In This Issue

	Michigan Legislators Pursue More Local Road Funding
	Route 35 Moves Forward, More Funding Needed
	Proposed Peanut Ban on Planes Cancelled
	Ohio DOT Goes Green
	Missouri’s 5-Year Highway Plan Focuses on Maintenance
	Quiet Hybrids Pose Safety Issue for Lawmakers
	Calif. High-Speed Rail Ridership Forecast not Reliable, study finds

Michigan Legislators Pursue More Local Road Funding

Michigan – Several bills advancing through the Michigan legislature are aimed at boosting local road funding and help with the ever-constant struggle to find more revenue to pay for transportation projects. A bill to give county road commissions more funding for local projects from the Michigan Transportation Fund received unanimous approval by the Senate. The measure would boost the percentage of a county road commission’s primary road system funds to be used on the county road system ( currently 30 percent) to 50 percent.

In the current two-year fiscal period, county road commissions are allotted $593 million from the transportation fund, largely made up of fuel tax and vehicle registration revenue. House lawmakers voted 106-1 to approve a bill designed to increase road funding options for local governments.

Meanwhile, the Senate rejected a separate bill to allow the state to block driver’s license renewals for people who accumulate three or more unpaid parking tickets. The House previously approved the measure to boost local revenue. In Detroit alone, the city has $30 million in unpaid parking tickets. State law currently requires six unpaid parking tickets in the same community before it will prohibit drivers from renewing their license.

This last paragraph deserves a comment. $30 million is available in unpaid parking tickets which could be collected with a slight change in the law. Readers, how many unpaid parking tickets do you have? I’ll bet not many of you are in the 3-6 range. I just wonder what constituency is being served by protecting the people who owe all this money to the city? TW

Route 35 Moves Forward, More Funding Needed

PUTNAM COUNTY, W. Va. – State officials believe the best option to make a deadly highway safe is to make it a toll road, as the Route 35 expansion project remains unfunded. The West Virginia Division of Highways (DOH) is conducting public meetings on the idea next week, which are required by the Federal Highway Administration. On July 4, a mother and her 11-month-old baby were killed on the road when the woman veered into oncoming traffic and was hit by a tractor-trailer.

The state needs more than $200 million to widen a 14.6-mile stretch of Route 35 in Putnam and Mason counties. Two sections of the expansion of one of the most dangerous highways in the state were completed with federal earmarks.

“The fact is without the money to fund this project and to build this missing piece, it probably won’t get built,” said Brent Walker, a spokesman for DOH. “So we have to find ways.”

Members of the West Virginia Parkway Authority said at a meeting Thursday that the toll road would stretch 31.88 miles and would have to be approved by county commissioners in Putnam and Mason counties. Board members took the first step in the process at the meeting by passing a resolution to Senate bill 427, which allows the DOH, Department of Transportation and the Parkways Authority to collaborate, as well as formally agree and approve the project.

Proposed Peanut Ban on Planes Cancelled

Federal transportation officials proposed a ban on airline peanuts to protect the nation’s estimated 1.8 million nut allergy sufferers. The U.S. Department of Transportation announced last month that it was soliciting public input on the proposal, among other protections for air passengers under consideration by the agency.

However, recently published reports say the proposal exceeds the federal official’s authority, as federal law prohibits such restrictions without commissioning and publishing a peer-reviewed scientific paper that showed individuals with peanut allergies could actually benefit from the policy change.

Ohio DOT Goes Green

The Ohio Department of Transportation is going green, with environmentally friendly tactics such as replacing 25% of the agency’s traffic lights with LED (Light Emitting Diode) technology to cut electricity consumption by the lights. LED technology has already reduced electricity consumption in traffic lights, and LED’s will also improve the reliability of the traffic lights, and reduce repair and maintenance costs.

ODOT also plans to achieve LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification with at least 50% of its newly constructed buildings, and also plans to reduce energy usage in existing buildings by 15%.

Other plans for ODOT’s green team include a pilot project t o install a Truck Electrification System (TES), which reduces the amount of truck idling, and purchasing at least 4 electric vehicles and 1 all-electric delivery truck. Over the long term, ODOT will measure how its projects, operations and maintenance affect water and air quality, and find ways to reduce negative impacts.

Missouri’s 5-Year Highway Plan Focuses on Maintenance

JEFFERSON CITY – Missouri’s new five-year highway construction program will focus on maintenance rather than constructing large new projects to relieve congestion. Approved July 1 by the Missouri Highways and Transportation Commission, the program is one-third the size of the 2009 program. The $5.7 billion plan for 2011-2015 will emphasize taking care of the state’s busiest highways as annual transportation spending will drop by two-thirds by 2015. The state will complete major projects laid out in the last plan, including a new interchange at I-435 and Front Street.

“This five-year direction requires significant cost-saving strategies like reducing the number of MoDOT’s salaried employees and operating expenditures for mowing and equipment,” said Kevin Keith, interim director at the Missouri Department of Transportation. “These measures are estimated to save more than $200 million that we’ll use to keep our roads and bridges in good condition.”

Missouri is a mirror for most of the rest of the country. Absent a new highway bill and some assurance of federal funding into the future our nation is turning into a maintenance only operation for highways. Sadly, even in this mode the highway system will continue to decline. TW

Quiet Hybrids Pose Safety Issue for Lawmakers

Lawmakers are calling for hybrid and electric cars to be noisier, as researchers and safety groups suggest the vehicles can be a safety hazard to pedestrian and the blind who depend on sounds to travel safely. Congress has added sound requirements for hybrids and electric vehicles to an auto safety bill under consideration following the massive Toyota recalls.

Advocates for the blind have been seeking such artificial noise additions in hybrids cars for years. A 2009 report by the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said hybrid vehicles were twice as likely to be involved in an auto-pedestrian crash at low speeds as a car with a conventional engine. Lawmakers may consider the changes this summer, and car companies would have to have the artificial sounds ready three years later, if approved.

If you’ve never been around a hybrid it is a bit unnerving to not have engine noise. Maybe the new sound could be something more pleasant than what we have now. TW

Calif. High-Speed Rail Ridership Forecast not Reliable, study finds

BERKELEY – The California High-Speed Rail Authority's forecasts of demand and ridership for a new San Francisco-to-Los Angeles high-speed train are not reliable because they are based on an inconsistent model, according to a new study by researchers at the Institute of Transportation Studies at the University of California, Berkeley (ITS Berkeley).

"We found that the model that the rail authority relied upon to create average ridership projections was flawed at key decision-making junctures," said study principal investigator Samer Madanat, director of ITS Berkeley and UC Berkeley professor of civil and environmental engineering. "This means that the forecast of ridership is unlikely to be very close to the ridership that would actually materialize if the system were built. As such, it is not possible to predict whether the proposed high-speed rail system in California will experience healthy profits or severe revenue shortfalls."

The study is the first academic review of the rail authority's ridership forecasts, which were included in California's successful application for federal stimulus dollars. In January 2010, the Obama administration awarded the state $2.25 billion in stimulus funds for trains that are expected to reach 220 miles per hour between Los Angeles and San Francisco. The review was commissioned by California's Senate Transportation and Housing Committee, chaired by Sen. Alan Lowenthal (D-Long Beach), and was funded by the rail authority. The researchers presented their findings to the rail authority and the California State Senate June 30.