Highway Spending Is Important

If you are ever tempted to take highways for granted, and if you are ever tempted to label transportation projects "congressional pork" just because they are expensive, think about the crowded lanes leading north from New Orleans shortly before Hurricane Katrina hit. Think about how good it is that those highways got so many people out in time, and how the heavy volume may have dissuaded others from hitting the road as they were urged to do by their mayor.

Of course, highways are much more than evacuation routes. America's economy and standard of living depend on efficient transportation. In 2003, the cost of traffic congestion nationwide was over $68 billion resulting from 3.7 billion hours of extra travel time and 2.3 billion gallons of fuel wasted while sitting in traffic. The average trip takes 32 percent more time in rush hour than in non-rush hour.

Accordingly, the major highway bill that Congress approved in late July is an economic necessity for our nation and communities. As Chairman of the Subcommittee on Highways, Transit and Pipelines, I'm proud of my work on this essential legislation. $286 billion in spending over six years is a significant investment, but in fact it is considerably less than the $375 billion identified by the U.S. Department of Transportation as being necessary to improve safety and to promote increased quality of life.

The highway bill is really about much more than highway projects. A more accurate term for the legislation would be "transportation bill," since it includes money for public transit and seeks to be "intermodal," encouraging the efficient use of cars, buses, trains, airplanes, bicycles, walking and more.

There has been some criticism of the so-called "pork barrel" projects in the bill. While I have no interest in defending every one of these projects, the vast majority are good and sound. Members of Congress generally understand local priorities, and a project can well be legitimate even if it is promoted by a politician rather than by somebody in the state or federal transportation bureaucracies.

My key position on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee has enabled me to protect Wisconsin's interests. The new law includes a 30% increase in highway funding for our state. The increase translates into 10,000 new local jobs.

Wisconsin will receive an average of $711.9 million in highway funding due to the formula we've worked out. We will get back on average $1.06 for every dollar our drivers send to the Highway Trust Fund through their federal gasoline taxes. This will help to make up for decades of underfunding when we got back as little as 70 cents for every dollar of gas taxes we sent to Washington.

Often overlooked are the important policy initiatives included in the new law. We are acting to encourage greater seat belt use, decrease drunk driving, improve truck safety, promote recreation in ways which greatly enhance communities, and provide greater enforcement tools to go after unscrupulous household goods movers. We can justly be proud of these provisions, even though they don't provide for new roads or bridges.

Federal highway spending is funded solely out of taxes paid for by drivers when they fill their gas tanks. Those taxes are a form of user fee. Nevertheless, commentators and politicians like to call transportation funding "bloated," and seek to raid the Highway Trust Fund for other unrelated purposes.

I agree completely that there are many important tasks that the government must fulfill, but if you understand that a modern society needs to get people and products from one place to another rather than leaving them in stall-and-crawl traffic, burning expensive fuel to travel inches, then you will understand that efficient transportation is a necessity rather than something we can safely shortchange.