DC Velocity - February 2009

thoughtleaders BRUCE CARLTON

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I would add, although it is outside of our NITL traffic lane, that my reading of the agenda going forward is that it calls for investment in America’s infrastructure in its broadest sense. Yes, it is going to be about highways and intermodal connectors, and yes, it is going to be about runways and Mississippi River locks and dams, but it is also going to be in the parallel lane of infrastructure on our water and sewer systems, our electric distribution systems, and this thing we call broadband, which I am too old to understand.

QFrom NITL’s viewpoint, what would a sound national freight transportation policy look like?

AWhat we would hope to achieve is a rational, coherent policy that, first of all, proclaims freight transportation to be a key matter for the American economy and the American people, and second, provides sound guidelines for the distribution of monies to necessary projects. We are not naïve. We know that there will be earmarking of projects for time and eternity. What we would like is that earmarked projects go to a highest and best purpose and that a significant share of the funding be dedicated to freight projects that have been well tested. By that, I mean that have survived a rigorous analytical framework for picking and choosing among competing projects so that we get the best.

I will say that the previous administration at DOT has done a good job of setting up the question and the debate. I think that their work on identifying transportation corridors, which brings a multi-state, multi-jurisdictional approach to project selection, is a tremendous positive addition to the public policy process. They have opened their eyes to nontraditional transportation funding mechanisms. I think they’re perhaps a bit too narrow in their approach, but nevertheless, they are directing the next group of decision makers to take a good, hard, honest look at private funding, public-private partnerships. What they have essentially concluded is that taxes alone probably cannot come up with an amount that is going to be sufficient to pay what all of us understand is going to be an enormous bill.

QAny closing thoughts?

AYes. I would like to add that this new framework in the public dialogue that we call “green” and “sustainable” is very real. It is a great opportunity going forward for American business and executive leadership. It is going to create jobs.

What I find is most fascinating, though, is how quickly and how deeply set this new imperative has become. The idea of green business was seen, I think, as sort of fringe and kooky politics only a few years ago. It is now at the heart of everything we talk about and every initiative, and transportation is right in the bulls-eye target here. We are a carbon-based industry and in several key regards, will remain so for a very long time. We are going to be talked about a lot. That means that as professional transportation industry practitioners, we are going to need to confront that head on.

New technologies and new operating systems are going to be part of this debate going forward. I can tell you that the league and its members are on board. I like to tell people that the NITL as an association is a very proud member of SmartWay [the Environmental Protection Agency’s fuel conservation and environmental initia-tive]. I know that any number of our members are proud members of SmartWay. When there are sound initiatives coming forward, we are going to take a hard, analytical look at each of them, and we will be a flag bearer for the good ones. We are about being green, and we want people to know that we are about being green.

QIt seems that the world has suddenly realized that what we now call green business isn’t just a warm and fuzzy goodwill-building marketing ploy, that green is the color of money. As a result, it’s going to be a lot less difficult to convince everyone to get on board. AYou have put your finger on it very, very nicely. We used to laugh at those tree-huggers.