Sharp Exit From a Dead-End Policy : Shifting money from highways to mass transit

The U.S. Senate’s $123-billion version of a new five-year federal transportation program could have been tailor-made for Southern California. In some respects, it was. Now Californians must buckle down to getting something very much like it from the House and persuading President Bush that it is a better plan than his own.

California’s share of the money in the bill would be $17.8 billion. But the most striking thing about the bill is the freedom it gives states for the first time to shift money from highways to rail transit systems if rail transportation is what the states need most.

Its formulas for matching funds also would tilt the program away from decades-old policies that earmark most federal transportation monies for new highways and toward repairing old roads and bridges. One way the Senate would change the tilt is by having the federal government put up 80% of the cost of mass transit and road improvement projects and only 75% of the costs of new roads.

Several billion dollars could be spent on new technology to speed up traffic by creating “smart roads” as one means of getting more mileage out of routes already in place.

Some of these features--for example, new flexibility in deciding how to use transportation money--were first spelled out in California, notably by the Southern California Assn. of Governments.

That, in turn, may reflect the fact that Southern California is closer to gridlock than most areas and therefore more desperate to find ways to avoid it.

The region’s population may well exceed 20 million in less than 20 years, and that probably will mean half again as many cars on its streets and highways.

If nothing is done to clear traffic jams, the average speed of cars at rush hour will be about 12 miles per hour--four-hour round trips for commuters who live 25 miles from work. Cars would be moving bumper-to-bumper in downtown Los Angeles and parts of Orange County at between 5 and 10 m.p.h.

Southern California must deal not only with highway congestion but with the dirtiest air in any urban area, and two parts of the Senate proposal bear importantly on cleaner air.

One would divide an extra $5 billion among areas with severe smog problems to finance fixes in transportation networks that would reduce smog by, for example, reducing the need for some trips.

Flexibility to shift money from highways to transit would help on both the smog and the congestion fronts.

The transportation action now shifts to the House, where the leadership is promoting a bill similar to the Senate version but with an additional $30 billion to be financed by a nickel-a-gallon increase in the gasoline tax.

California will be able to put extra transportation money to good use for years to come. But the White House is not crazy about the Senate bill as it is, and this may be a bad year to be greedy.

If it comes to a choice between new money and new rules for making transportation decisions, California should grab the new rules and run.