Transportation Bill

WASHINGTON -- With two weeks remaining before Congress reconvenes, a new grass-roots effort is under way to focus attention on where the House left off: the nickel-a-gallon gas tax that would fund billions of dollars worth of road and transit projects nationwide.Although the thought of a tax increase generally makes most people run for cover, a coalition of highway and mass transit advocates, mayors and county officials, organized labor and manufacturers called a news conference to grab the limelight last week.

WASHINGTON -- A House subcommittee approved yesterday a new five-year transportation bill that would offer Maryland more highway money than competing Senate and Bush administration measures and would earmark $60 million over the next five years for light rail.The transportation bill approved by the House Public Works Surface Transportation Subcommittee would authorize the state $1.7 billion over five years, compared with $1.6 billion under a Senate-passed bill and the $1.4 billion under the administration-backed proposal.

WASHINGTON -- Motorists across the nation would pay another nickel per gallon in federal gasoline taxes to underwrite an ambitious five-year, $153 billion transportation bill introduced by House leaders yesterday.But Maryland commuters might see little return on their extra investment.The House version of the Surface Transportation Act, which has bipartisan support, would double current federal spending on transportation. But state officials say that, while Maryland received $1.75 billion in federal highway and transit aid over the past five years, the House bill would provide only $1.7 billion over the next five.

Washington -- After decades of pro-highway, anti-transit policies that skewer cities and waste energy, official Washington seems finally to have done something right.Neal R. Peirce writes a column on state and urban affairs.

WASHINGTON -- House leaders are readying a transportation bill that would cost nearly 50 percent more than President Bush has proposed and plan to pay for it with a 5-cent-per-gallon gasoline tax increase.The House bill would dedicate a minimum of $6.7 billion a year to mass transit -- twice as much as Mr. Bush wants to spend -- as part of an effort to shift the federal highway program away from its current interstate orientation and toward congested urban areas.The five-year, $153 billion proposal, to be introduced in about two weeks, was described yesterday by Representative Norman Y. Mineta, D-Calif.

WASHINGTON -- An attempt by the Senate to pass a landmark transportation bill dissolved early today as an acrimonious fight broke out over state shares of billions of dollars in federal aid for highways and mass transit systems.The failure to settle on a compromise allocation plan that would have permitted Senate passage of the bill clearly angered the measure's principal author, Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, D-N.Y."Those who think they will get more by being difficult may get nothing. Nothing," Mr. Moynihan said.

WASHINGTON -- A $105 billion transportation bill to give states unprecedented freedom to decide how to spend federal highway money was sent to the Senate floor yesterday.The bill includes provisions that would affect most U.S. motorists and commuters, including continuing restrictions on double- and triple-trailer trucks, continuing the 65-mph speed limit for some roads and strengthening emphasis on mass transit.Overall, the five-year bill would shift the highway program's emphasis from construction to maintenance, recognizing that a 30-year era of massive road building is ending with the imminent completion of the interstate system.

The battle over higher motor vehicle fees may not be over, even though a House of Delegates committee rejected the proposed increases this week.House Speaker R. Clayton Mitchell Jr. said last night that he would reconsider a Schaefer administration bill that would raise fees charged by the Motor Vehicle Administration if the state Senate could reach an acceptable agreement with transportation officials on how the money would be used."

WASHINGTON -- It was conceived as a challenge, a clarion call to Congress that would cause lawmakers to charge out of the bunkers.But President Bush's Wednesday night exhortation to "move forward aggressively on the domestic front" has triggered mostly yawns and snickers on Capitol Hill, where members of Congress -- particularly majority Democrats -- doubt that Mr. Bush will be able to translate accolades for his Persian Gulf choreography into enhanced political...