The Obama administration’s transportation funding plan has officially made its way to Congress, as Department of Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx unveiled the four-year, $302 billion plan April 29. Trucking interests, however, are not impressed, taking particular issue with the bill’s giving states the authority to toll existing Interstates and with an expanded share of funding for transit and rail programs.
“Failing to act before the Highway Trust Fund runs out is unacceptable – and unaffordable,” Foxx said. “This proposal offers the kind of job creation and certainty that the American people want and deserve.”
The GROW AMERICA Act — Generating Renewal, Opportunity and Work with Accelerated Mobility, Efficiency and Rebuilding of Infrastructure and Communities throughout America — will prop up the Highway Trust Fund and rely on business tax reform to generate money for infrastructure projects, Foxx says.
The secretary also touts the 350-page bill’s aim to add jobs to the U.S. economy, address aging roads and bridges, help state and local governments plan more long-term projects, boost efficient freight networks and address regional economic needs.
A spokesman for the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association said the leadership was still reviewing the proposed bill, but noted “many concerns,” including tolling and allowing toll revenues to be used for costs other than highways and bridges.
The American Trucking Associations also expressed disapproval for the bill, saying it is “disappointed” by it, especially coming from President Obama – who “has talked more about the need to address our critical infrastructure deficit than any president in the past 20 years,” the ATA news release notes.
“Any proposal that moves away from a user-fee funded transportation system is not going to be acceptable to the American trucking industry, period,” President and CEO Bill Graves said. “Furthermore, we have real questions about the viability of the administration’s plan to use one-time proceeds from an unspecified and unlikely to pass corporate tax reform idea, along with inefficient highway tolling or private capital financing.”
