• America 2050 has created a video depicting a fictional White Sox fan’s 300-mile journey to Detroit’s Comerica Park, as part of its “A Better Tomorrow” project to visualize America’s future communities and transportation systems. (America2050)

• The epic Burj Dubai-cum-Burj Khalifahas unexpectedly closed just a month after its elaborate opening, causing doubts about whether the permanent occupants will be able to move in as scheduled. The reason for the quick closing? Partly electrical problems, but the chief cause remains a mystery. (AP)

• But things aren’t all bad in the UAE: Dubai residents Elizabeth Monoian and Robert Ferry have created the Land Art Generator Initiative and launched an international design competition for the best “outdoor public art work that is conceptually engaging while at the same time produces real, usable renewable energy.” In other words,they’re looking for designs for “aesthetic power plants.” (Treehugger)

• TSA debacle of the day: A security breach this morning led officials to taser a man and shut down and evacuate the McNamara Terminal at the Detroit Metro Airport. The breach was reportedly a passenger who passed through security gates but had no luggage or ticket.  (Freep)

• And a mysterious person scaled the massive Manhattan Bridge today! Here’s wishing him/her a safe climb. (Gothamist)

The idea of a National Infrastructure Bank has plenty going for it: It could streamline and  facilitate necessary projects, secure credit at low rates, and help leverage private funds to create the long-term investment that’s needed to see big projects through to completion.

Still, the concept isn’t without its problems. And the biggest problem, in fact, is right there in the name: Bank. If it’s a bank, then it needs to generate revenue, and therefore make investments that repay themselves. And of course, not all infrastructure projects worth funding are ones that will be rolling in profits. Ken Orski sums up the issue thusly:

[A]s [a recent]press conference and most NIB proposals have urged, the Bank would fund a broad range of public infrastructure projects, some of which, such as schools, public housing and mass transit facilities do not generate a revenue stream that could be used to repay the bank loans. Hence, the NIB would require periodic federal appropriations to cover grants for non-revenue producing projects. And indeed, in its FY 2011 budget request, the White House proposed to launch the bank with a small $4 billion appropriation. Of that amount, $2.2 billion would be for grants, which prompted one former member of the National Infrastructure Financing Commission to observe, that “institutions that give away money without requiring repayment are properly called ‘foundations’ not ‘banks.’” That could be the reason why the White House renamed the NIB in its FY 2011 budget request as the “National Infrastructure Innovation and Finance Fund” (NIIFF) — a clumsy but more accurate designation.

So basically what we’re talking about is a federal organization that injects large amounts of capital on an as-yet-to-be-determined basis, while still trying to convince investors that their money will be reserved for projects that could turn a profit. As Pa. Gov. Ed Rendell told us in a recent interview, there could be safeguards written into the legislation creating the bank to avoid a Fannie/Freddie repeat, and care could be taken with the type of people appointed to it — I.E. make sure every appointee has substantial experience in infrastructure development, such as state secretaries or former DOT employees. Still, the plan leaves plenty in the air as to how and whether necessary but non-profitable projects will be financed.

Then there’s the small matter of political power. As Orski puts it:

What is the likelihood that Congress would be willing to turn the power of decision over large-scale capital projects to a bureaucratic organization lodged in the Executive Branch? Probably not very great. Many lawmakers, including the powerful chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT), believe that Congress must not abdicate its authority to decide how public capital should be spent. As one Senate aide remarked to us, one cannot “depoliticize” the project selection process, as NIB advocates would urge, because major public infrastructure investment decisions are inherently and fundamentally political in nature.

In other words, as it does with so many potentially good ideas, can Congress kill the National Infrastructure Bank even before it’s born?

• Check out the new PBS special, “Blueprint America: Beyond the Motor City” tonight at 8 pm ET, for a fascinating discussion of how to save Detroit by reviving its now almost-nonexistent public transportation system.

• Behold the Power of LaHood! The Transpo Secretary caused a firestorm when he issued a statement suggesting that consumers stop driving Toyota vehicles until they had been repaired altogether — a remark that also caused Toyota’s stock to plunge 5%. (Oz)

• La Hood has also come out against the increasing numbers of gadgets and gizmos that are popping up on new car dashboards. (Wired)

• Alas, football season is over. But transportation plans are already underway for the 2011 Super Bowl, according to the North Texas Super Bowl Host Committee. And yes, commuter rail will play a heavy part. (DallasNews)

• So Las Vegas (And Nevada in general) missed out bigtime on high speed rail. What should they do now? (LVSun)

• And do densely urban cities necessarily equal more sustainable cities? Let’s hope so, for high-speed rail’s sake. (CUNYSustainable)

• Yup, lots of other countries have really cool high speed rail.

• To recap, America 2050 director Petra Todorovich and Infrastructurist editor Melissa Lafsky took to the cable news networks to talk high speed rail. Some discussions were fair and reasonable…others less so.

• California was the clear stimulus winner…so which corridor in CA will get the bulk of the cash? One CA High-Speed Rail Authority board member thinks Los Angeles-to-Anaheim is clearly winning. (MercuryNews)

• So what happens when the $8 billion dries up? Many states have been less-than-forthcoming about how they plan to pay for the completion of HSR projects. Experts say most are counting on the feds to cover at least half of their costs over the next few decades. (ABC News)

• The California High Speed Rail Authority is looking abroad for planning advice, and is is expected to approve a memorandum of understanding with Korea, which has had a high-speed rail network since 2004. (SFExaminer)

• A former councilman in Waterloo, Wis., argues that that a high speed rail line passing through could harm small towns more than help, by lowering property values near the tracks.  (NBC)

• And what of Amtrak? The wayward passenger rail system says it needs $11 billion in new rail equipment during the next 14 years. Where that money will come from remains undetermined. (BusinessWeek)

The electromagnetic spectrum, and the ways we use it, affect the everyday lives of almost everyone on Earth. Governments allocate the use of radio waves for innumerable commercial, non-profit, and public uses, with the goal of improving communication speed and ease around the world. Indeed, every piece of technology that involves wireless transmission — from televisions to cell phones to Wi-fi — is taking advantage of these waves as we speak. But as the image above shows, the airwaves are getting more and more crowded, to the point where big moves are necessary if we want to continue expansion.

Now, the U.S. government is making a move that could both expand available airwaves and raise much-needed funds. In his fiscal 2011 budget released this week, President Obama proposes allowing the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to continue auctioning off parts of the radio spectrum until 2020 — an authority that was set to expire in 2012. In addition, the budget calls for allowing the FCC to sell the rights to small parts of the spectrum that are still not used; in total, the new fees will bring in an estimated $6 billion or more for the feds.

In addition to the money, these changes will bring important new capacity to the increasingly-overburdened airwaves, adding to last June’s conversion of all U.S. television broadcasting to digital signals — a monumental move, since it meant the government opened up a massive new block of transmission at frequencies of 700 MHz. The TV stations that had once broadcast at channels 52 to 69 were simply moved to lower channels, leaving the space open for other use.

Why are these specific frequencies so crucial? Unlike many other parts of the radio spectrum, they are ideal for transmitting information to pretty much anywhere — they can travel long distances and penetrate thick walls (which is why they were used for TV in the first place).

Read the rest of this entry »

• A UMass report says that reforestation is a better job generator than road and bridge repair by a factor of almost two to one–and better than nuclear power by a factor of almost ten. (Grist)

• “Unpaving” — recycling asphalt into gravel roads — is how some states are cutting maintenance costs. (USA Today)

• NY’s MTA estimates that it will receive $350 million less than expected from the state this year because of that payroll tax debacle, so they’re going ahead with a $650 million bond sale. (Bloomberg via Business Week)

• 681 miles of bike infrastructure in Portland will cost $613 million over the next twenty years, but the mayor insists it would be “very difficult” to pursue livability, affordable transportation, and the reduction of greenhouse gases without it. (CSMonitor)

• The TSA scrapped its plans to impose strict security regulations on the private air travel industry. (NPR)

• A confidential report from a commission on Radiation Safety says women and children should not be put through body scanners at airports because of “extremely small” doses of radiation–less than the cosmic rays absorbed while airborne. (Business Week)

• And a blogger suggests that for Milwaukee to be successful in the 21st century, it must look to its past for inspiration and take advantage of the incredible vistas that distinguish it from so many midwestern cities. (Urban Milwaukee)

A new report indicates that less than a sliver of the stimulus funds spent on transportation has gone to minority contractors. A source inside the DOT has revealed that of the $48 billion in ARRA funds designated to highway projects via state DOTs thus far, only $986 million, or 2%, had been committed to Disadvantaged Business Enterprises (DBEs) as of December 11, 2009. In addition, the DOT has awarded $32 million to minority owned firms in direct federal contracts.

Laura Barrett, the executive director of the Transportation Equity Network, issued the following statement:

The USDOT has disclosed that only 2% of the $48 billion in federal stimulus funds spent on highway construction has gone to disadvantaged and minority contractors. This number is absolutely shocking. Secretary LaHood is encouraging state DOTs to increase allocations to minority and disadvantaged contractors, but this number proves that encouragement is not enough. The old boys network that locks out minority contractors was built on the state and local level, and it needs to be fought at that level to reverse this outrageous inequity.

Job one is recording and publicizing detailed demographic information on exactly who is winning these contracts and who is actually performing the jobs. We also have to apply the TEN workforce equity model, which was a huge success in Missouri, across the country. Minority and female workers performed 26% of the workforce hours on Missouri’s $500 million I-64 highway project, and the project was finished three weeks early and $11 million under budget. The Missouri DOT proved that when you make diversity a priority, everybody wins.

Finally, we need to ensure that federal stimulus funds spent on public transit—which has been proven to create twice as many jobs as highway construction—have strong workforce equity requirements as well. Public transit is not only an economic lifeline for low income and minority communities, it is a way to build lives and careers.

What do you see if you go 100 feet directly below New York’s Grand Central Station? WNYC has put together an impressive gallery of pics offering a sneak peek inside the construction of the MTA’s new commuter rail terminal, which is scheduled for completion in 2016. When it’s finished, the system will connect four out of eight Long Island Railroad tunnels, sending them to a central hub in the West Wing of Grand Central Terminal.

Image Courtesy WNYC

• Car-sharing went up a staggering 117% between 2007 and 2009. According to analysts, a person who drives 12,000 miles a year can save $1,834 annually by forsaking his or her own vehicle and shifting to a car-sharing service. (Treehugger)

• Is it ironic or just sad that the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality thinks that tightening emissions standards is “arbitrary, unnecessary and unachievable”? (NYTimes)

• A fashion photographer, a writer, a former mayor, and the chair of London Food share their visions of London in 2030. One imagines compulsory cycling, and lots of white ghost-bicycles. (Guardian)

• New York unveiled “Active Design Guidelines,” an overlay to the livability initiatives of several departments that aims to “promote physical activity and health through design.” (Urban Omnibus)

• “If Texas had had its act together,” said Ray LaHood, “It would have gotten some high-speed rail money.” Zing! (Houston Chronicle)

• A writer at GOOD gives a guided tour of what it’s like to turn a city street into a bicycle corridor. (GOOD)

• And not to be an alarmist, but as it turns out, every hour spent driving takes 20 minutes off your life expectancy. (This is a terribly convoluted way of thinking about things.) (MSN)

The debate over the benefits of mass transit falls along a pretty clear “Mars and Venus” partisan line: Democrats cherish every ounce of mass transit, while Republicans love love love their cars. A few months back, we did a Q&A with Bill Lind, the conservative author of Moving Minds: Conservatives and Public Transportation, which evaluates mass transit policies from a conservative perspective. Now that the debate over rail, both high speed and passenger, has lit up following the distribution of Obama’s stimulus funds, we thought we’d check back in with Bill to see if his views had changed, or held steady.

Infrastructurist: Given all the heated partisan debate that has crippled Congress in other topics like healthcare, can infrastructure really be bipartisan?

Lind: Yes. There should be a nonpartisan non-ideological consensus in favor of adequate infrastructure. From the conservative perspective, the federal government has two and only two legitimate functions: national security and infrastructure. The first bill passed by the first Congress was an infrastructure bill. With government involvement in canals and railroads and highways, the federal government has been involved in infrastructure from the beginning. This is consistent with a free market economy, because the markets only work if there is adequate infrastructure.

More specifically to the current time, conservatives do not enjoy being stuck in traffic any more than liberals. We may be in a Mercedes or Jaguar instead of a Neon, but [traffic] still isn’t fun. So when high quality transportation is offered — meaning rail, not bus — conservatives are using it. If you look at the demographics of rail transit riders. what you see is that a lot of the people on board are conservatives. if you look at the ridership on Metra around Chicago, in some counties the average income of people on trains is higher than people driving alone to work. You are turning waste time into time when you could be productive. So the fact is that where high quality transportation is provided, conservatives use it. But there isn’t much rail transit in this country for us to use.

I: It sounds like your definition of “conservative” basically means “wealthy people.” What about conservatives who aren’t necessarily Jaguar-drivers?

L: The fact is that most conservatives own cars. They have sufficient money that they own cars. which means that if they ride transit they ride from choice, not necessity. Which means they want high quality transit, not just something to get around. So the transit that is relative to conservatives is that which is relevant to people with cars — I would rather take transit than drive to work.

I: Does your support for trains extend to high speed rail?

L: High speed rail is an entirely different question. We’re talking commuter trains, light rail, and streetcar. We are very much in favor of inner city rail. But high speed is a chimera. High speed means 250 miles an hour. All the other countries that have created true high speed rail have a dense network of passenger trains. We have nothing. We have Amtrak, which is almost useless — one train passing through, usually in the middle of the night and running late.

What we want to see is building up a network of higher-speed regular trains that becomes dense enough that you can actually use it, and then adding bus service that would connect the largest part of the county to the nearest train — so, like at one time in the U.S., you could get from any point in the country to any other point in the country without driving or getting on a plane. Seventy, eighty years ago a number of steam railroads were running at over 100 miles an hour. But after World War II the government slapped speed limits on passenger trains. We want to make trains that are time competitive with the automobile - we’re not interested in competing with air travel. Our fuel dependence is seated on cars, not planes. So we want trains running at speeds of up to 110 miles an hour — all of which we had with steam trains in the 1930s.

I: So what you’re advocating is more, and faster Amtrak.

L: More passenger trains, more Amtrak trains, on more routes, more trains on existing routes, running at speeds that make the time competitive with the automobile.

Read the rest of this entry »

• As it grows, slime mold “connects itself to scattered food crumbs in a design that’s nearly identical to Tokyo’s rail system.” Friends, we are outdone. (MSNBC via Science)

• Someone at the Reason Foundation says HSR in the U.S. won’t reduce greenhouse gases, petroleum dependence, or congestion.  (National Journal)

• The editors at a St. Louis paper are disappointed that the $1.1 billion they received in HSR funding won’t go to area passenger rail systems. (STL Today)

• A damning report from the MTA’s Inspector General in New York reveals that the agency fails to determine which contractors are lousy, and therefore wastes millions awarding them one job after another. (AMNY)

• New Orleans’s City Planning Commission approved a long-awaited master plan, which includes among its priorities “aggressive city leadership in redeveloping 60,000 vacant and blighted lots.” (NOLA)

• A former CNN correspondent thinks a light-rail system in Detroit will bring the crowds downtown once more. “It’s been proven,” he says. “If you build it, they will come.” (Hour Detroit)

• HSR in the U.S. will involve more than just building tracks and trains, says Blair Kamin — it will require a full rethinking of passenger experience, including station architecture. (Chicago Trib)

• In a New Hampshire town hall meeting today, President Obama reportedly appeared to be caving to the Senate’s demands that the carbon cap be dropped from his proposed energy bill. (Mother Jones)

• And over at the New Republic, The Avenue blog does a nice rundown of Obama’s proposed infrastructure spending in the 2011 budget. (TNR)

• U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has pledged that the review of defects in Toyotas will continue, writing “We’re not finished with Toyota” in an emailed statement. (Reuters)

• In demolition news (we just writing “in demolition news”) Howard Button, chief executive of the National Demolition Training Group and National Federation of Demolition Contractors, is fighting with a group of reticent contractors to get them to recognize the Demolition Supervisor qualification devised and delivered by the NDTG. (DN)

One question that’s arisen (and rightfully so) around the subject of U.S. high speed rail is, who would be in charge of security? With millions of people riding a brand new, modern rail system that travels up to 200 miles an hour, the issue of security can’t be ignored.

Granted, train travel doesn’t bring the same inherent security concerns as air travel — as Obama noted in a recent speech, you can’t fly a train into a building, or take over a train and turn it into a makeshift pressurized missile. Still, the bombings in Madrid and London have driven home the fact that rail travel is hardly immune from terrorism. And as Politico’s Josh Gerstein noted, “given that Obama was announcing that the federal government is awarding $8 billion in stimulus money for the planning and construction of high speed rail projects, wouldn’t it be unwise to allow an Al Qaeda operative to blow up a chunk of that investment?” In fact, there’s the possibility that HSR security could become a Catch-22 — in order to get it built, we need to make a big deal of it in the U.S., but the bigger deal we make of it, the more likely it is to become a target for terrorists (a possibility that could hinder it getting built in the first place). And round and round etc.

So it’s clear that U.S. HSR will need security. The questions are, how much, and who will be charged with providing it? TSA’s long string of unabashed failures doesn’t exactly make a case for government agency control. And the absence of shoe-removal hassles are one of the main benefits of taking the train — inputting them in HSR might drive passengers back to air travel. Robert Cruickshank at the California High Speed Rail blog had the following suggestion:

Certainly you don’t want to turn HSR into a target by boasting about how it has less strict security than airplanes. But one doesn’t have to create a big and unnecessary security theater system to deal with potential threats. Instead, the US needs to take cues from its European counterparts when it comes to HSR security.

Despite people who think the US is constantly under threat of terrorist attack (the reason we haven’t been attacked by overseas terrorists since 2001 is because they just don’t pose the kind of ongoing threat many believe they do), Europe actually has FAR more experience with actual terrorism than the US has. Countless terror attacks targeting transportation infrastructure in Europe since the 1970s have shown them the threat is very real. Yet their HSR security isn’t anywhere close to what the TSA operates at US airports.

Granted, given the U.S. propensity for guns guns everywhere, we’ll likely need a few more metal detectors than your  average European train station. But the presence of smart security, with the absence of security theater, could make HSR trains a safe and attractive way to travel.

Image via Flickr

• Will the iPad be a boon for mass transit, since riders can now make their commute more productive? (And we can only pray that no one uses it while driving, unlike cell phones and Blackberries.) (BusinessWeek via NG)

• South Korea’s National Pension Service has paid $160 million for a 12% stake in the U.K.’s Gatwick airport, in an effort to increase its international investments. (NY Times)

• The cause of last year’s crash of Flight 3407 in Buffalo will be announced today by the National Transportation Safety Board. (13Wham)

• New Jersey Governor Chris Christie has said he will rule out raising/adding tolls or hiking gas prices…meanwhile the state’s budget crisis continues to loom. (BW)

• And if you’re flying anytime in the near future, or have any trepidation about flying, we highly recommend you not read this. (USA Today)

Image: Isamu Sanada

• It’s hee-ere! The White House’s proposed fiscal 2011 budget is seeking $4 billion for the creation of a National Infratructure Bank. Gov. Rendell must certainly approve. (NY Times)

• An ordinance in L.A. would require new homes, larger developments and some redevelopments to capture and reuse the runoff water generated in rainstorms, in an effort to improve water quality and recharge groundwater. (LA Times)

• In Brazil, infrastructure projects may require as much as $85 billion in financing over the next decade to meet the country’s expanding transportation and boosted energy production. (BusinessWeek)

• Are foreign governments hacking our infrastructure? A new study reports that more than half of the operators of power plants and other “critical infrastructure” say their computer networks have been hacked — and in many cases, the suspects are foreign governments. (Baltimore Sun)

• Where should the HSR money have been spent? The Washington Post opines — and sure enough, their vote is for the Northeast Corridor. (WaPo)

Fox Business anchor Brian Sullivan asks an interesting question: Who will be making our HSR trains? Thankfully, it likely won’t be U.S. trainmakers, none of which have ever produced high speed trains with the level of sophistication and technology that a shiny new HSR line will require. Watch Sullivan discuss this issue with Infrastructurist editor Melissa Lafsky.

• Here’s a clip of Petra Todorovich, the director of America 2050, defending U.S. high-speed rail plans against a contentious trio of talking heads. (Fox Business)

• And tune in this afternoon to hear Infrastructurist ed-in-chief Melissa Lafsky discuss high-speed rail and stimulus funding on Fox Business at 1:15 ET.

• President Obama will propose permanent Build America Bonds in the budget plan to be announced today. Treasure Secretary Geithner says they will continue to make credit available for infrastructure projects that, according to the Milken Institute, will create more than three million jobs in everything from air traffic control to offshore drilling. (Reuters, Occupational Health & Safety)

• A new study indicates that cell-phone bans for drivers may not result in a significant decrease in accidents. (WSJ)

• A “futurist” says that many suburbs are unsustainable, and that the debate of cities vs. suburbs “is the political conflict that will define the next decade.” (Grist)

• In spite of everything, Dubai will spend billions to expand its airport and build another one; the CEO of Dubai airports says that aviation generates up to a whopping 25% of the emirate’s economy. (Business Week)

• An “accidental transportation upheaval” is taking place, as electric bicycles are gaining popularity are around the world. “It’s miraculous,” says a 78 year-old New Yorker. “It takes the hills out of riding.” (NYTimes)

• And here’s another extraordinary historic proposal for a massive public works project in New York. This one would have connected Brooklyn to Staten Island with a 10,000 foot tunnel.

• Governer Schwarzenegger held a press conference today with U.S. Deputy Secretary of Transportation John Porcari, Congressman Jim Costa and other government officials to applaud the $2.25 billion awarded to the state. Quote highlights: “I don’t go to France to buy things. I go to France to ride the high speed rail!” (Gov.CA)

• Were the stimulus funds for HSR awarded free of partisanship? Joe Biden thinks so. Still, StreetsblogDC points out that the bulk of the funding went to 22 states,  nine have GOP governors, versus 13 with Democratic governors. (Streetsblog)

• Can high speed rail succeed in the U.S.? Time’s Bryan Walsh sounds off. (Time)

• Illinois Governor Pat Quinn said at a news conference that the state’s high-speed rail project will provide an estimated 6,000 jobs for three years. (BND.com)

• In the category of “less-good news”: Transportation officials say the $590 million in money given to Washington state will only cut about 16 minutes off the Portland-Seattle trip, and not until 2017, at an average speed of only 90 mph — which comes out to $36,875,000 a minute. (NWCN)

• And the award for Biggest Shaft on HSR Federal Funds goes to…Nevada! The state’s application for $83 million was denied when their plan was deemed ineligible for funding. (Review Journal)

There’s some mutterings about the over $1 billion Florida received  in HSR stimulus money yesterday.  After all, we’re trying to hurl the U.S. into the new century and galvanize the country’s transportation system — so what about the West and Ease Coasts? Well, look closely and you’ll see that Florida does have some major benefits going for it. As Brookings Scholar Robert Puentes noted, the Tampa-Orlando corridor is more “shovel ready” than many of its competitors — it already cleared the environmental impact assessment stage, as well as other procedural hurdles, and successfully leveraged private sector funds — the Disney Corporation donated $25 million in land for one of the station locations. Plus a private partner, as opposed to the state, will assume the risk of ridership revenue to cover the system’s costs. The state also owns a whopping 90% of the right-of-way along the route, a result of the state’s gunning for high speed rail for years now — since 2000, to be exact. Shouldn’t the early entrant be rewarded?

Plus, as Puentes states, Florida has the potential to be a national showcase project: “One lesson our European competitors have taught us is that it is important to get the initial investment right. Then demand for additional investments increases, political and public support follows, and the national system is built incrementally.”

As for Florida’s economic impact, Adie Tomer at the New Republic brings up some good points:

The Tampa and Orlando metropolitan areas, along with their sandwiched neighbor Lakeland, were home to almost 3.4 million people in 2008. That year their economies produced $230.6 billion of economic output, more than the Czech Republic. A huge part of this is the vibrant tourist industry: Few places in the world give visitors simultaneous access to many top theme parks, multiple world-class beaches, and bona fide big city culture all within 120 miles. A pleasurable and useful train ride won’t just benefit Floridians, and could become an additional beacon to visitors across the country.

And as an added bonus, the state projects to have the corridor built by 2015 — over a decade sooner than California. And if it becomes the first completed HSR line in the country, just imagine how a successful line could motivate other states to complete their own. And heaven knows, with costs in the multi-billions, motivation will be much needed.

• Foreign governments are the suspected invaders of critical infrastructure systems across the country, like power plants and sewage systems, according to a study by McAfee and the Center for Strategic and International Studies. (ABC)

• The American Society of Civil Engineers says it will take $2.2 trillion to bring our national infrastructure up to speed. What exactly is the point of that figure? (Nasdaq)

• A look at the new guidelines for transit funding suggests that cities like Cincinnati, Boise and Fort Lauderdale, who are close to implementing streetcar programs, might be the big winners. (Wired)

• GOOD has a great infographic displaying commuters’ waste of time and fuel in major U.S. cities, as well as the remedies those cities are working on to ease the pain. (GOOD)

• In Long Beach, a sculpture outside City Hall declares, “Long Beach, the most bicycle friendly city in America.” Thoughts? (LATimes)

• And a creepy weirdo played with a chicken on the 6 train in New York yesterday. (NY Daily News)