Frederick
P. Salvucci Room
1-230
Senior
Lecturer Tel: 617-253-5378
Massachusetts
Institute of Technology Fax:
617-258-8073
Fred Salvucci is a Civil Engineer
specializing in Transportation, with particular interest in infrastructure,
urban transportation, public transportation, and institutional development in decision-making.
Most of his career has been in the
public sector, having served as transportation advisor to Boston Mayor Kevin
White between 1970 and 1974, and then as Secretary of Transportation of the
Commonwealth of Massachusetts under Governor Michael Dukakis between 1975 and
1978 and again from 1983 to 1990. In
those roles he has participated in much of the transportation planning and
policy formulation in the Boston urbanized area and the Commonwealth of
Massachusetts over the past twenty years, with particular emphasis on the
expansion of the transit system, the development of the financial and political
support for the Central Artery/Tunnel Project, and the design of implementation
strategies to comply with the Clean Air Act consistent with economic
growth. Other efforts include the
extension of the Red Line in South Quincy and Alewife, the relocation of the
Orange Line in Boston's Southwest Corridor, the acquisition and modernization
of the Commuter Rail Network, the restructuring of the MBTA, the formulation of
noise rules to halt the increase in aircraft noise at Logan Airport, the
development of strategies to achieve high speed rail service between Boston and
New York, and the planning for the redevelopment of the Park Square section of
Boston through the location and construction of the State Transportation
Building there.
More recent activities have included
participation in a restructuring of commuter and rapid transit services in Buenos
Aires, Argentina, using concession contracts with private-sector companies (the
new system has improved both efficiency and effectiveness); participation with
the Volpe Center in a review of the transportation planning process in US
metropolitan areas of over 1 million people, and participation in an innovative
research and educational collaboration with the University of Puerto Rico and
the Puerto Rico Highway and Transportation Authority, focused on the
development of a new transit system for San Juan, Puerto Rico. The project, called Tren Urbano, is the
first design-build-operate system in the United States. Mr. Salvucci is also a key participant in a
new major MIT research project with the Chicago Transit Authority, patterned on
the Tren Urbano program.
Mr. Salvucci teaches courses in Urban
Transportation Planning, Institutional and Policy Analysis, and Public
Transportation. He attended MIT as both
an undergraduate and graduate student of Civil Engineering, earning his
Bachelor of Science in 1961 and his Master of Science in 1962. International education includes a year at
the University of Naples as a Fulbright Scholar from 1964 to 1965, studying the
use of transportation investment to stimulate economic development in high
poverty regions of Southern Italy.
Testimony of
Frederick P. Salvucci before the United States Senate Committee on Environment
and Public Works March 19, 2002
First, let me thank the Committee for
the extraordinary opportunity to participate in your consideration of the needs
to be addressed in the process of reauthorization of Federal Surface
Transportation Funding. Let me share
with you my views on some key emerging issues, based on my experience as a City
and State transportation official in Boston, Massachusetts, and more recently
as an academic researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
A. Emerging
issues
As
we anticipate the reauthorization process for the surface transportation bill,
I believe this is a useful time to step back and re-examine the evolution of
the Federal program since 1956, and the changing needs of the nation.
The
initial impetus of the program, to create a national highway infrastructure,
has substantially been accomplished.
The mechanism of high Federal matching ratios for capital investment,
stable and reliable funding, clear Federal policy guidelines, and
implementation decentralized to the State government level, has been very
successful at creating an ubiquitous high-quality highway network. As this primary objective has been
substantially achieved, the program has evolved to include funding for
complementary modes such as transit and the urban system, and to issues of
management of operations and maintenance (ITS). These shifts have required more complicated planning and
environmental procedures and institutional requirements, with transit
authorities, metropolitan areas and cities, and sister agencies with
environmental and public health responsibilities, playing important roles, in
addition to State highway departments.
Persistent issues of congestion, especially in suburban areas, continue
to generate intractable problems at the interface of transportation
performance, economic growth, land use, and environmental quality. Moreover, as the system ages, deteriorating
physical condition of old infrastructure gives rise to the need for
reconstruction, or redevelopment of old urban infrastructure in complex urban
environments. The Big Dig in Boston is
perhaps an extreme example of the cost and complexity of this challenge, and is
indicative of challenges ahead in a very large number of urban areas. The need to renew and expand the bridges and
tunnels that serve Manhattan, compounded by the tragedy of September 11, is
perhaps the most vivid example, but dealing with the earthquake damaged
infrastructure in West Coast cities such as Seattle is likely to be similarly
challenging. The vulnerability of the
air traffic system exposed by the September 11 tragedy was already becoming
obvious because of the growing airport congestion, and poses the question of
the need for complementary intercity rail services and improved "ground
access" to airports.
Finally,
the unglamorous question of proper maintenance of the existing highway network
is perhaps becoming more important to the national interest than the further
expansion of the network.
I
believe that our democratic political system will and should translate these
emerging problems into a demand to be as innovative and creative with new
national initiatives as were the founders of the Interstate system.
My
suggestions to anticipate and deal with these emerging issues are these:
(1) Establish a new program to federally
fund the cost of operating and maintaining the existing national highway system,
with clear Federal guidelines and policies for planning, but a decentralized
structure to allow local flexibility for implementation. A pay-as-you-go incentive of 1/3 Federal,
2/3 State funding would, in my judgment, be adequate to create substantially
more attention and sophistication to this unglamorous but vital activity.
(2) Develop a new category of funding for
the rebuilding and redevelopment of old infrastructure and mega-projects. This will be a very expensive undertaking,
but one that is essential to the economic health of the nation. It will require high Federal matching ratios
to be affordable at the State and local levels, and will require planning and
financial mechanisms similar to those of the Interstate program. Early costs are likely to be modest because
of the long lead times often involved, and some national planning will be
required to even develop realistic national cost estimates.
(3) Develop a new initiative to prioritize
access to airports, particularly for truck movements which are increasingly
trapped in congestion, with severe economic consequences. Again, the early costs are likely to be
modest because of lead time, but eventual costs will be high, and require high
Federal matching ratios.
(4) Develop a new program to provide
Federal funding for improved paratransit
services. The dramatic
growth in the aging population is creating a mobility demand far in excess of
the "interim" services for the elderly and disabled provided by
transit authorities for systems which are not fully accessible. The growing need extends well beyond the
extent of many transit providers, and as transit systems become physically
accessible they could theoretically withdraw the current limited services. To deal with this emerging issue at an
adequate level requires that it be viewed as a responsibility of the entire
transportation system (not just inaccessible public transportation systems) and
that it receive reliable Federal funding, not be imposed as an unfunded Federal
mandate. A 50-50 Federal share of costs
is probably adequate to motivate the level of effort required, but the unserved
need is great and growing, so the (Federal and State) funding needs will grow
substantially as organizational capacity to serve the need improves.
(5) Understand and anticipate increased
funding requirements for complementary systems such as transit, intercity rail,
elderly and disabled access, and recognize that aviation funding authorizations
will be considered in the same time frame as surface transportation
reauthorization.
(B) Implementation
Considerations
For
all of these emerging needs, an expanded and restructured financial base will
be required, and it is important to consider the political and financial
context of reauthorization.
The Federal role in transportation has
been evolving based on a combination of three factors:
(1) the
changing needs of the nation as a whole,
(2) The
narrower needs of the transportation public agencies at the State,
metropolitan, and local level, and
(3) the
needs of the transportation construction industry whose economic viability is
strongly affected by Federal transportation authorizations and appropriations.
In many ways the evolution of the
Federal program has been shaped by these three forces, particularly in the
recent history of the program (1990 to the present), and the challenge facing
the re-authorization process of 2003.
In order to balance these three considerations, the Congress has
periodically increased Federal funding through increases in the gasoline tax so
that "new" issues can be addressed without weakening existing
programs, but the President appears unlikely to support this approach in 2003.
I believe that the successful balancing
of these three considerations in 2003 could best be achieved by reconsidering
three major features of the Federal program:
(1) If the pay-as-you-go philosophy,
established by Eisenhower, were partially replaced by a capital budget bonding
approach, similar to that used by every State government, the existing tax
revenue streams could support a major expansion of program to meet changing
national needs and allow expansion for all transportation agencies and the
transportation construction industry, while deferring the need to increase
gasoline taxes. If one-third of the
existing revenue streams were to be used for debt service, the program size
could expand, so that over the next six years, instead of approximately $145
billion it would be possible to invest approximately $175 billion,
approximately a 20% increase. While OMB
would oppose this possible change (as it has in the past) it would have major
economic benefits to the nation by allowing increased investment now, producing
both short-term economic stimulus, and long-term economic growth, within the
existing tax constraints.
(2) If
the State and local matching ratios were increased beyond the 20% ratio now
favored, national program size would increase, and State and local
accountability would grow, easing the burden on Federal oversight
somewhat. Traditional thinking has
favored very low State and local matching ratios based on the precedent of the
90/10 ratios of the Interstate highway program and the strength and popularity
of that program, and the very simple political task of building State and local
political will to raise 10¢ to attract 90¢.
But it is still a bargain to raise 33¢ at the local and State level and
get 67¢ from the Feds, and you "leverage" a somewhat larger program,
with more fiscal discipline at the State and local level.
(3) If
the focus of the Federal role were shifted from capital investment to include a
larger component for operation and maintenance, the effectiveness and
efficiency of the overall program would increase. An extremely large and extensive highway network has now been
created, but the operation and maintenance of that system is often inadequate
and inefficient. The "new"
capital needs are increasingly to rebuild older parts of the system which have
deteriorated from decades of inadequate attention to operation and
maintenance.
Modification of any one of these three
features alone is very difficult, but a combination of the three could make it
possible to deal with both pressing "new" initiatives such as elderly
and disabled needs, environmental concerns, very expensive reinvestment and renewal
needs, and increased levels of funding for operation and maintenance as well as
continuing existing programs, allowing all major players to "win"
without a tax increase during the near-term future.
The current situation, with gasoline
tax revenue estimates low, has created multiple political problems. Highway appropriations have been cut, and
the beginning point for the reauthorization is lower. In a policy area with increasing claims, a "growing
pie" is essential to accommodate new interests without damage to
long-standing constituencies. A
"shrinking pie" is a disaster.
This political problem could produce the political will to partially
shift to a capital budget approach, which could produce growth rather than
shrinkage, and allow the Congress to better deal with emerging issues.
ISTEA began a process of introducing
operation and maintenance themes into the program through its management
reporting systems and "flexibility", but these have not been fully
embraced by the states because the management reporting requirements were often
treated as perfunctory paperwork, and flexibility requires shifting money away
from some traditional activities. This
proposed new combination would allow introduction of funded operation and
maintenance activities (perhaps at "low" 30% match) that would
produce the carrot for real operation and maintenance reform, without sacrifice
of capital investment, and could really continue, deepen and consolidate the
new initiatives of ISTEA while respecting the continuing need for new
investment (and the economic and political importance of the construction
industry). It could also prepare the
capacity to deal with major national infrastructure rebuild issues such as
Manhattan Post-9/11 and (to extrapolate to the aviation re-authorization
process) large reinvestment projects like the proposed restructuring of O'Hare
Airport.
(C) Some
additional clarification of conceptual proposals
Let me provide a little more
explanation of the new program initiatives I proposed earlier.
(1) Operations
and/or Maintenance Funding
Such an extensive highway and transit
system has now been built that the use of what we have, and its proper
maintenance, is more important to performance of the overall system than the
addition of a new link. Yet in spite of
the importance of maintenance and operations, and the system management
requirements of ISTEA, maintenance and operations continue to be treated as
afterthoughts, with sporadic attention and funding. Most State transportation systems continue to focus on
facilities, not the operation of the system, and new construction continues to
be the most visible activity. This is
partly institutional; these agencies tend to be dominated and led by civil engineers
(like myself) who like to build things, especially new things. New construction is exciting, highly
visible, expensive, and Federally funded, so there is a lot of attention to
doing the job right (and less attention to asking if we are doing the right
job). In these organizations there is
often high capacity to design and manage the construction of new facilities
coexisting with under-funded and poorly managed maintenance, so that facilities
require reconstruction because of deferred maintenance. Traffic operations is often viewed as less
exciting, or important, and is reactive.
Very little attention is given to protecting existing capacity and
safety through acquisition of development rights, so we see sprawl development
eroding highway capacity, as well as environmental quality. In order to
transform this institutional landscape into one where improved mobility and
accessibility are the primary objectives, and sophisticated management of
facility maintenance is available to serve the accessibility mission (while
retaining capacity for excellence in the design and construction of new
facilities or the redevelopment of obsolete facilities), it is necessary for
Federal leadership to adequately fund maintenance and operations activities and
provide support for research and management improvement. Steady reliable Federal funding, even at
modest ratios such as 30%, will serve to protect O&M budgets from the
vagaries of local budget fluctuation, and allow this transformation to occur.
(2) Rebuilding, redevelopment of old
infrastructure and mega-projects.
I believe that there is a large backlog
of aging infrastructure in most metropolitan areas which badly need to be
renewed, replaced, redeveloped, or augmented, but which are systematically
under prioritized in the planning and procurement systems in metropolitan
areas. Often these facilities are seen
as lower priority because they already exist.
In addition, they are often intensively utilized, creating dramatic
problems of maintenance of traffic during construction, so agencies may tend to
postpone projects that will be very difficult to manage and politically
unpopular. The environmental processing
of redeveloping and/or replacing old, heavily-used facilities can be complex
and time-consuming, and the high cost and "lumpiness" of these can be
very difficult to deal with in an MPO process, because they often require a
large share of available funds on one project in a small geographic areas over
multiple years. The combination of
competition for resources from other projects, the difficulty and potential
political unpopularity, and large funding requirements make these difficult to
achieve, yet they are crucial to the future viability of many of our major
metropolitan areas.
I believe that some protection from
competition, through dedication of Federal funds at high Federal ratios, is
essential to mitigate a tendency to avoid these challenges, with long-term
destructive impact on accessibility and economic performance.
There are often suggestions that
simplification of environmental procedures would expedite these and other
"mega-projects." I believe
this is a dramatically mistaken view.
First of all, the complexity of the environmental process is a
reflection of the real impacts that redeveloping our infrastructure will have,
on both traffic and the environment.
Moreover, old infrastructure problems are often seen as the occasion to
reconceptualize the facility and its relationship to the environment, not
simply "rebuild" it. Indeed,
if we do not want our regions to become a form of "petrified wood,"
locked into hundred-year-old patterns, reconceptualization is an appropriate
and essential activity. Developing
public understanding and participation in this process is desirable and necessary,
and I believe the environmental process is a useful way to organize this
essential participation. Given the
political importance of the environmentalists rather than picking a fight, I
propose that we should strengthen the enforceability of environmental
commitments. More fundamentally, the real
delays in implementation do not come from legitimate environmental process so
much as from lack of available funding, "predatory" competition for
funds, and agency reluctance to implement these difficult projects. Attempting to reduce environmental process
is likely to simply increase the political unpopularity of these projects and
exacerbate the real problem, which is competition for limited funds. Creating an adequately-funded, high Federal
matching ratio, dedicated funds for these "mega-projects" would deal
directly with the real problem which inhibits dealing with this category of
issues. In addition, increased Federal
capacity for technical support and oversight of these projects is needed. I believe that the FTA Project Management
Oversight program which uses expert consultants responsible to FTA to help
oversee these unique projects is a good model. New York's West Side Highway
collapsing without real replacement, and the redevelopment of Boston's Central
Artery as a depressed highway, at very high cost, are good examples of the
range of possibilities, and the importance of this issue.
(3) Airport
Access
This represents another category of
accessibility likely to be very important to the economy, but underprioritized
in the metropolitan area process.
Airports and the aviation industry zealously oppose any idea of
responsibility to deal with landside access.
Additionally, port authorities tend to make money from parking and
rent-a-car revenues, leading to a lack of advocacy or even support for improved
public transportation access to airports.
Truck access to airports, presumably very important for high-value
goods, generally receives no particular attention. In the competition for scarce funds at the metropolitan area
level, airport and other intermodal access is often a bit of an orphan (similar
to rebuild and mega-projects). Again, a
separate high Federal matching ratio dedicated fund for airport and intermodal
facilities could help ensure adequate attention to this important area. Since the reauthorization of aviation
funding is under consideration by Congress at the same time as the surface
transportation authorization, it should be possible to introduce symmetrical
provisions in the aviation reauthorization to create some responsibility and
funding to prioritize landside access.
If some matching share from the airport proprietor were required to
access dedicated surface transportation funds for airport and inter-terminal
access, an incentive could be created to encourage a more proactive attitude by
airport operators.
(4) Elderly
and disabled paratransit services.
Currently, most paratransit services
for the elderly and/or disabled population are provided by public
transportation providers whose fixed-route services have not yet achieved full
ADA accessibility. There are several problems inherent in this situation:
a) Funding the paratransit service competes
directly with funds to operate fixed-route bus and rail services, and weakens
fare recovery ratios. (Paratransit
fares typically cover only 5-10% of operating costs.)
b) This leads transit providers to consider
the paratransit an "unfunded Federal mandate," and provide
paratransit service of lower than desirable quality, and (because of budget and
fare-recover ratio constraints) reduce fixed-route service.
c) As fixed-route service comes into
compliance with ADA, the legal obligation to provide paratransit service is
removed, but approximately 50% of the clients cannot really use
"accessible" fixed-route service, creating a potential crisis.
d) Outside of fixed-route transit districts,
paratransit services are less available.
e) The aging population, some of whom should
not drive but still need mobility, is growing dramatically.
For all of these reasons I believe we
should recognize that we are dealing with a problem of access to society, not
access to fixed-route systems, for growing numbers of people, and that this is
a transportation system responsibility, to be funded (at a 50-50 level) by
Federal funds with Federal planning and service characteristics, in order to
provide reasonable access and mobility to the full population. This could be a building block toward
creating institutions focused on mobility and accessibility rather than exclusively
on facilities.
(5) Intercity rail and bus services to
complement aviation in the aftermath of 9/11.
Partly because of the ongoing fiscal
problems of Amtrak, partly because of the increased aviation travel times
caused by the increased security in the aftermath of 9/11, intercity rail and
bus facilities are likely to be seen as increasingly legitimate claimants for a
share of transportation funding. While
this will raise complex institutional issues which neither states nor MPOs are
perfectly suited to encompass, I believe there is legitimacy to the public
claim and that it would be prudent to anticipate a need for a new funding
initiative here, at least for capital.
(6) Implementation of reauthorization.
Again, given the combination of
legitimate increased public claims for participation, the reduced level of
gasoline tax receipts, and the likelihood of great resistance to increasing the
gasoline tax before the next election, and that the historic reality has been
that the surface transportation act reauthorization require "all
winners," I believe that re-opening the question of a capital budget
approach to surface transportation is the best hope to create adequate room to
go forward with a broad consensus.
To be sure, using part of the current
revenue streams for bonding allows increased investment in the short run, but
requires either ending some capital investment or increasing the gasoline tax
at some point in the future. But either
of those outcomes is better than the status quo. Bonding costs are at or lower than the rate of inflation in the
construction industry, so dealing with investment needs sooner through bonding
does not cost more. On the contrary, it
provides both short-term economic stimulus and long-term economic growth, both
of which are desirable. It is the way
every homeowner in America buys a house, most private investment is financed,
and every State and City government invests.
If, in six years new investments are curtailed, we're better off to have
had the investment early. If, on the
other hand a unified constituency successfully lobbies to increase the gasoline
tax so investment can continue, that's even better.
In the short term, we need a strategy
to incorporate "new" claimants and environmentalists in support of an
expanded surface transportation authorization, and I believe these suggestions
can help us get there.
Thank you again for the opportunity to
testify.