Foxx Brings Urgency to Highway Finance Debate

During a remarkable Q&A session March 16 at the Council on Foreign Relations, U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx channelled the growing sense of urgency that many Beltway associations feel about the latest highway reauthorization debate.

With IBTTA’s Washington Briefing coming up March 29-31, the Secretary’s comments show that the tolling industry is on the right track with an advocacy campaign that calls for a mix of funding tools, allowing states greater flexibility to best suit their funding needs.

32 Short-Term Fixes in Six Years

When the Q&A moderator asked about surface transportation reauthorization, Foxx led with an astonishing reality: Congress has kept the highway system running with 32 short-term extensions in six years. A great many legislators recognize the need for stable, long-term funding. But in the end, “what Washington has told the rest of the country is, just stop,” the Secretary said. “And that’s the opposite of what we need to be doing.”

He added that the longer it takes to begin clearing the highway infrastructure deficit, the more it will cost to get the job done. “It is going to be more expensive for us to doddle around for years and years and years than it would be to just bite the bullet, develop a strategy, stick to the strategy, and pay now, because it’s going to be a lot cheaper than trying to pay later.”

All Transportation Funding is Local

The late House Speaker Tip O’Neill famously stated that “all politics is local.” Foxx took a similar tack when an audience member asked him how he would distill the essential messages from his 300-page Beyond Traffic blueprint

“A lot of our storytelling has to be told at a very localized level,” he said. “It has to be almost microtargeted, in a sense. This road in your neighborhood that the state has been talking about for 10 years has not gotten done because the money doesn’t exist.”

With that comment, Foxx put his finger on a reality that is familiar to each of the more than 120 tolling agencies across the United States: For the average motorist, highway funding is as simple and complex, satisfying or frustrating as their own highway experience.

Which is why decisive numbers of American drivers (also known as taxpayers and voters) repeatedly say they are willing to pay tolls when they can see the improvements that result on the roads they use.

Common Cause in the Common Good

Secretary Foxx’s remarks could not have come at a more pivotal moment. As the latest round of highway reauthorization negotiations gains momentum, it will be essential for Congress to consider a mix of funding strategies, recognizing the wide difference in needs between a rural route in Wyoming, an urban/suburban commuter highway in densely populated areas of Virginia or Texas, and a freight corridor in Pennsylvania or Ohio.

There will never be a one-size-fits-all solution to America’s highway funding crisis. Members of Congress can seize the opportunity and move the nation forward by embracing tolling as one revenue option to stop our nation’s infrastructure from steady decline. Tolling, with its proven history, will help move the U.S. beyond a non-sustainable gas tax and a cluster of one-time fixes, rather than setting us up for another 32 short-term extensions by the end of this decade.

For smart ideas on transportation finance, check out IBTTA’s Transportation Finance and Road Usage Charging Conference in Portland, Oregon on April 26-28.