SAFETEA-LU: DOT Holds Final ‘Town Hall’ for New Bill

The U.S. Dept. of Transportation on July 14 held the last of six town-hall meetings to gather opinions about what the long-delayed successor to the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: a Legacy for Users, or SAFETEA-LU, should look like. For months, industry officials have been waiting for DOT to release its “principles” for a new multiyear bill. DOT officials heard views from a range of groups but didn’t announce the principles.

One participant, American Highway Users Alliance CEO Greg Cohen, told ENR, “Hopefully [the meeting] will lead to no further delays on an administration principles document.”

Since SAFETEA-LU expired on Sept. 30, 2009, highway and transit programs have been operating under a series of extensions. The latest stopgap expires on Dec. 31.

Pam Hunter McFarland was a Senior Editor of ENR and her expertise was: Sourcebooks, Environment, Labor

Tom Ichniowski has been writing about the federal government as ENR’s Washington Bureau Chief since the George H.W. Bush administration, and he has covered at least five major highway bills. A recognized expert on government policy on infrastructure and regulation, Tom is also a Baltimore native and Orioles fan who grew up rooting for Brooks and Frank Robinson. He is a graduate of Columbia College and Columbia’s graduate school of journalism, where he once used “unrelentless” in a headline.

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