NEWS FLASH: Congressional negotiators agree on 5-year highway bill

The FAST Act, which provides $253 billion in funding over five years for highway and bridge infrastructure, motor carrier safety, hazmat safety, passenger rail programs and transit, now goes to the House and Senate for a full vote.    House and Senate negotiators have issued a conference report bridging the differences between surface transportation bills in their respective chambers. The new bill – Fixing America’s Surface Transportation (FAST) Act – now goes to both bodies for a final vote.
   The reauthorization legislation provides $253 billion over five years for highway and bridge infrastructure, motor carrier safety, hazardous material safety, passenger rail programs and transit ($48 billion).
   FAST includes a first ever dedicated freight program with $6.3 billion of formula money going states for freight projects and a $4.5 billion competitive grant program for nationally significant projects, $500 million of which can be used for non-highway mode improvements. And it creates a federal multimodal freight policy and strategic plan to better coordinate freight transportation.
   The bill would cover obligations of the Highway Trust Fund through fiscal year 2020 by using a series of offsets from other parts of the budget. 
   Congress is in a race against time to approve the FAST Act because the latest temporary funding extension expires on Friday.
   The Hill newspaper reported that House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., is confident there will be majority agreement in both chambers to achieve passage of the FAST Act when the legislation is presented Tuesday. Congress has been using stop-gap extensions, sandwiched around the two-year MAP-21 reauthorization, to fund transportation in the short term, but states have complained that it’s difficult to plan large projects in the future without greater funding certainty.
   The Highway Trust Fund does not have enough of a balance on its own to repay states for the federal share of construction because inflation has eroded the purchasing power of the motor fuel tax, which hasn’t been raised since 1993, and more efficient cars means fewer gallons of gasoline are being purchased on a relative basis.
   The combined bill includes provisions aimed at streamlining project delivery and consolidating some permitting regulations, similar to what the Obama administration wrote into its GROW America proposal.
   Other provisions call on the Department of Transportation to establish a working group and collect additional freight data on an annual basis to help freight planning nationwide. The bill also aims to improve freight planning efforts on a multimodal basis.
   States are also granted more flexibility through consolidation of state trucking enforcement grants issued by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.
   Trucking reforms address shortcomings of the Compliance, Safety and Accountability program and how motor carrier scores are used to evaluate motor carriers for hire. The bill includes new incentives for motor carriers to adopt innovative safety technologies and practices and it establishes a pilot program to address the driver shortage by allowing qualified current or former members of the armed forces who are between 18 and 21 to operate a commercial vehicle in interstate commerce. 
   For railroads, the bill consolidates rail grant programs and cuts red tape for infrastructure and safety programs, and accelerates the delivery of rail projects by reforming environmental and historic preservation review processes.
   Dedicated funding and financing that can provide about $2 billion in relief for implementation of Positive Train Control, a wireless communication system that can override a conductor to slow or stop a train to prevent an accident, is also included in the bill. An extension of the original Dec. 31 deadline for railways to implement Positive Train Control until 2018 at the earliest was included in a previous short-term highway extension passed at the end of October.
   The FAST Act also closes a potential loophole in DOT regulations related to thermal blankets on tank cars carrying flammable liquids.
   “Working together with colleagues in the House and Senate, the final conference report includes provisions that will improve overall safety, including motor vehicle safety,” Chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation John Thune, R-S.D., said of the combined bill. “The Senate Commerce Committee’s effort will help in reforming flawed regulations, providing key agencies new tools to improve safety, and laying critical groundwork for freight and passenger railroad infrastructure improvements. Each state has unique transportation needs and the FAST Act offers critical flexibility to streamline projects and deliver better results.”
   “If there is one thing most Americans can agree on is that many of our road and bridges are crumbling,” added Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., ranking member of the Senate committee. “This bipartisan agreement provides states and cities with the long-term resources they need to fund critical transportation projects, while also improving vital highway safety and consumer protection measures.”