Really, Senator Paul?
Last year, under the leadership of key committee chairs Senator Barbara Boxer of California and Representative John Mica of Florida, Congress passed a new transportation bill, MAP-21 (an Orwellan acronym for “Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century”), that dismantled dedicated federal funding for biking and walking by combining Transportation Enhancements, Safe Routes to School and Recreational Trails into one and cutting the funding by 30%. The new, diminished program was re-named “Transportation Alternatives.”
Now Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky is proposing to eliminate the Transportation Alternatives program altogether by de-funding it.
Really, Senator Paul? Eliminating the only federal transportation program that is (more or less) dedicated to pedestrian and bicycle projects strikes you as an urgent national priority?
RELATED:
• DEFEAT FOR CYCLING: Boxer-Mica Law Eliminates 20 Year Transportation Enhancements Program
• Sen. Carper Reacts to Transportation Bill Compromise Vote
• DelDOT Transportation Enhancements Projects
5 Responses
Who would vote for someone like that ?
[…] on the Network today: Bike Delaware remarks on Rand Paul’s idea to cut all the national funding for biking and walking. Exit 133 […]
How about we eliminate federal funding for transportation altogether? The vast majority of it goes to new highway construction. That’s a Tea Party I’d join.
http://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2012/11/19/what-is-the-federal-role.html
One extra side benefit to reducing the federal role in transportation. Some of those smart bike advocates living in DC would have to move to CA, NY, TX, PA etc….where their expertise is needed and where it could have a big, big impact.
Interesting thought, James, for sure but there are definitely pluses and minuses to reducing the federal role in transportation. Can you imagine how much more disjointed travel could become with an even worse checkerboard of rules and regulations? Especially since much travel is interstate, especially in this area of the country. Even for cyclists, when it comes to Delaware 🙂 For example, the lowering of the legal bac has a lot to do with federal influence based on funding. And some states would not put in a penny towards alternative transportation, which impacts all of us in the end. In Delaware, we can never forget that when it comes to pollution, what the states west of us make, we take (even when it comes to the stuff that isn’t emitted from towering smoke stacks). What the fed’s have been doing lately is definitely a problem, but I think the solution to this one needs to be well thought out.