by Hank Kalet, Managing Editor
President-elect Barack Obama is poised to modernize America’s roads, bridges and other infrastructure.
During a radio address on Friday, Mr. Obama announced an economic plan that he says will create 2.5 million new jobs “rebuilding our crumbling roads and bridges, modernizing schools that are failing our children, and building wind farms and solar panels; fuel-efficient cars and the alternative energy technologies that can free us from our dependence on foreign oil and keep our economy competitive in the years ahead.”
The two-year recovery plan, which observers say could cost as much as $700 billion, will be drafted over the next several weeks. Mr. Obama said he wants the plan to be “big enough to meet the challenges we face” and to be ready for his signature shortly after he takes office in January.
”These aren’t just steps to pull ourselves out of this immediate crisis,” he said. “These are the long-term investments in our economic future that have been ignored for far too long.”
He’s right. The American Society of Civil Engineers, a professional group, has been giving the nation’s infrastructure poor grades for several years. Its most recent report card, issued in 2005, was a D and the organization says little improvement has been made over the last three years.
The group says that upgrading the nation’s infrastructure will cost about $1.6 trillion over the next five years and that doing nothing will cost significantly more in lost economic opportunity and quality of life.
The ASCE says:
• More than a quarter of the nation’s nearly 600,000 bridges “rated structurally deficient or functionally obsolete” with $9.4 billion needed annually over the next 20 years to address the issues.
About $11 billion will be needed annually to “replace aging facilities and comply with safe drinking water regulations.” The federal government currently spends less than a billion dollars annually.
• The nation’s power grid is outdated and inefficient. “Existing transmission facilities,” ASCE says, “were not designed for the current level of demand, resulting in an increased number of ‘bottlenecks’ which increase costs to consumers and elevate the risk of blackouts.”
• A lack of rail capacity “has created significant chokepoints and delays,” with the problem getting worse as freight tonnage increases and rail service is expanded to accommodate a growing number of commuters.
Failing roads and intersections “cost U.S. motorists $54 billion a year in repairs and operating costs — $275 per motorist.” And congestion — like the traffic tie-ups that paralyze Route 1 in West Windsor during rush hour — mean that Americans spend a total of 3.5 billion hours a year in gridlock “at a cost of $63.2 billion a year to the economy.”
And this does not take into account crowded schools, a lack of broadband access to most rural and some urban areas and the need for new power sources like wind and solar.
The evidence of this dysfunction is all around us. Motorists turning onto New Road in South Brunswick from Route 1 during either the morning or evening rush hours know the light sometimes changes as many as four or five times before they can just get through the jughandle. The same goes for Sand Hills Road, Washington Road in West Windsor, parts of Route 206 in Hillsborough and elsewhere.
The reason for this, of course, is a shortsighted focus on the most recent tax bill that assumes there will be money available down the road. The problem with this, however, is that there always are reasons not to ask taxpayers for the money and needed improvements get deferred year after year until congestion reaches a crisis level or worse — a bridge collapses or a levee is breached by a storm.
I remember a covering budget negotiations in Princeton Borough in the mid-1990s. Taxes were set to rise and the money that the Borough Council was planning to set aside for road maintenance landed on the table. Council members wisely left the money intact, having learned from the expedience of previous councils that delaying maintenance does little more than result in potholes and traffic backups.
It’s a lesson that state and federal governments should have learned, as well. Though, the ASCE report card — and last year’s Minnesota bridge collapse — indicate otherwise.
Let’s hope that Mr. Obama’s promise to invest heavily in infrastructure portends a shift in thinking that outlasts his administration and becomes part of a long-term commitment.
Hank Kalet is managing editor of the South Brunswick Post and The Cranbury Press. He can be e-mailed by clicking here. His blog, Channel Surfing, can be found at www.kaletblog.com.

