The last few months, the Illinois Chamber of Commerce participated in community meetings across the state. These were informational meetings to learn about local transportation needs in different parts of Illinois. These meetings were also used to build support for a state capital bill focusing on transportation. These local projects are important: but there are transportation inefficiencies in Illinois tha ...

I love working with engineers. They design, build, and maintain everything that keeps us moving us forward as a society. Engineers also tend to be really good at math. If an engineer is explaining something to you and it involves numbers, you can be sure that it has been checked, double checked, and triple checked (before being checked again). Numbers don’t lie, or at least that’s what every teacher I had g ...

Don't moan or walk away, this is important. I'm talking about the world we're in and how we message transportation and infrastructure projects. Even just a few years ago it was possible to hire a bunch of highly connected lobbyist and get a project or program to be sponsored and pushed by a Congressional office. Some of these projects were bad but most of them were good. The reality will always be that some ...

Two days ago President Obama addressed the American people giving his 2013 State of the Union Address. Watching it gave me flashbacks of late nights working on the Hill so I didn’t watch it. Instead I read the transcript and focused on the substance instead of the constant applauses that distracted from the message. Several paragraphs focused on infrastructure and it received more attention than last year. ...

This Road Brought to You By... Proponents of increasing the funding our transportation infrastructure tend to look at increasing the gas tax or taxing drivers per-mile as a way to increase funding. While a good start it is important to look beyond these and examine  to increase revenue. News reports out of Seattle discuss a bill introduced in the legislature that if signed into law would allow for naming ri ...

Passed June 29, 2012 Signed into Law July 6, 2012 Overview Provides highway/transit authorizations for the remaining 2 months of FY12 plus for all of FY13 and 14.  (Getting here took 10 SFETEA-LU extensions.)  Also provides authorizations for NHTSA highway safety, motor carrier safety and some miscellaneous programs.  Does not provide any rail authorizations. In general, maintains funding at FY12 levels wit ...

The Transportation for Illinois Coalition is proud to acknowledge Congress finally provided a longer-term transportation spending plan for our state and nation, while also streamlining bureaucratic hurdles that have often delayed progress. We thank U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin for his perseverance and leadership to make it happen as well as the 17 members of the Illinois House delegation who supported the bill. Du ...

Infrastructure needs I am encouraged by the leadership and vision Mayor Rahm Emanuel has shown in announcing his plans to establish a private infrastructure fund for the city of Chicago ("Emanuel's rebuilding plan price: $7 billion; Mayor's public-private rent-to-own proposal still short on the details," Page 1, March 30). The Illinois Chamber of Commerce has advocated tirelessly in Washington for long-term ...