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ROAD TO RUIN REPORT SHOWS HOW TO SAVE TAXPAYERS $17 BILLION My name is Ralph DeGennaro, Executive Director of Taxpayers for Common Sense. TCS is a non-profit, politically independent national budget watchdog group founded in 1995. We are dedicated to cutting wasteful spending and subsidies, from bilingual education to the International Space Station. Taxpayers for Common Sense is pleased to join today with Friends of the Earth and grassroots organizations in more than 30 locations to release the Road to Ruin report. It calls for rejecting the 50 worst proposed highway projects in the nation. Proposed to be located in 26 states, these projects would cost federal taxpayers a total of $17 billion. While we have issued this report before in 1996 and 1997, none has been issued for almost two years and this report is significantly expanded in scope and upgraded in quality. For the first time ever, it also contains the Road to Ruin Top 10 List of the very worst roads. Before we get into details, I want to emphasize that Taxpayers for Common Sense is not anti-road. It's useful to remember how few 50 projects is. The TEA-21 transportation bill enacted in 1998 guarantees total highway spending of $162 billion over six years. Furthermore, TEA-21 contains a record 1,850 so-called demonstration projects, plus other special programs. In addition, the 1991 ISTEA law contained 538 location-specific demonstration projects, some of which are still on the books. In addition to all of these specific earmarks, TEA-21 provides formula funds to each state which are spent for hundreds of other road projects selected by state officials. The Road to Ruin report is modest. Of these thousands of road projects, Road to Ruin identifies what we believe to be the 50 worst ones – those unneeded projects that waste taxpayer money, harm the environment and hurt local communities. Each of these 50 projects was first nominated by local citizen organizations or individuals as part of a nationwide nomination process. Each was then examined by staff for TCS or Friends of the Earth in consultation with other knowledgeable persons. All 50 projects are unneeded, all have serious problems, all face significant local opposition and none should be built as proposed. These 50 worse projects are presented in no particular order. From these 50 projects, TCS and FOE then selected the Road to Ruin Top 10 List and ranked the Top 10 using three major criteria. First, we considered cost to taxpayers, both total cost to federal taxpayers and cost per mile. Second, we considered impact on the environment, especially those roads that would be built through national parks or similar protected lands. Third, we considered which roads would feed sprawl development. Finally, extra ranking was given to those projects that would contribute to loss of farmland; undermine historic preservation; worsen air quality, and undermine existing local businesses. Each of the Top 10 projects is particularly outrageous. We can get into to details during the question and answer period. Here's one thing I have learned in fighting wasteful government projects. People who want taxpayer money keep telling you it's too early to worry about their proposal until it's suddenly too late. That's why this report focuses on projects that have begun to move, but can still be stopped. Most of these projects have received at least some money. For example, the proposed Second Access Road to Denali National Park received $1.5 million in federal money for construction. In Maryland, the state has spent $19 million since July 1998 purchasing rights-of-way for the Inter-County Connector. These road projects are and should be important local issues. But since all of them would receive federal taxpayer money, they are also national issues and somebody needs to defend the interest of federal taxpayers. The bottom line is that no state DOT official or county engineer makes protecting the federal taxpayers his number one priority, so Taxpayers for Common Sense will. These projects are not inevitable. Nowhere are they carved in stone in God's master highway plan. In recent years, citizen groups can claim at least three victories in stopping the proposed Red Rock Crossing Project in Arizona, the I-287 expansion in New York, and the Barney Circle Project here in Washington, DC. Elsewhere, citizen activists have mounted effective campaigns and made progress in stalling the Route 50 Corridor in Middleburg, Virginia and in rallying extraordinary opposition to the I-69 extension project in Indiana. Projects dreamed up decades ago are falling to a spontaneous and growing citizen movement against unneeded, wasteful new highway projects. From around the nation, the message is the same. People are tired of seeing their tax dollars used for unneeded highway projects in their own back yards. In closing, I'd like to thank two TCS staff who did truly extraordinary work and were responsible for producing this report – Bryan Knowles who coordinated this project, and Webmaster Chris Burley who produced the maps and the on-line version, which can be found at www.taxpayer.net Taxpayers for Common Sense is an independent budget watchdog organization dedicated to cutting wasteful government spending and balancing the budget through research and citizen education. Contact: Keith Ashdown (202) 546-8500 x110
Good morning. My name is Brent Blackwelder, and I am President of Friends of the Earth. I'm here today to talk about some of the worst proposed roads in the country - from Corridor H blasting through the majestic mountains of West Virginia, to Interstate 69 destroying the unique wetlands, forests and rolling hills of southwestern Indiana, to Route 710, which would demolish an historic Hispanic neighborhood is South Pasadena, California. Since 1956, the federal government has spent hundreds of billions of dollars of our money building highways. Our national highway system has brought us mobility, but at a high cost. These roads have caused significant environmental harm, smashed through our communities, and wasted our money. As new and bigger highways are planned across the country, and Congress dumps record levels of money into highway building, it seems like there is no end in sight. Each time we widen a local highway, it simply fills up with more cars. Once traffic fills up a 12-lane highway, we widen it to 14 lanes, then 16 or more. These so-called "solutions" are never more than temporary fixes, at best. For this, we make a trade: we burn increasing amounts of gasoline, our air quality gets worse, and we lose natural open space to pavement and sprawl. But there is hope. In 1964, James Morton, the Special Assistant to the U.S. Secretary of Commerce, said "The most serious obstacles in our roadbuilding program are not money, nor engineering problems, nor cruel terrain - but PEOPLE." Less than a decade into the construction of the Interstate Highway System, communities were already witnessing the damage to the environment and neighborhoods caused by poorly planned highways. Throughout the late 1960s and early 70s, people stood up and said no to destructive highways. Today, people are standing up again, and standing in the way of highways that will do more harm than good. Road to Ruin is about the people and communities who have the courage to seek real solutions to transportation problems. The proposed roads in this report are being opposed by small, grassroots groups who care about their communities, their health, and their quality of life. These people are not anti-progress or anti-development, as they are so frequently labeled. Rather, they are people who are concerned about what a new highway means to their community. A new highway means increased sprawl, as precious open space is paved over for strip malls and car dealerships. A new highway means worse air and water quality, as more and more cars spew pollutants into the environment. And a new highway means less money available for road maintenance, public transportation and rail projects. Road to Ruin shows that battles over highway construction are not just local issues - they are part of a national uprising against destructive new highways. Across the country, people are desperately seeking solutions to their traffic and clean air problems. Unfortunately, the answers coming out of Congress and state Transportation Departments hasn't changed in 40 years. If the problem is traffic, the answer is to build more roads. If the problem is poor air quality, the answer is to build more roads. If the problem is economic development, the answer is to build more roads. This short sighted, broken-record policy must end. Last year, Congress approved the largest highway funding bill in history. States now have so much highway funding, they don't even know what to do with it all. So they reach back into the old planning books, dust off a decades old idea, and move it to the top of the list. Highways dreamed up in the 1940s and 50s suddenly come back from the dead, even though today they serve no purpose. No transportation purpose, at least. They serve as an excellent way of creating work for the concrete and asphalt industry. It is time to take the concrete and asphalt industry off of the welfare roles, and tell them to get real jobs. Corridor H in West Virginia is a classic example of everything wrong with our national highway building program. This Appalachian road serves no real transportation need, it takes over a billion dollars away from desperately needed road maintenance, and would slash through a national forest and civil war battlefields. So why is it being pushed aggressively by the state? The answer can be found in last year's federal transportation bill - hundreds of millions earmarked for Appalachian roads. But people are working to stop this road. These local residents, calling themselves Corridor H Alternatives, want to see the money used to repair and upgrade existing roads, while preserving the character and beauty of the region. Road to Ruin shows that there are groups like Corridor H Alternatives across the country, trying to preserve their community, or their national forest. These groups understand the need for honest transportation solutions that don't hurt the environment or bulldoze communities. Now it is time for Congress and state Transportation Departments to get the message. Contact: Mark Whiteis-Helm at Friends of the Earth, 202/783-7400 x102 |
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Prepared Statement of Ralph
DeGennaro
Statement of Brent Blackwelder
