Recent Streetsblog USA posts about Government Organizations

Why Federal Efforts to Link Transportation to Climate Change Matter

By Tony Dutzik | Apr 26, 2016 | 8 Comments

Cross posted from the Frontier Group. Twenty-five years ago this spring, I was a fresh-faced undergrad at Penn State enrolled in a course on existential threats to civilization, including climate change. We knew then (and yes, with a reasonable degree of certainty we did know) that emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases were […]

U.S. DOT Blows Chance to Reform the City-Killing, Planet-Broiling Status Quo

By Angie Schmitt | Apr 19, 2016 | 19 Comments

The Obama administration purportedly wants to use the lever of transportation policy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx recently said he’d like to reverse the damage highways caused in urban neighborhoods, but you’d never know that by looking at U.S. DOT’s latest policy prescription. U.S. DOT has drafted new rules requiring state DOTs to track their […]

U.S. DOT Wants States to Disclose Climate Impact of Transportation Projects

By Angie Schmitt | Apr 18, 2016 | 9 Comments

The Obama administration wants state DOTs to report on the climate impact of their transportation policies, reports Michael Grunwald at Politico, and the road lobby is dead set against it. As part of the implementation of the MAP-21 federal transportation bill, U.S. DOT officials are preparing a new rule that would require states to set goals […]

Anthony Foxx Wants to Repair the Damage Done By Urban Highways

By Angie Schmitt | Mar 30, 2016 | 96 Comments

Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx is offering a surprisingly honest appraisal of America’s history of road construction this week, with a high-profile speaking tour that focuses on the damage that highways caused in black urban neighborhoods. Growing up in Charlotte, Foxx’s own street was walled in by highways, he recalled in a speech today at the Center for American Progress. Building big, grade-separated roads through […]

The Complete Case Against Highway Widening in Detroit

By Angie Schmitt | Mar 1, 2016 | 3 Comments

Michigan DOT wants to spend $1 billion rebuilding and widening I-75 to Detroit’s sprawling northern suburbs, at the expense of the city and close-in suburbs. Royal Oak, a walkable suburb that borders the city, is not having it. The City Council passed a resolution unanimously this week officially opposing the widening of I-75 as well as […]

Houston Mayor Calls for “Paradigm Shift” Away From Highway Widening

By Angie Schmitt | Jan 29, 2016 | 17 Comments

Newly elected Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner gave a remarkable speech yesterday in Austin [PDF], calling on the state to change its transportation priorities and stop pouring billions into widening highways. Turner told the Texas Transportation Commission, the appointed board that leads Texas DOT, that the state needs a totally new transportation paradigm. The speech is phenomenal, and Texas […]

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