Tanya Snyder
Tanya became Streetsblog's Capitol Hill editor in September 2010 after covering Congress for Pacifica Radios Washington bureau and for public radio stations around the country. She lives car-free in a transit-oriented and bike-friendly neighborhood of Washington, DC.
Recent Posts
Foxx: “We’ve Got to Look at Transportation in a Multimodal Fashion”
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Tomorrow marks the end of Anthony Foxx’s first month as the U.S. secretary of transportation. Today he met with reporters who have been eager for an on-the-record meeting with him. Though Foxx has been confident and specific in answering questions by members of Congress, he was more reserved with the press gaggle. He repeated some […]
House Pulls Its Disastrous Transpo Spending Bill As Senate Moves Ahead
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While the Senate continues to consider amendments to its transportation budget bill, expected to pass this week, House leadership has canceled a vote on its own version. The bill, which passed the full Appropriations Committee a month ago, was scheduled to hit the floor this week for a vote by the entire House. A spokesperson […]
Can California HSR Learn From Spain’s Fatal Train Crash?
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The Spanish train crash in Santiago de Compostela that killed 79 people last week has sparked questions about whether high-speed rail is safe. In fact, it’s among the safest ways to travel, and technology that already exists can make the type of human error that led to tragedy in Spain nearly a non-issue. Future high-speed […]
Stuck With Bad Transit Options? There’s an App for That.
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The next time your subway car is overcrowded, or your train is delayed, or your bus is bogged down in traffic, you can access a direct line to your members of Congress and let them know you’re not gonna take it anymore. Building America’s Future, a lobbying group for more federal infrastructure spending, just released […]
Vitter Seeks to Cut Environmental Reviews for Massive Road Projects
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Bridges are getting a lot of attention as senators add their two cents to the upper chamber’s transportation budget proposal for next year. The Senate transportation appropriations bill includes $500 million for “bridges in critical corridors” (BRICC), designed as a response to the recent bridge collapse along I-5 in Washington state — home of Senator […]
Paul Krugman Links Sprawl to Persistent Social Inequality
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Is sprawl holding back social mobility in America? Paul Krugman didn’t mince words yesterday in a follow-up to a post he wrote soon after the Detroit bankruptcy was announced. In that initial blog post, he compared Detroit to Pittsburgh and concluded that it wasn’t just the loss of manufacturing jobs that hurt Detroit — it was […]
Eleanor Holmes Norton Takes Top Dem Slot on Highways and Transit Panel
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Rep. Ed Markey of Massachusetts was elected to the Senate last month, setting off a chain of events that has led to the appointment of a new ranking member of the Highways and Transit Subcommittee in the House. That new ranking member is DC Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton. The path from Markey’s victory to Norton’s […]
Sen. Boxer Calls For Solution to Highway Trust Fund Insolvency
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Senator Barbara Boxer brought together transportation industry representatives this morning to highlight the damage that would be done to the economy if Congress doesn’t come up with a solution to the impending insolvency of the Highway Trust Fund. New CBO estimates, released this week [PDF], project that the fund will be zeroed out by the […]
At First Hearing, Foxx Defends Projects That Advance the “Public Good”
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Should the nation’s largest infrastructure loan program finance projects that make the transportation system more productive and efficient? Hell no, says Senator David Vitter, ranking member of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. Hundreds of millions of dollars should be available to any old project that comes along, as long as it has a […]
UPDATE: Here We Go Again: Sen. Rand Paul Pits Bikes Against Bridges
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Rand Paul is at it again. Last year, Sen. Paul (R-KY) made a laughingstock of himself by alleging that the Transportation Enhancements program — which largely funds bicycle and pedestrian improvements — was used for things like “turtle tunnels and squirrel sanctuaries and all this craziness.” His statements had no basis in fact, but that […]
A Few Wacky Ideas Persist as Congress Moves to Accept Funding Realities
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There are five stages of mourning, and Congress is moving through them as they begin to face the inevitability of increased revenues for transportation. Lawmakers been through denial, anger, and bargaining, and now they’re pretty solidly in the depression phase. That leaves just one more: acceptance. But today’s hearing in the House Transportation Committee was […]
Transportation Meltdown: The Too Hot to Move Edition
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Stay inside, friends. The heat index is a sizzling 111 degrees here in DC and I’m betting it’s not much better where you are. And heat exhaustion isn’t the only reason to crank the air conditioning or lounge in the kiddie pool. Transportation systems are also breaking down in the heat. Shane Phillips at Better […]