SB 104-16: Atlasia Transportation Modernization Act (Rejected)

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

Be it enacted in the Congress of the Republic of Atlasia:

To upgrade our transportation system

Atlasian Transportation Modernization Act

Section 1. Purpose

(a) That this bill shall establish federal infrastructure sub-accounts for each region of Atlasia.

(1) In accordance with the federal government, regions shall establish operate a regional state infrastructure account for mixed-use transit-oriented development projects. This infrastructure account will be part of the federal transportation registry.

(b). Each regional state infrastructure sub-account shall consist of the following sources of revenue:

(1) Monies received by the corporation from counties for the repayment of the loan principal and the payment of simple interest from various assessments or fees from special improvement districts, improvement districts, tax increment financing districts, community facilities districts, and other areas where property value increases are captured over periods of time for the purposes of infrastructure financing;

(2) Appropriations from the legislature;

(3) Federal grants and subsidies to the State or counties;

(4) Private investments; and

(5) Voluntary contributions.

(c) The corporation shall expend revenues in the sub-accounts to make grants and loans to state agencies, and loans to counties or private developers, for the costs, in whole or in part, of infrastructure improvements that would increase the capacity of the infrastructure facilities, including regional sewer systems, water systems, drainage systems, roads, and telecommunications and broadband.

(d) Whenever the corporation undertakes, or causes to be undertaken, a regional infrastructure improvement project, the cost of providing regional infrastructure improvements may be assessed against transit-oriented development projects specially benefiting from the improvements, and the corporation shall take into consideration previous contributions by project owners to infrastructure improvements; provided that:

(A) According to the area of real property for transit-oriented development projects;

(B) According to the area of real property within an assessment area;

(C) Any other assessment method that assesses the real property according to the special benefit conferred;

(E) Grants and loans shall be made only for capital improvement projects approved by the respective county council and mayor, or state agency, as applicable, with a view towards planned growth rather than upkeep and maintenance. The sub-accounts shall house funds related to transit-oriented development projects.

Sponsor: Spark

The gentleman from Florida is recognized.

[Spark]

Establishing this transportation fund is incredibly important for providing access to not only Atlasians in rural communities, but everyone. This bill does just that. Providing equal opportunity for our citizens to get to work is essetial and necessary for our economy to thrive.

[Joseph Cao]

I'm on board with the aims of this bill, though I might return later and see if there are any problems with it.

[Joseph Cao]

Minor nitpick I missed but subsection (E) at the bottom might need to be amended to (D). Grammatical mistakes of this kind can probably be amended by the PPT if I am reading the Senate rules correctly, though Spark ought to check in on that as well as on amending that specific subsection to change "state agency" into something more in line with the bill's goals to involve regional governments.

On a broader note, I remember reading somewhere recently that the trouble with infrastructure in this country is generally not so much the willingness to expand – the political capital is usually present for that – but rather the willingness to expend funds on upkeep and maintenance. This is obviously not the intent of this specific bill but codifying something like this is helpful both for guiding future infrastructure expansions and for providing a blueprint of sorts towards funding the upkeep of our roads, drainage systems, broadband, etc. should we choose to dedicate future legislation toward that effort.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Minor nitpick I missed but subsection (E) at the bottom might need to be amended to (D). Grammatical mistakes of this kind can probably be amended by the PPT if I am reading the Senate rules correctly, though Spark ought to check in on that as well as on amending that specific subsection to change "state agency" into something more in line with the bill's goals to involve regional governments.

On a broader note, I remember reading somewhere recently that the trouble with infrastructure in this country is generally not so much the willingness to expand – the political capital is usually present for that – but rather the willingness to expend funds on upkeep and maintenance. This is obviously not the intent of this specific bill but codifying something like this is helpful both for guiding future infrastructure expansions and for providing a blueprint of sorts towards funding the upkeep of our roads, drainage systems, broadband, etc. should we choose to dedicate future legislation toward that effort.

Its the ribbon cutting effect, politicians benefit politically from new projects because of the photo ops but not so from the day to day maintenance as such.

[SevenEleven]

I agree with Senator Cao that infrastructure maintenance is critical to a successful transportation grid and would welcome such considerations.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

There are a number of cities that wish to have the interstate system withdrawn from the core of their cities. There are many good arguments in terms of minimizing congestion and such for bypassing the city centers, as well as restoring old communities and removing artificial barriers of division that the highway system created by virtue of the way in which it was built.

At the very least, would the wishes of the cities and communities be respected as part of this process?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

So about my last question?

[Deep Dixieland Senator, Muad'dib (OSR MSR)]

There are a number of cities that wish to have the interstate system withdrawn from the core of their cities. There are many good arguments in terms of minimizing congestion and such for bypassing the city centers, as well as restoring old communities and removing artificial barriers of division that the highway system created by virtue of the way in which it was built.

At the very least, would the wishes of the cities and communities be respected as part of this process?

Why are interstates even running through the centres of cities?

[Spark]

There are a number of cities that wish to have the interstate system withdrawn from the core of their cities. There are many good arguments in terms of minimizing congestion and such for bypassing the city centers, as well as restoring old communities and removing artificial barriers of division that the highway system created by virtue of the way in which it was built.

At the very least, would the wishes of the cities and communities be respected as part of this process?

This is a noble question. Rerouting the interstate away from major cities could come at a steep cost and would arguably cause less access to these major commercial areas.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

There are a number of cities that wish to have the interstate system withdrawn from the core of their cities. There are many good arguments in terms of minimizing congestion and such for bypassing the city centers, as well as restoring old communities and removing artificial barriers of division that the highway system created by virtue of the way in which it was built.

At the very least, would the wishes of the cities and communities be respected as part of this process?

Why are interstates even running through the centres of cities?

40s - 60s urban planning. People like Robert Moses liked the idea of building highways that destroyed parts of the urban core, to facilitate car commuting at a time. Him and others of similar view were able to influence to the construction of the Interstate System to do likewise, which conflicted with Eisenhower's original vision at least in part, though connections to port facilities was a part of his desire.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

There are a number of cities that wish to have the interstate system withdrawn from the core of their cities. There are many good arguments in terms of minimizing congestion and such for bypassing the city centers, as well as restoring old communities and removing artificial barriers of division that the highway system created by virtue of the way in which it was built.

At the very least, would the wishes of the cities and communities be respected as part of this process?

This is a noble question. Rerouting the interstate away from major cities could come at a steep cost and would arguably cause less access to these major commercial areas.

You would still have connections obviously. Raleigh for instance has the Belt lines and I-95 does not pass through it, it goes to the South and East. I-40 crosses 95 and connects to the Beltlines that skirt around the City center (used to be the City itself but sprawl). US HWY 70 also connects I-95 and Raleigh.

Passing interstates through cities, makes them horribly inefficient for their primary job at "interstate commerce" because they get clogged up with local travelers, reducing speeds and creating traffic jams. I-95 passes by Raleigh unimpeded, then gets clogged all to hell in places like Philly.

There is also the fact that the plowing of the interstates right through the city centers destroyed historic districts, minority neighborhoods and divided cities and communities. Doing so  triggered induced demand with regards to local traffic leading to a clogged highway system that was suppose to be an unimpeded thoroughfare for the transportation of military vehicles.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I think if we are going to "modernize our transportation system" we need to take a look at the whole system and examine what parts of it are working as intended and also look to alternative means to accomplishing our primary responsibility "interstate commerce" working in productive collaboration with Regional, state, and local government bodies as well.

As for the current system, there seems to me to be a fatal flaw in building, widening and expanding more Highways only for them to be clogged up as well through induced demand. These roads are fiscal sink holes that drain more and more money as they age, they operate on both a "someone else's money" model, promote a deeply inefficient model of long distance transportation (not to mention the impacts on the environment, traffic fatalities and the like), and depend on massive federal subsidization to exist.

A part of this is examining the relationship between the highways and the cities that they interconnect with and respect not only the desires of those cities and states, but also recognize the federal interest in promoting interstate commerce and interest of retreating from or bypassing congested city centers in preference for more free flowing traffic.

It is also necessary to recognize the role played by massive federal subsidization and gov't intervention to promote automobile usage, that in turn led to the decline of the major rail networks (all private sector at the time) and recognizing the imbalance this created along with the conflict between directly subsidized construction of the highways versus private and taxed models that the Rail networks operate under. While I do not share in the belief that Rail networks should be nationalized, I do think that this imbalanced should be corrected and at least recognized, with an aim towards restoring the importance of rail as the primary method of long distance freight and even passenger service and making the expansiveness of the rail network a profitable endeavor.

At the end of the day, both the highway system and the rail network cost a lot of money to maintain. The importance needs to be weighed thus based on efficiency; concepts like rolling resistance; the cost, maintenance and environmental impact of steel wheels versus those made of rubber, and likewise for steel rails versus roads made of asphalt and concrete. When you look at all of the factors and costs involved as well as the massive impact on the budget and the debt, the railroads have to come out on top.

I don't think we can afford in the modern era of indebtedness and environmental concern, the luxury of chasing utopian visions of the 50s and 60s when we have had nearly sixty years of evidence that the numbers don't add up.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

When you make an effort post to kick start discussion by including some controversial topics, only to find that two weeks later, no one has posted since.

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

With Spark gone, this bill no longer has a sponsor. Any volunteers?

EDIT: I have a bad habit of mixing Spark's seat up, although he should still swear in and we need to get back to this.

[S019]

I'm confused what exactly this is supposed to achieve? Also setting aside funding for different aspects of transportation, such as highway expansion might help. Also how is all of this supposed to be funded? I personally recommend either tolls or a VMT.

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

We really need to get back to this or move to a vote.

Anyway, I certainly don't favor tolls, but insofar as they are an option, this is definitely something the regions should decide.

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

A final vote will open in 24 hours, barring objections.

[S019]

So there's no appropriations built into this, what do we do with it?

[Spark]

I object. This bill needs an appropriations piece. I also do not favor tolls.

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

I object. This bill needs an appropriations piece. I also do not favor tolls.

So where are the appropriations? This has been on the floor since July and we still don't have that in place.

[Spark]

I object. This bill needs an appropriations piece. I also do not favor tolls.

So where are the appropriations? This has been on the floor since July and we still don't have that in place.

The House needs to handle appropriations for this.

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

I object. This bill needs an appropriations piece. I also do not favor tolls.

So where are the appropriations? This has been on the floor since July and we still don't have that in place.

The House needs to handle appropriations for this.

...We don't have a House.

[Spark]

I object. This bill needs an appropriations piece. I also do not favor tolls.

So where are the appropriations? This has been on the floor since July and we still don't have that in place.

The House needs to handle appropriations for this.

...We don't have a House.

I suppose we can work this out.

[WD]

Doesn’t seem like this is going anywhere. Motioning to table.