Ryan Avent
Recent Posts
Obama Admin Declines to Consider New Funding for Transportation
| | No Comments
Having entertained legislators’ own ideas about how best to fund future transportation spending, the House Ways and Means committee turned to representatives from the administration and key interest groups today to hear their thoughts on the matter. The administration’s view could not have been much clearer — this business is all very important, but we’re […]
Prospects for Oberstar’s Transportation Reauthorization Dimming
| | No Comments
House transportation committee chairman Jim Oberstar (D-MN) has been fighting the good fight in trying to keep the hopes for a 2009 transportation bill alive, but the odds appear to be dimming by the day. (Photo: Capitol Chatter) Oberstar’s latest gambit, as reported by Elana, is a move to trim the trust fund patch to […]
Americans Still Use a Lot of Gas
| | 3 Comments
The release of the Department of Energy’s Transportation Energy Data Book is a transportation stat geek’s dream — 300-plus pages of numbers detailing the way the country burns this or that moving people and freight from city to city. Of course, not everyone gets a thrill from poring through data tables for hours at a […]
A Brief Reply to Heritage’s Ronald Utt, PhD
| | 2 Comments
Readers, Ronald Utt has written a memo for the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, on Barack Obama’s transportation policy. Typically, when presented with an article from a group not known for its progressive views on urban issues, I’ll read through the piece at least twice to make sure I’ve gotten the argument. I’ll have […]
Understanding Washington’s Metro Crash
| | 2 Comments
The scene of June 22nd’s Washington D.C. Metro crash. (Photo: AP) The House of Representatives subcommittee on the Federal Workforce, Postal Service, and the District of Columbia convened yesterday afternoon to hear testimony related to the tragic Washington Metro accident of June 22. The proceedings got off to an appropriately somber start, as California Representative […]
Obama’s Agenda for Cities: Enough Talk
| | No Comments
In closing his speech to a roundtable on urban and metropolitan issues, given yesterday at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, Barack Obama quoted Chicago architect Daniel Burnham, who famously urged men to "make no small plans." It’s a nice line for leaders with big goals, but it’s worth noting that Burnham wasn’t all talk. Does […]
In Search of Stimulus on Capitol Hill
| | No Comments
While many cautious economists are at pains to point out that the bulk of the funds in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act — that is, the stimulus — have not yet been spent, others are arguing that the economy is significantly weaker than was expected when the bill was passed and a larger fiscal […]
What Happens Once You Get Off the Train?
| | 4 Comments
Economist Tyler Cowen responds to my recent take on Ed Glaeser’s recent HSR column: My question is simple: how could you take rail from Dallas to Houston and cope once you got there? San Antonio I can see, at least provided you will camp out in city center (a mistake, but that’s a question for […]
Getting the Message
| | 3 Comments
Two things were clear at this morning’s hearing of the Senate Banking Committee concerning green investments in public transportation. First, transportation experts and leading legislators are very much in agreement on how transportation spending should change. And second, Randal O’Toole’s days as anything other than an anachronism are numbered. Cato Institute fellow Randal O’Toole testified […]
Missing the Point on High-Speed Rail
| | 15 Comments
Ed Glaeser is a fantastic economist. He has done magnificent work analyzing the economics of urban growth and written indispensable papers on the connection between housing regulations and migration. But when the man picks up his pen to write a piece for public consumption, he tends to take complete leave of his senses. I realize […]
Stimulus Lesson: When Time is of the Essence, Invest in Transit
| | 1 Comment
To be effective, fiscal stimulus must be timely. The idea behind the policy is that in recession, households and businesses have an excess demand for savings — everyone decides that they want to save at the same time, with nasty effects — and so by borrowing those savings and spending them, the federal government can […]
Money or Nothing
| | No Comments
Building America’s Future is a kind of DreamWorks for the infrastructure set. It’s an organization put together by Govs. Ed Rendell (D-PA) and Arnold Schwarzenegger (R-CA) and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg — men strongly committed to the idea that infrastructure investment is of critical importance for a nation’s economic health, and should enjoy […]