Ryan Coakley's List: Obama Infrastrcuture Spending

• has released $26.6 billion in funding dedicated towards infrastructure spending, which he said will help to spur job creation and help the United States economy get back on track.
• Obama said his administration will be announcing more details about the kinds of transportation projects that will be launched as part of the stimulus package, noting that investment into highways is a cornerstone of the transportation infrastructure investments allocated in the package.

• n a deal struck last week, a Spanish-led group will be paid as much as $1.8 billion over 35 years to design, build, operate and maintain three new toll lanes along traffic-clogged Interstate 595 near Fort Lauderdale. The agreement came as something of a surprise during a period of turmoil in credit markets, and many experts called it a model for how states and private investors can work together to upgrade the nation's aging roads, bridges and other transportation infrastructure.

• By congressional mandate, the government aims to award 23% of all contract dollars across all agencies to small businesses every year. State and local governments have their own rules.

   

  Attendance at contracting expos and seminars is up as more companies try to learn the intricacies of government contract work. Many government contracting consultants are also reporting a surge in new inquiries from small companies looking into contracting for the first time.
• General Services Administration schedule, a list of pre-vetted companies that government agencies can use to find contractors.
• Some contracting experts say the small companies best-positioned to take advantage of the stimulus money are those that already have established relationships with government officials and have experience doing government contracting work.

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• The legislation includes appropriations and tax provisions that will help bolster the electrical construction industry.

• The following projects and research will be funded through The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009: facility sustainment, restoration and modernization projects using energy efficient products, $4.2 billion; improve energy efficiency in aging public housing, $4 billion; energy retrofitting and investing in green projects in HUD-assisted housing, $250 million; increase energy efficiency using green technology in federal buildings, $4.5 billion; energy efficiency and conservation grants, $6.3 billion; energy efficiency and renewable energy research, $2.5 billion; and new loan guarantees for renewable projects, including wind or solar projects and electricity transmission projects, $6 billion.

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  Because of the investment in infrastructure and energy, heating and cooling systems will be upgraded in government buildings and schools. States will receive $9.75 billion to modernize and renovate schools' heating and cooling systems.

• According to the U.S. Congress, the following projects and research will be funded through The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009: facility sustainment, restoration and modernization projects using energy efficient products, $4.2 billion; improve energy efficiency in aging public housing, $4 billion; energy retrofitting and investing in green projects in HUD-assisted housing, $250 million; increase energy efficiency using green technology in federal buildings, $4.5 billion; energy efficiency and conservation grants, $6.3 billion; energy efficiency and renewable energy research, $2.5 billion; new loan guarantees for renewable projects, including wind or solar projects and electricity transmission projects, $6 billion.

• PennDOT Releases Final List of Projects for $1 Billion Federal Recovery Initiative
• The Department of Transportation today released the final list of highway and bridge projects funded by   $1.026 billion from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).

   

  PennDOT also released a list of   $1.8 billion in projects already scheduled to go to contract in 2009.

• Formula programs in the ARRA apportion to California approximately $2.57 billion for highways, local streets and roads, freight and passenger rail, and port infrastructure projects, and $1.07 billion for transit projects.

• Twelve states post all their state spending, six post the checkbooks of selected departments, and seven have passed laws ordering the creation of online spending websites,

• More than a quarter of the nation’s bridges are structurally deficient or functionally obsolete.

• • We have contact in Seattle
• battles that must be waged quickly, since the states must begin spending the money in four months.
• Seattle, in one of the most ambitious building projects in the nation, plans to tear down the aging, unsafe elevated highway that blocks off its waterfront and replace it with a tunnel. Seattle’s mayor, Greg Nickels, and Washington’s governor, Christine Gregoire, both Democrats, wanted to jumpstart the project with around $75 million in stimulus money to help the city replace two major roads.

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• the new law waves aside Buy America restrictions if “the relevant manufactured goods are not produced in the United States in sufficient and reasonably available quantities.”
• Seventy percent of the 14,000 wind turbines in the United States were imported. That level of imports would continue, even under the new Buy America clause, if domestic manufacturers could not fill the orders. Importing many of these products will dilute the job creation and output increases that are the overall goals of the stimulus package, many economists say, just as job creation and output are diluted when people save tax rebates or spend them on imported goods and services.

• $100bn or so allocated to infrastructure in the US stimulus plan really is just a first step towards addressing the more than US$2 trillion of US infrastructure needs.
• The stimulus money will fund desperately needed shovel-ready projects that should spur immediate activity, and has brought much needed attention to the state of infrastructure in this country.
• One alternative is increased usage of Public-Private Partnerships (PPP), used successfully by governments around the globe.
• • New financing models for the delivery of infrastructure assets should be explored, moving away from predominant reliance on government grants and municipal bonds.
       
  • Performance-based decision-making could be applied more consistently to prioritize project funding, including criteria such as total lifecycle costs, congestion relief, economic benefits and environmental considerations.
       
  • Government should be completely transparent to the public and accountable for delivering results - success will breed success, and ultimately the public will value infrastructure that work.

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• U.S. infrastructure is deplored
• The group estimated that $2.2 trillion must be spent in the next five years to restore the nation's infrastructure to good condition.

• Roughly six proposed routes with federal approval for high-speed rail have a good chance of getting some of the $8 billion award, Transportation Department officials say. Spurs include parts of Texas, Florida, the Chicago region, and southeast routes through North Carolina and Louisiana.
• New Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, a former Illinois Republican congressman, said developing high-speed rail is the country's No. 1 transportation priority.
• New Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, a former Illinois Republican congressman, said developing high-speed rail is the country's No. 1 transportation priority.
• "Here's what's going to happen: The [Obama] administration will issue these funds in dribs and drabs — to this project and that project — and the result will be an Amtrak train from Chicago to St. Louis that takes maybe 15 minutes off the travel time."
• "Here's what's going to happen: The [Obama] administration will issue these funds in dribs and drabs — to this project and that project — and the result will be an Amtrak train from Chicago to St. Louis that takes maybe 15 minutes off the travel time."
• n 2000, voters approved development of a Florida high-speed rail service. Yet, concerns about community impact and construction costs estimated at $20 billion to $25 billion drove voters to repeal it four years later, ending plans for a Tampa-St. Petersburg-Orlando system, as well as a proposed second link from Orlando to Miami.
• Led by a private company that included two former Amtrak officials, the project ultimately was abandoned for several reasons, including a barrage of protests from residents near proposed stations and public outcry over the environmental exemption.

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• Burgeoning global population has huge market implications for infrastructure finance. In a new working paper, the Organisation for Economic Development and Cooperation estimates (p. 5) that through 2030, annual infrastructure requirements for electric transmission and distribution, road and rail transportation, telecommunications and water are likely to average about 3.5 percent of global gross domestic product, or about $2 trillion per year,
• higher if other kinds of infrastructure are added in. Small wonder new consultancies fluent in P3s are forming. States and nations are coming to the dance, and matchmakers are in demand.
• Under SB 4, unlimited transportation P3s are allowed between now and January 1, 2017.
• The Expert Review Panel on SR 99 Alaskan Way Viaduct Replacement and SR 520 bridge replacement stressed the value of regional tolling and P3s as finance tools, especially for the looming life-safety rebuild of the 520 bridge. The Regional Transportation Commission chaired by former Seattle Mayor Norm Rice and ex-Western Wireless CEO John Stanton recommended serious attention to possible long-term concessions and build-operate agreements with private partners. A report prepared for the legislature's Joint Transportation Committee stressed that P3s can attract new capital otherwise unavailable, accelerate project delivery, and offload government's construction cost overrun risk.
• P3s could prove especially helpful in getting built the new bridge across the Columbia River between Clark County, Wash. and Portland, Ore.
• In Florida, a Spanish-based consortium, ACS Infrastructure Development, has closed a $1.6 billion-plus deal to design, build, finance, operate and maintain a 10.5-mile reconstructed I-595 connector in Broward County, from near the Fort Lauderdale Airport and I-95, going west to the I-75/Sawgrass Expressway interchange. A central feature, right down the middle, is three reversible, electronic time-variable tolled lanes called 595 Express.
• Already operational North American toll facilities built under P3 arrangements include the E-470 in metro Denver (going totally cashless this summer), the South Bay Expressway in San Diego, the SR 91 express lanes in Orange County, Calif., the William R. Bennett Bridge in Kelowna, British Columbia, and the Dulles Greenway and Pochohantas Parkway in Virginia. Not to mention the Hiawatha Light Rail Transit System in Minneapolis and a cruise ship terminal in Galveston, Texas, among a bevy of P3 projects discussed in this recent trend piece by Wired magazine.

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• The real cost of modernizing the country's infrastructure, says the American Society of Civil Engineers, exceeds $2.2 trillion — an overwhelming figure. Cities and states increasingly are inviting private firms to manage assets these governments can no longer afford and build projects they can't finance. More than half of the states are considering public-private partnerships to get things done, following an example set by European countries that have turned over airports, highways, waterworks and other critical infrastructure to the corporate sector.
• The American Society of Civil Engineers gave the nation's critical networks a D on its most recent Report Card for American Infrastructure. The group's estimate that we need $2.2 trillion over the next five years to bring everything up to snuff is up from its $1.6 trillion estimate in 2005.
• He points to the Chicago Skyway as an example, noting that the consortium drags what is essentially a giant magnet across the road each morning to remove metal debris, reducing the incidence of flat tires and increasing safety. "The public sector never would have come up with this," says Norment. "They’re just not in the business of innovating."

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• Colorado has just opened its first bidding for road and bridge repairs. And Marketplace's Mitchell Hartman reports that some states might actually get a good deal.
• But with so many projects on hold or canceled, contractors are hungry for business
• There's a pent-up capacity and demand. There are a lot of folks in the infrastructure and construction industries available for work.
• An average of 12 percent under the engineers' estimates

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• So today’s news that the Obama administration is digging in its heels against any federal gas tax hike – as Fall ‘09 reauthorization of the surface transportation spending bill draws nearer - adds weight to the growing realization that states and regions will have to continue examining and implementing other fiscal strategies to pay for big-ticket projects.

    

  These can include politically-charged strategies such as raising state gas taxes, county sales taxes, or regional vehicle excise taxes. Another more sustainable category of strategies to pay for ongoing costs of surface transportation to serve a growing population, is sometimes called “the user pays.” It's more direct than a fuel tax can ever be. That menu includes:

    
  • electronic tolling of new highway express lanes in major metro regions with higher charges at peak hours and lower charges off-peak (transit and ride-share vehicles go free);
    
  • creating a network of such electronic, variably-tolled express lanes on all major highways in populous regions, which would exist side-by-side with more congested free lanes;
    
  • Electronic time-variable tolling of all lanes of all major highways in a metro region;
    
  • Carefully-designed regional or state plans to charge vehicles by the mile for travel on all streets and highways, with discounts for off-peak travel, travel on less-congested routes, vehicle weight and fuel efficiency.