Editorial: Whirlwind Week

During a very busy week on Capitol Hill, trucking and other freight transportation executives told legislators about the nation’s desperate need for investment in infrastructure. Shortly thereafter, the Senate’s Environment and Public Works Committee passed a six-year transportation plan, while the Obama administration campaigned publicly for its infrastructure proposal.

While we applaud Senate EPW’s efforts, it still has to be said there is something missing.

Members of key committees understand what is going on. For example, Tom Carper, the Delaware Democrat, came to American Trucking Associations’ Capitol Hill office to urge his colleagues to support a gradual increase in federal fuel taxes.

He correctly pointed out that, while those levels have not been increased in more than two decades, prices for construction materials have all increased.

Likewise, Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), EPW’s chairwoman, discouraged the notion of a temporary extension for the current transportation funding law, saying that merely extends uncertainty.

In addition, Sen. David Vitter, EPW’s ranking Republican from Louisiana, said relieving traffic congestion is of major importance for him, and Missouri’s Roy Blunt, also a Republican, called for intermodal shipping improvements.

In the private sector, trucking, railroads, ports and intermodal leaders said their policy disagreements are quite minor, compared with the overwhelming, uniting certainty of knowing America needs to modernize.

All of this leaves us a bit disappointed the Senate bill is just six more years of status quo transportation spending, save for inflation adjustments.

Sure, an orderly six years is better than six years of chaos brought about through a chain of slap-dash extensions rather than a long-term bill. It is also far better than spending cuts.

There are some small, positive developments in the Senate panel’s bill, such as a greater emphasis on freight.

And on the whole, it is a more preferable option than the Obama administration’s call for a large infusion of general fund spending into transportation coffers. We’re opposed to general fund solutions and have advocated consistently for transportation users paying for transportation networks through transportation fuel taxes.

However, none of the options, thus far, makes any change to federal fuel taxes. We urge the president and members of both chambers to listen to Sen. Carper’s suggestions.

Somewhere in all of this discussion, there needs to be a last blast of combustion to power all of these well-demonstrated and -understood needs into a real plan for action.

Everyone in freight transportation should call or write a senator or representative and tell him or her to invest in American infrastructure.