall, the NTSB said, though a date won’t be announced until “later in the year.” The smoke and fire incidents that precipitated the NTSB’s probe, and the fleet’s subsequent grounding, occurred in early January 2013.
THE AUTOBAHN (SPEED READ)
- Vice President Joe Biden and Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx will swing by the Detroit Auto Show next week. POLITICO: http://politi.co/K6aVUJ
- “Turning the page on Government Motors,” an op-ed by former Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez. Detroit News: http://bit.ly/1cYZppe
- Metro awards new fare collection contract, including work on letting riders pay with a smart phone. WMATA: http://bit.ly/19TqM5F
- There were nearly 2.7 billion transit trips in the third quarter of 2013. APTA: http://bit.ly/1cC6Vp8
- Tesla’s Supercharger Network wins the technology of the year award from AOL Auto. http://aol.it/1iVRzRm (h/t Bob King)
- A Dallas-Houston high-speed rail line is in the headlines again, but it’s old news for some. Dallas Morning News: http://bit.ly/1fexzZx
- There’s been yet another fire after a derailment of a train carrying oil in Canada. AP: http://bit.ly/1giJ2DM
THE DAY AHEAD: All day — International CES conference. Las Vegas, Nev.
8 a.m. — The Coast Guard holds a meeting of the Merchant Marine Personnel Advisory Committee. Maritime Institute of Technology and Graduate Studies (MITAGS), 692 Maritime Boulevard, Linthicum Heights, Md.
9 a.m. — State Department holds a meeting of The Shipping Coordinating Committee to prepare for the first Session of the International Maritime Organization's Sub-Committee on Ship Design and Construction to be held Jan. 20-24. Ballston Common Plaza, 4200 Wilson Boulevard, Ninth Floor, Alexander Hamilton Room, Arlington, Va.
10 a.m. — Architectural and Transportation Barriers Compliance Board holds a meeting of the Rail Vehicles Access Advisory Committee on accessibility guidelines under the Americans with Disabilities Act. Access Board Conference Room, 1331 F Street NW, Suite 800.
Noon — The Federal Trade Commission and the County of Los Angeles Department of Consumer Affairs will hold a press conference to announce Operation Steer Clear, a nationwide sweep against deceptive auto dealer ads. Kenneth Hahn Hall of Administration, 500 W. Temple St., 7th Floor, Room 743, Los Angeles.
THE COUNTDOWN: DOT appropriations run out in seven days. Surface transportation policy is up in 265 days and FAA policy in 630 days. The mid-term elections are in 299 days and the 2016 presidential election is in 1,034 days.
CABOOSE — Biking desk: What’s the good of a standing desk if it’s attached to the grid? If you’re sick of your standing desk colleagues looking down at you (figuratively and literally) for sitting down to do your work, now you can one-up them in the do-good game. Just hope your legs are in shape. Behold, the biking desk that lets you pedal your way to a full laptop battery. Atlantic Cities: http://bit.ly/1aJ2SUQ
Stories from POLITICO Pro
LaHood takes over Schwarzenegger seat at infrastructure group
LaHood takes over Schwarzenegger seat at infrastructure group back
By Adam Snider | 1/8/14 5:43 PM EST
Who do you call when the "Governator" says "hasta la vista" to your infrastructure advocacy group? Ray LaHood, of course.
LaHood, who stepped down from his job as Transportation secretary last year, will join infrastructure advocacy group Building America’s Future ahead of a contentious debate on how to fund expensive but much-needed upgrades to the nation’s infrastructure.
LaHood will take the co-chair seat held by Arnold Schwarzenegger, who is departing to focus his domestic policy work on the USC Schwarzenegger Institute. Building America’s Future was founded in early 2008 by the then-California governor, then-New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and then-Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, creating a “tri-partisan” leadership team of politicians combining forces in a push for better infrastructure.
“The people that belong to BAF are doers,” LaHood said of his new colleagues. “They don’t sit around and wring their hands and cry in their coffee every morning. They do things — they’re mayors, they’re governors. They make things happen.”
Fellow co-chair Rendell, at a briefing with reporters to formally introduce LaHood, called him “one of the best, if not the single best, Transportation secretaries we’ve ever had.” Rendell also said LaHood is “as well-liked a person in Washington, D.C., as you’re going to find.”
The new job gives LaHood a platform to draw on his decades spent working on transportation. During his seven terms in Congress, he served on the House Transportation Committee and then the Appropriations Committee that handles DOT funding. He then wrapped up his public service with nearly five years as Transportation secretary in President Barack Obama’s administration.
The new job comes at an important time for a major highway and transit bill due later this year. The Highway Trust Fund that pays for road projects is nearly bankrupt, and Congress has yet to coalesce in support of a clear plan to raise the tens of billions of dollars needed. LaHood brings to the table a network of administration and congressional contacts built up over the years.
Bloomberg figures to play a key role with the group, too. Fresh out of Gracie Mansion, Bloomberg now has a lot of spare time on his hands — as well as a lot of money and a history of jumping into broad policy debates.
But perhaps most important for LaHood, his new gig gives him a platform to speak his mind.
“I like the idea of being a private citizen,” LaHood said when POLITICO asked about his life outside the Cabinet and Congress. “I think it gives me the opportunity to be an advocate for the things that I think are important.”
Things haven’t always been that way.
LaHood had several high-profile run-ins with his White House bosses for saying things he shouldn’t have. Early in his tenure, he suggested that a fee based on how far you drive should be considered as a long-term funding solution — a very logical idea, experts agreed. But soon after saying it, LaHood was summoned to 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. for a dressing-down, and press secretary Robert Gibbs had to quickly squash a media backlash by saying the administration would never support such a tax.
LaHood also had a few other gaffes, including his advice to Toyota owners worried about unintended acceleration problems to “stop driving it,” and providing Republicans with years of fodder by saying that his goal was to “coerce people out of their cars.”
But shifting from a public-sector to private-sector job can lead to some awkward about-faces, such as LaHood’s move to now advocate for a gas tax increase that his old boss opposed.
Even before joining BAF, former Secretary LaHood publicly said lawmakers should hike the tax a dime and index it to inflation. But that never would have flown under Secretary LaHood, who said the president had promised not to raise middle-class taxes and that money saved from ending the wars in the Mideast, among other things, could be used to pay for the transportation bill.
LaHood’s not alone in that situation, though. Former Republican Sen. George Voinovich of Ohio became an ardent and vocal supporter of boosting the gas tax — but only after he said he wouldn’t run for reelection.
The truth is that it’s hard to sell constituents on your vote to raise their taxes, even if they know roads, bridges and rails are crumbling. LaHood and Voinovich might be speaking freely now, but not everybody is in the same boat. One House Republican told POLITICO he was intrigued by Rep. Earl Blumenauer’s (D-Ore.) idea of a 15 cent gas tax bump but would have to publicly deny it because it wouldn’t play well with his party or his voters.
LaHood, however, is out of Congress and free to speak his mind — even hinting that he might have yet another job.
“Obviously, BAF offers me a good platform but I think there will be some other opportunities that we’ll announce soon, too, that will give me a chance to really talk about the things that really make a difference,” LaHood said after the roundtable.
When asked if that opportunity would be with his new group or elsewhere, LaHood chuckled and replied, “Well, stay tuned.”
BAF IN THE NEWS
Politico Morning Transportation: LaHood takes over Schwarzenegger seat at infrastructure group
http://www.politico.com/story/2014/01/ray-lahood-platform-to-speak-his-mind-101939.html?hp=l6
Who do you call when the "Governator" says "hasta la vista" to your infrastructure advocacy group? Ray LaHood, of course. LaHood, who stepped down from his job as Transportation secretary last year, will join infrastructure advocacy group Building America’s Future ahead of a contentious debate on how to fund expensive but much-needed upgrades to the nation’s infrastructure.