Our hopes and aspirations for 2015 may turn out to be just that: hopes and aspirations. Here in the League’s home base of Washington, D.C., we hope the new Congress with one party in power will act to resolve the knotty problem of enacting a long-term solution for funding our surface transportation infrastructure. But don’t bet on it.
While we are hoping, how about some attention to the rest of America’s aged and deteriorated infrastructure, things such as our electric power grid, inland waterways, urban water and sewer systems? We should probably aim low.
We hope the Congress returns to governing — actions such as annual appropriations bills and genuine policy-driven oversight hearings of the federal agencies. Wouldn’t it be nice to see some tough pushing and shoving between the Congress and the administration where our transportation issues are resolved by negotiation, compromise and reasoned analysis? Don’t get your hopes up.
Out beyond the Beltway (a/k/a “the real world”), we’ll be confronting the capacity challenges in our West Coast ports long after the PMA and ILWU sign a new contract. “Capacity” will be written in bold type in every account of rail and truck industry performance — but can we please stop blaming it on the weather? Come July, we’ll be praying either for more or less water in the inland rivers, and hoping the lock gates make it just one more year. (See above reference to infrastructure.) We will still be looking for truck drivers.
Not much is actually transported in the nation’s capital, and it’s been reported by some that not much is accomplished either. The odds on our annual new year hopes for an improved freight transportation environment seem to worsen as the years go by.
Maybe 2015 will be different — or not.
Bruce Carlton, President and CEO, National Industrial Traffic League