Assuming Obama wins passage of his recent proposals to inject $50 billion into major infrastructure projects (a big assumption) and assuming his proposed National Infrastructure Bank gets up and running quickly and efficiently and starts prioritizing and doling out cash the way it’s intended to (an even bigger assumption) then there’s still the question: Which projects are the most necessary/worthy of funding?
The North American Strategic Infrastructure Leadership Forum has assembled a list (via Business Insider) of the most strategic infrastructure projects based on: 1) contribution to local productivity; 2) contribution to global competitiveness; 3) job creation; 4) business opportunity; and 5) energy productivity.
The list (see it in its entirety here) covers such popular projects as the Dulles Corridor Metrorail Project Phase 1 ($2.6 billion, Washington D.C.), the Orlando to Tampa high speed hail line (which already received a $1.25 billion chunk from the $8 billion put aside for high speed rail in the first stimulus bill), a toll road between Maryland’s Montgomery and Prince George’s counties, the additional nuclear power plants proposed to be built in Georgia, the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge project, and of course New York City’s $4.4 billion Second Avenue subway line.
Some projects, like the $20 billion update of the nation’s air-traffic control systems to NextGen, which will result in fewer delays, lower fuel use, shorter travel times, and more, are no-brainers, and are already incorporated into the president’s proposal as a whole. Others, like the $15 billion modernization of O’Hare, could be prime candidates for the National Infrastructure Bank to test its leveraging of private funds (and profit-making potential, assuming that it is indeed structured as a public-private investment organization).
Still, for every project on the list, there are myriad that could arguably be called equally important. How exactly the National Infrastructure Bank organizes its prioritization process will be crucial — we know that our current system of funding pork projects and earmarking funds for individual Congressional districts is leading to vast inefficiency (like the fact that only 32% of the infrastructure funds from the first stimulus bill have been spent, since the rest is being held up in endless red tape). What we need is a national body charged with naming a list of the biggest and most important projects, and making sure they get funded. But the criteria for “most important” are sure to be hotly contested.
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back in my day a rail line didn’t cost 2 billion dollars.
again, i’m in the wrong business.
No 30/10 financing? Weak.
A bullet train from Orlando to Tampa is “strategic”? Meanwhile, in NY you have to drive over a 70 year old two lane bridge with 10 foot wide lanes and no shoulders to get eggs from New Jersey to Staten Island. This country is effed.
Why not start with something truly shovel ready and revolutionary, like high-speed/commuter rail over the Lackawanna Cut-Off or building out HSR between Washington, Richmond, and south Hampton Roads? Or uniting the Boston rail system by building a north-south connector? Or, better yet, restoring defunct Amtrak routes like the Pioneer, The Desert Wind, the Sunset Limited east of New Orleans, the Kentucky Cardinal, the National Limited and the North Coast Hiawatha?
The electrification and completion of the Empire Corridor rail line, NYC to Toronto via Albany, Syracuse, Rochester and Buffalo/Niagra Falls. This, coupled with Smart Start type projects, AKA streetcars and light rail for those cities located on this line can help breathe life into upstate.
Also, perhaps turning the NEC into a true highspeed line using that proposal from the Upenn students?
Cargo trains along 81 would also help to boost upstate NY and PA’s economic core. The CSX improvements to intermodal ports should also be considered bc of it’s very low relative cost.
I think you have it right when you say the most important thing to do is develop the national infrastructure bank and give them the power to build a cohesive plan and prioritize infrastructure expansion and maintenance. Take infrastructure out of the hands of greedy politicians and put it into the hands of engineers, planners, and bankers. That makes a lot of sense to me.
After that, I would prioritize like this:
Long distance passenger rail
1) Treatment and transportation of water and wastewater
2) Efficient transportation of food and goods (Freight Rail first, trucks second)
3) Electrical Infrastructure (Efficiency first, Renewable production second, non-renewable last)
4) Storm/flood ways
5) Communication
6) Public Transportation (Buses first, then rail)
7) Short Distance Vehicular traffic (<50 miles)
9) Long distance Air Traffic
10) Long distance vehicular traffic
Hey, I didn’t know we could put smiles in our comments.
Something that’s very close to my heart that I think that should be focused on is some sort of time spent to unify transit systems. Here in Phoenix, all the transit authorities for the metro area are divided, and there is a terrible coherency between our fleet, with different paint schemes, and different types of buses. It really is a pain. Also there are two different BRT systems, (maybe three, depending on how you look at our Express system) Link and Rapid. It’s so defunctional, and I know the situation is similar in other places across the US, and even with rail. We need to cut back on the agencies who run these lines, and create a singular agency. Also a US Bicycle Route System would be beast, and it’s already in the works, (two routes are done, but that was a long time ago).
Dallasm, agree 80% with your priorities, I’d switch the Air Traffic improvements (primarilt the next gen ATC) with communications. Considering that communications is still primarily a private enterprise function, I’d place it a bit lower in priorities, still warrants funding thru an infrastructure bank but perhaps not as high of a priority.
Though come to think about it though, the telecom industry would probably be placed better to repay funding than teh airline industry. Maybe I can be convenced to 100%
Matt
that list from North American Strat is out of whack in places. Hawaii mass transit ($5.3B) at #3? Detroit train service ($130M) at #4? No. Way.
Other than that, they have some good suggestions, if the order is maybe a little out of whack.
In no particular order (and IMHO):
Power Generation/Grid Upgrades
Added capacity and flexibility in the West
True National Grid via connecting the East, West and Texas Grids
Investment in molten salt battery technology and storage capacity
Airport Upgrades
L.A.’s Bradley West
O’Hare’s extension
JFK’s Delta Terminal
Miami International (might as well as start over with that one)
– or (and I’m biased here) -
Orlando International Second Terminal
NextGen
Rail Upgrades
Crescent Corridor
NEC Improvements (end the backlog of maintenance, add dedicated HSR, reduce choke points in NJ getting into NY, new Penn Station and new Hudson River access; basically the UPenn plan)
CREATE in Chicago (eliminate at-grade crossings)
A National Infrastructure Bank should focus on National Projects, not a subway line that may or may not be funded properly (and I say this as a resident of the Upper East Side and daily user of the Lexington Avenue Line); we want a new subway line, we should pay for it. The same goes with the Silver Line in D.C. Unless you’re talking about having consistent express service from Dulles International to downtown D.C. (making Dulles a true competitor against Regan for D.C. air passengers), a local subway line should be paid for with local money.
To pay for all of it? Public-Private Partnerships, an increased gax tax, and taxes on users. No free lunch people; decide what level of service you want and prepare to pay accordingly. Hold your government accountable, but hold yourself accountable.
Matt, I can see your point, but it’s hard for me to concede that easily. I still think that communications needs to be ranked higher on the list. Suburban sprawl is frustrating mostly because it relies on the automobile. It causes huge amounts of land to be taken up by roads and parking, and air quality to suffer from exhaust. And then there is both foreign oil and global warming concerns. But the suburban design in and of itself isn’t bad. They provide safe places to raise families, which is why people are drawn to them. I personally believe that suburbs can adapt into sustainable, clean, and lively communities with the advent of telepresence. Many people who commute into downtowns don’t really need to, and could do their jobs remotely from their homes. This would help with just about everything from congestion to pollution. But it will take a continued investment in infrastructure, both private and public. (Remember, the vast majority of the pipes for the internet was paid for by Al Gore’s 1988 National High Performance Computer Act and his Information Infrastructure and Technology Act of 1992.)
Lots and lots of freeways, obviously! DUH!
I’m kidding.
I love high Speed Rail but Tampa Orlando should NOT be the top priority, that’s crazy. Any city around Chicago or the California Line should be priority one.
Surrpisingly decent list, but it’s got some incredible clunkers on it. Columbia River Crossing is a misdesigned nightmare of superhighway worship. Building HOT lanes in the DC Beltway is a complete scam; just redesignate some existing lanes on those super-wide expressways, folks. Say, four each way?
#1, New Jersey’s new Hudson River tunnels, is also a misdesigned nightmare. The tunnels are very important, but the terminus in Manhattan, completely disconnected from all existing tracks and stations, is a budget-busting error.
CREATE, on the other hand, is really top priority. Nationally.
“After that, I would prioritize like this:
1) Treatment and transportation of water and wastewater”
Have to agree with this — water and sewer are the primary marks of civilization — though I’d put *preservation* of clean water supplies (securing watersheds against toxin infiltration from industrial activities) as the first part of that.
Ugh. Just, ugh.
So, first, confusing high-speed rail and commuter rail, and building high-speed rail on marginal corridors, are both quite revolutionary. We can’t be like Japan or France or Germany or Korea, with their socialist ideas of putting HSR on the highest-demand corridors first. The NEC is for sissies; real men would put HSR on the Lackawanna Cutoff and the Orlando Airport-Tampa corridor and in Virginia.
Second, express airport links are a giveaway to the rich. It’s much more effective to just cut income taxes at the top; it has the same transportation and infrastructure value, and it buys political capital with which to spend money on things that are actually useful.
Third, if the point is to distribute money where it is most useful, then everything in the New York area other than SAS Phase 1 should be blacklisted. SAS Phase 1 is expensive, but the ridership projection is high enough that the per-rider cost is $26,000, which by US standards isn’t that obscene. The rest are in the $50,000/rider area, and need to be canceled, like, yesterday.
And fourth, the Upenn plan for the NEC has so much chaff in it that it shouldn’t even be on an AA for future speed upgrades. There are much more cost-effective ways to increase speed than to tunnel under downtown Philadelphia and the Long Island Sound.
How did none of these projects end up in the first $800 BILLION of funding? Ridiculous. What shovel-ready projects were completed with that first pile of cash?
Using the page numbers rather than rankings..
http://www.businessinsider.com/25-strategic-infrastructure-projects-that-could-change-your-life-by-2025-2010-6#21-fastracks-rtd-1
I’m quite sure #2 is already fully funded & under construction. #4 is sponsored by the Maryland Transportation Authority (MdTA) and is also funded & under construction. I believe #14 is also funded and under construction. Both #4 and #14 are also *highly* controversial. I believe #21 is also funded & under construction… unless I’m getting it mixed up with another rail project also crossing the Hudson.
[...] Melissa Lafsky highlights the need for an Infrastructure Bank that can prioritize among national infrastructure projects “What we need is a national body charged with naming a list of the biggest and most important projects, and making sure they get funded.” [...]
@Ted Morrison: the first stimulus didn’t have much infrastructure in it. It was heavy on tax cuts, aid to states, and extension of benefits. The infrastructure it did fund was mostly small backlogs of projects from some years ago, such as ARC; it did not have enough infrastructure money for a $20 billion air traffic control modernization.
Thanks Alon – there’s a website I should look up that was supposed to track the use of stimulus funds. I just recall hearing the “shovel-ready” buzzword over and over when it was being pitched.
They must be Texas haters as usual. None of those projects are in the TX area, or even surrounding states. Guess they must have overlooked the fact that Texas is the 2nd most populated state in the union.
I guess the need for more funding to build Houston’s (pathetic) light rail, expand the Houston Ship Channel, get the Texas T-bone HSR network going, Dallas’ DART, border crossing, and a bazillion other projects much needed here, will just be put on the backburners. Texas gets screwed as usual.
Dallasm has a really good grasp of the need to creat a prioritized order of infrastructure investments to guide the ultimate funding of the nation’s needs via a true Infrastructure Bank.
Public fundung alone will never suffice to keep pace with both the deferred maintenance of our nations’s infractrucure (whether visible, roads and bridges, or invisible, clean water and wastewater tunnels and pipelines) – Leverage and applying revenues able to be sourced from either existing tolls, transit fees, taxes, water use and disposal fees or “shadow” fees on roadways and transit systems to be applied to the most productive and ultimately profitable infrastructure is the work of a Committee that needs to be appointed to an Infrastructure Bank.
It needs to be comprised of educated individuals who are not politicized but charged with spending a minimum of “X” dollars per year from the Bank or see you later we get someone who can – ideally the committee would be as close to the Federal Reserve Bank “essence” as possible – independent but committed to the wise and prudent dispensaton of hard-earned dollars to the right projects, and while never perfect, at least they would remain a constant in the ever-changing political cyclone of Wash DC and would not require re-education every time an election year displaces an elected official, which is going o be a constant theme for the rest of time it seems.
Lastly, it seems possible that the US Gov’t is eyeballing the PPP’s of european, South American nad Canadian origin and just waiting for the US to be more inundated with the huge Consortium Construction Conglomerates to apply for the Concessions within the US to enable the public funds that are availabe to be leveraged into PPP’s where the private dollars allow the public funds to go alot further. This is not a wrong-minded theory, but the projects have to be specifically suited for the equity/debt/capex/operation/maintenamce costs mix that PPP’s require.
They could start laying the ground work for the high speed rail from Chiicago to St Loius if they started building four track wide railroad overpasses on main line from Chicago so that they could move the existing freight tracks on to the new over passes and have room for the passanger train high speed rail tracks only to be put in next door to them. That way the Republicans can’t complain to loadly in that they would be removing railroad crossings. What they could also do would be to extend eletric powered Metra south and west of the existing eletric lines so that more of Metra could be put under wire. Maybe they could even have a new section of metra catenary go out towards the spot where the high speed rail line begins.