America 2050

The Contra Costa Times, a daily paper covering the fast-growing suburbs of Contra Costa county in Northern California, ran a lengthy article following SPUR's November newsletter and study of the Northern California megaregion. The article is interesting in that it highlights both the advantages and disadvantages of the emerging megaregion identity and reality in Northern California.

On the positive side, reporter Erik Nelson describes how transportation officials recently used the Northern California megaregion identity to secure more transportation funding from the California Transportation Commission -- as much as $840 million -- to address the megaregion's freight needs, including a growing export economy. He writes,

At a recent meeting of the MTC, its executive director, Steve Heminger, unveiled San Francisco Planning and Urban Research's map of the Northern California megaregion and credited the concept with the funding coup that would pay for major freight rail improvements and other aids to easing the area's flow of cargo.
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One of Northern California's key selling points was that it "could show more bang for the buck, a greater return for the infrastructure bond investment up here, based on a variety of projects and a variety of benefits," said Steve Gregory, senior port strategic planner for the Port of Oakland.
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The megaregion has another advantage over Southern California, O'Connor said. The area has prodigious political clout, from San Francisco's House Speaker Nancy Pelosi calling the shots in Washington to Oakland's Sen. Don Perata running the state Senate.

But on the downside are the forces giving rise to the sprawling megaregion: longer and longer commutes by people in search of affordable housing who are priced out of San Francisco and Bay Area communities. Nelson describes one commuter, Jon Rubin, who seems to typify the pressures faced by millions of families in Northern California.

A San Jose native, Rubin found buying a townhouse in Silicon Valley out of reach and extended his family's search as far south as Morgan Hill, even though he was working in Pleasanton at the time.
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"We saw how big the homes were and they had front and backyards," he recalled. "So then we thought, 'Wow, for less money we can actually buy a detached home with a yard.'"
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Four years later, Rubin, a software test engineer, is commuting 124 miles round trip each day to Palo Alto.

Gabriel Metcalf, co-author of the SPUR study attributes the growth of the megaregion to the failure of coastal communities to accept their share of the housing growth.

"The existing cities of Northern California have been unwilling to grow," Metcalf said. "They have, for the most part, decided they are perfect as they are. That doesn't mean that the area stops growing. It's pushed out."

This sentiment is echoed with frustration by those working for economic development and sustainability in the Central Valley.  Carol Whiteside, founder of the Great Valley Center, is quoted in the article,

"Most people are increasingly frustrated with the (Central) Valley providing cheap housing for people who work in the Bay Area," she said.

This snapshot of the dynamics in the Northern California megaregion encapsulates the opportunities and challenges presented at the megaregion scale. By finding common cause around issues that connect adjacent regions, communities can gain mutual benefit, as demonstrated in the increased funding obtained for the megaregion from the State.

But the forces of sprawl and lengthening commutes between the coast and Central Valley in Northern California -- with negative impacts in both regions -- highlight the fact that growth in California has outgrown the "metropolitan" approach. However resistant the regions may be to a shared identity, the need for a planning process that includes a much larger area (and proactive strategies to create more employment in the Valley itself) is underscored by the spillover growth that is threatening quality of life and the environment in Northern California. 

The National Surface Transportation Policy and Revenue Study Commission issued their final report this week, calling for investments in the nation's surface transportation network of $250 billion a year for 50 years from all sources. Predictably, the media jumped on the Commission's controversial proposal to raise the gas tax over five years by 25 - 40 cents a gallon and index it to inflation. (Currently the gas tax is 18.4 cents a gallon.) No doubt a big political lift, our educated guess is that this is the scale of investment needed to invest in capacity for robust and prosperous economic growth in the 21st century.

But there are other valuable recommendations and themes in the report that help advance the debate around the nation's next surface transportation bill, which will come up for authorization in 2009. The report underscores the need for real reform. The current transportation program, scorned for its earmarks and regional battles over funding, is likened to a block grant program to the states with negligible accountability. The Commission's proposed solution is radical program reform, reducing the 108 existing mode-specific funding programs (all siphoned through separate administrations, Federal Transit, Federal Highways, Federal Railroad, etc.) to 10, "mode-neutral", goal-oriented programs like "Rebuilding America," "Saving Lives," "Congestion Relief," and "Energy Security." These programs would be guided by national plans and performance standards developed for each program to drive decisions about project funding and measure progress toward meeting program objectives.

Finally, a new independent commission, called the National Surface Transportation Commission (NASTRAC) would oversee the development of a national strategic plan composed of the 10 new program plans described above. NASTRAC would recommend the funding amount to Congress, and in the manner of the Base Realignment and Closure process (BRAC), would be subject to a Congressional veto but no amendments. In no actions are taken, the recommendations become law.

The devil is in the details of course, and we need to better understand whether the proposed process can move the transportation program away from the politics and earmarks that have plagued it, and toward a goal-oriented system with measurable results. If performance criteria become the key factor in project decision-making, the challenge is finding the right performance criteria that will select projects that provide a high return on investment, promote transportation choice and safety, and produce the greatest efficiency. In light of the enormous challenge to reduce carbon emissions 80 percent by 2050, we recommend performance criteria that evaluate projects on the basis of their climate benefits. Coordination with existing land uses could also be used to evaluate projects that create new capacity, as has been done in California.

Getting back to the gas tax, the Commission provides a great service by not shying away from the serious funding gap needed to fix the falling-down bridges, congested roads, inadequate public transit, and lack of decent intercity rail in the nation. America deserves a modern and sustainable transportation system to fuel growth and prosperity in this century as previous generations built for us in the past. We cannot and should not throw money at a broken system, so let us dive into the task of reform so we can feel secure in the investments we must make in our future.

Image: From left, Ms. Rae Rosen (Federal Reserve Bank of New York), Mr. Robert Yaro (Regional Plan Association), and Mr. Gerald Shaheen (U.S. Chamber of Commerce) testify at the November 15, 2006 Field Hearing in New York. (Photo: National Surface Transportation Policy and Revenue Study Commission.)

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi urged the rebuilding of America's infrastructure in the spirit of America's historic national plans in her "pre-buttal" to President Bush's State of the Union Address last Friday at the National Press Club. She said,

"For our nation, we will chart a New Direction where we renew America's infrastructure and rebuild it in a way that is greener and helps confront the climate crisis.
 
"Two hundred years ago, in 1808, Thomas Jefferson charged his Treasury Secretary, Albert Gallatin, with drafting a plan to develop America's infrastructure, works like the Erie Canal and the Cumberland Road, to take advantage of a nation that was growing thanks to the Louisiana Purchase and the Lewis and Clark expedition.
 
"A century later, in 1908, Theodore Roosevelt launched a similar commitment when he convened a White House Conference on Conservation to stress the importance of preserving America's natural beauty.  That led to the creation of the National Park Service and helped a growing America remain a green America.

"In 2008, in keeping with the traditions of these great American leaders, we must keep America growing while making America greener.

"That means reinvesting in our crumbling highways and bridges and renewing our commitment to mass transit, solutions which will create jobs for the middle class.  It also means expanding broadband access across America, and particularly to rural communities.

"Again, in our infrastructure challenge there is job-creating opportunity - to reinvigorate the American economy.

The 1808 and 1908 national plans, as well as the early interstate plan of the National Resources Planning Board in the 1930s, have served as inspirations for the America 2050 initiative since its first conception. The plans are described in historian Robert Fishman's paper: 1808 - 1908 - 2008: National Planning for America, commissioned for the America 2050 workshop at the Rockefeller Foundation's Global Urban Summit this past summer.

Now these historic plans are honored in two resolutions introduced by Congressman Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) last week in the House of Representatives. The resolutions honor the bicentennial and centennial of the Gallatin Plan and Theodore Roosevelt's Conference of Governors, respectively, resolving that the U.S. House of Representatives:

"supports the creation of a new national plan to align the demands for economic development with the resources of the Nation."

Download H. Res 935 commemorating the 100th anniversary of Theodore Roosevelt's Conference of Governors.

Download H. Res 936 commemorating the 200th anniversary of the Gallatin Plan.