When Congress passed the Federal Aid Highway
Act of 1956, it gave the Bureau of Public
Roads a clear mission: oversee construction of a
safe, high-speed Interstate Highway System. As
that system neared completion in the 1980s, the
mission of the Department of Transportation
became increasingly murky. Now the department
is supposed to reduce congestion; attract people
out of their automobiles; clean the air; promote
economic development; improve livability; create
a sense of community: and accomplish a variety
of other often conflicting goals — most of which
are not easily quantifiable.
As the mission became muddied, each surface
transportation reauthorization since 1982 has
included an increasing number of earmarks,
divided revenues among more and more different
funds, and added lengthy rules for how those
funds may be spent. Each earmark, apportionment,
and rule has made transportation spending
incrementally less efficient.
This increasing politicization of something
that began life as a fairly efficient program is the
predictable result of government involvement in
what is essentially a private economic activity. The
inevitability of such decline is a good argument
for abolishing the U.S. Department of Transportation
and devolving federal transportation programs
to the states.
Short of that, Congress should make every
effort to return to a system where people get what
they pay for — that is, transportation user fees are dedicated
to systems that benefit the people who paid
those fees — and people pay for what they get — that is,
people pay the full cost of the facilities they use.
As a second-best solution to abolishing the
Department of Transportation, this paper offers
eight proposals essential for the 2009 reauthorization
to achieve these goals. These proposals
include
- Apportion funds to states based on population,
- Require that short-term plans be efficient
- Create a citizen-enforcement process that
- Eliminate long-range transportation planning
- Allow unlimited use of road tolls
- Eliminate clean-air mandates
- Avoid earmarks
- Remove employee protective arrangements from transit law
land area, and user fees
or cost efficient
will ensure efficiency and cost efficiency
When Congress passed the Federal Aid Highway
Act of 1956, it gave the Bureau of Public
Roads a clear mission: oversee construction of a
safe, high-speed Interstate Highway System. As
that system neared completion in the 1980s, the
mission of the Department of Transportation
became increasingly murky. Now the department
is supposed to reduce congestion; attract people
out of their automobiles; clean the air; promote
economic development; improve livability; create
a sense of community: and accomplish a variety
of other often conflicting goals — most of which
are not easily quantifiable.
As the mission became muddied, each surface
transportation reauthorization since 1982 has
included an increasing number of earmarks,
divided revenues among more and more different
funds, and added lengthy rules for how those
funds may be spent. Each earmark, apportionment,
and rule has made transportation spending
incrementally less efficient.
This increasing politicization of something
that began life as a fairly efficient program is the
predictable result of government involvement in
what is essentially a private economic activity. The
inevitability of such decline is a good argument
for abolishing the U.S. Department of Transportation
and devolving federal transportation programs
to the states.
Short of that, Congress should make every
effort to return to a system where people get what
they pay for — that is, transportation user fees are dedicated
to systems that benefit the people who paid
those fees — and people pay for what they get — that is,
people pay the full cost of the facilities they use.
As a second-best solution to abolishing the
Department of Transportation, this paper offers
eight proposals essential for the 2009 reauthorization
to achieve these goals. These proposals
include
- Apportion funds to states based on population,
- Require that short-term plans be efficient
- Create a citizen-enforcement process that
- Eliminate long-range transportation planning
- Allow unlimited use of road tolls
- Eliminate clean-air mandates
- Avoid earmarks
- Remove employee protective arrangements from transit law
land area, and user fees
or cost efficient
will ensure efficiency and cost efficiency
Randal O’Toole is a senior fellow with the Cato Institute and author of The Best-Laid Plans: How Government Planning Harms Your Quality of Life, Your Pocketbook, and Your Future and the forthcoming Gridlock: Why We’re Stuck in Traffic and What to Do about It.