Budget in Brief Table of Contents | DOT.gov
I appreciate this opportunity to share the highlights of President Bush's $68 billion budget plan for our Nation's transportation programs.
We are working with the President to hold the line on spending, while giving travelers and taxpayers the best possible value for their transportation dollars by transforming the way our transportation system works and is funded. At the Department of Transportation, our focus is on finding real transportation solutions that make travel safer, improve the performance of our transportation systems so that they operate more efficiently and serve us better, and apply advanced technologies and contemporary approaches to today's transportation challenges.
Consistent with these priorities, nearly 31 percent of the funds requested for Fiscal Year 2009 support safety programs. The budget allows us to build on our successes in delivering safer transportation systems by focusing on problem areas like runway incursions and near misses in the air, as well as motorcycle crashes and pedestrian injuries on the road. It is important that we continue a data-driven safety focus that allows us to target resources more effectively.
The budget request provides resources to hire 306 additional air traffic controllers. It also bolsters pipeline safety by funding eight new inspectors to increase oversight of poor performing pipeline operators and by increasing state pipeline safety grants by $11.3 million.
Just as the budget supports continued strong progress on the safety front, it also builds on our comprehensive efforts to identify new partners, new financing, and new approaches to reduce congestion. If last year's record traffic jams and flight delays taught us anything, it is that our old approaches are no longer producing the results we need to keep America's economy growing.
The Bush Administration has moved aggressively on short-term measures to bring passengers relief from chronic flight delays, especially in the New York region. In addition, almost a year ago we sent Congress a transformative proposal that would use market forces more effectively to address aviation delays. It would modernize how we pay for airports and allow us to overhaul the nation's air traffic control system.
The President's $14.6 billion budget for the Federal Aviation Administration assumes congressional passage of this overdue legislation. With a more efficient revenue structure and the ability to price congestion, we will be able to build on our exemplary aviation safety record while expanding the number of aircraft that the nation's airspace can safely handle at any given time.
Key to achieving these higher levels of safety and efficiency is the move to 21st Century technologies to guide air traffic. Our FY 2009 budget more than doubles investment in these Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen) technologies, providing $688 million for the transformation from radar-based to satellite-based navigation systems.
Technology also can play an important role in relieving traffic on our highways. Through programs like our Urban Partnerships and Corridors of the Future initiatives, we have been aggressively pursuing effective new strategies to reverse the growing traffic congestion crisis. The interest around the country has proven quite strong - over 30 major U.S. cities responded to our call for innovative plans to actually reduce congestion, not simply to slow its growth.
The FY 2009 budget would encourage more of this type of bold thinking by dedicating 75 percent of discretionary highway and transit funds to fight congestion, giving priority to projects that combine the powerful mix of pricing, transit, and technology solutions. We currently are conducting another nationwide competition, and will be announcing cities that could benefit from this funding very soon.
Instead of having our transportation dollars whittled away by hundreds of congressional earmarks, we need to direct funding to projects that have the most impact on highway performance and congestion relief.
To further promote innovation, the President's budget calls for re-directing $175 million in inactive earmarks for innovative programs to fight congestion in metropolitan areas and along major highway corridors. These projects will help us find a new way forward as we approach reauthorization of our surface transportation programs.
FY 2009 is the final year of the current surface transportation authorization, known as SAFETEA-LU. The President's budget completes the six-year, $286.4 billion investment by providing $52 billion in 2009 for highways, highway safety, and public transportation.
To honor that commitment even with anticipated shortfalls in Highway balances, the President is requesting temporary authority to allow “repayable advances” between the two accounts in the Trust Fund. This flexibility will get us through the current authorization without any impact on transit funding in 2009; however, unreliable Trust Fund revenues are another sign that we need to move away from our reliance on gasoline taxes and be open to new ways to finance our infrastructure.
It is increasingly clear that America's transportation systems are at a crossroads. The President's FY 2009 budget builds on the exciting things we are doing at the Department of Transportation to help America move forward on a new course - a course that delivers high levels of safety, takes advantage of modern technology and financing mechanisms, and mitigates congestion with efficient and reliable transportation systems.
As we begin the planning process for 2009, I look forward to working with the President, the Congress, and all the members of the transportation community. Together, we can ensure that America continues to have the best transportation system in the world. Thank you.
Mary E. Peters
Secretary of Transportation