Kay Bailey Hutchison says highway system has been built out

Seeks gas tax opt out 4 Texas

Jon Boyd, Aug 11, 10.

Reauthorization of the transportation bill
Victor Mendez kicked off the second day of the Transportation and Infrastructure Summit, as reported in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram transportation blog:

It’s Day Two of the Transportation and Infrastructure Summit in Irving, and Federal Highway Administrator Victor Mendez was the featured speaker at breakfast this morning. Mendez spoke about the importance of letting states use their federal transportation dollars for a variety of projects, not just highways. Congress is expected to debate a sweeping reauthorization bill in 2011 that would provide five or six years of funding.

“We’re going to focus on giving people transportation options,” Mendez told several hundred people chomping on cantaloupe and croissants at the summit. “Our goal isn’t to favor one mode over the other.”

In determining which projects to fund, the FHWA will look at how a proposal will make cities more “livable”.

“We need to go from a formula system to an approach that goes on successes and outcomes,” Mendez said.

Highway Trust Fund
U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison told summit participants at the keynote luncheon speech, as reported by Gordon Dickson of the Fort Worth Star Telegram: 

On Wednesday, US Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, said she supports allowing states to opt out of the federal highway trust fund. For years, she claimed, Texas contributed millions of dollars a year more in federal gas taxes - at 18.4 cents a gallon - than it gets back in highway and transit grants.

After decades of being a “donor state,” Hutchinson said Texas today receives about 99 percent of the money it puts into the highway trust fund. But she said that’s only a temporary correction, caused in part by Congress’ decision to add money from the general fund to keep the highway trust fund solvent.

“Our national highway system has been built out,” she said. “There’s no longer a need to be giving this money to other states. Other states have the capacity to build these highways themselves.”

Hutchison also predicted that Congress wouldn’t debate the reauthorization of a multiyear transportation bill until 2011. Instead, Congress will likely pass temporary measures to keep current road work going, but with no major changes in transportation policy until after the midterm elections, she said.

The Senator is concerned that donor states like Texas are assuming too much responsibility for the nation’s highway trust fund.  She said that the vision of a national highway system has been fulfilled, and it’s no longer necessary to draw money from Texas to build highways in other states.

Vulnerable User Panel Discussion
Representative Linda Harper-Brown headed a panel discussion on vulnerable road users. She and State Senator Rodney Ellis carried SB 488, the first attempt to comprehensively define a vulnerable user in Texas statute, expanding the definition of travelers who would have a legal right to use the roadway.  This expanded definition included cyclists, motorcyclists, stranded motorists, tow drivers, a wells as construction, road and utility workers.  In addition, the bill defined a responsibility for turning motorists to yield to pedestrians in the crosswalk. The bill passed by overwhelming margins in both houses before Governor Perry vetoed the bill while the Legislature was out of session. 

Representative Harper-Brown explained that Texas does not currently have specific guidelines for passing vulnerable users.  What is a safe passing distance?  The roads don’t just belong to drivers, they belong to other kinds of travelers, she stated.  The bill enjoyed a broad range of support, including a diverse range of constituencies including AAA, Bike Texas, farm workers, motorcyclists, and tow operators, she said. She still believes the bill could become law, but the new Chair of the Vulnerable Road User Subcommittee is considering a new strategy.  What about changing the design of the roads to reduce the number of conflicts?

Anne O’Ryan of AAA concurred with Representative Harper-Brown on the right of a wide range of transportation users to share the road, “They have equal rights and responsibilities to share.”  She talked about a need for, “getting into a culture of safety mindset,” invoking AAA’s Safety Culture Index Report.

Texas Highway Patrol Captain Brian Rippee expressed concerns about motorcyclists and construction workers, two types of vulnerable users.  A veteran of many accident investigations, he claimed that the motorcyclist is usually not at fault for the collision.

“We’re serious about protecting people working in these construction zones,” Captain Rippee said, “You don’t know what it’s like to stand out there in the road with cars whizzing by you at 70mph.  It’s a very humbling experience.”

 

 

 

 

 

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