Is the Highway Trust Fund Dead?

Interstate 794 through Downtown. Photo by Jeramey Jannene.

Every day at The Overhead Wire we sort through over 1,500 news items about cities and share the best ones with our email list. Each week, we take some of the most popular stories and share them with Urban Milwaukee readers. They are national (or international) links, sometimes entertaining and sometimes absurd, but hopefully useful.

Highways without futures: For 20 years the Congress for the New Urbanism has been highlighting the damage of highways that ran through neighborhoods while celebrating the benefits of those which were torn down. The report shares 9 highways that should be removed and sent to the dustbin of history, replaced by something more socially and economically valuable. (Congress for the New Urbanism)

Are cities making progress on walkable neighborhoods?:  New development in cities can impact travel behaviors for the next 100 years. That fact has led policy makers to consider creating neighborhoods more friendly to active transportation and short trips. A new Terner Center report and data tool looks at how cities are performing at reducing people’s need for travel but finds mixed results. (Zack Subin, Quinn Underriner | Terner Center for Housing Innovation)

Highway trust fund ran out of money a long time ago: The Highway Trust Fund which federally funds transportation projects around the country is likely to become insolvent by 2028. But the fund, supported by dwindling gas tax monies and transfers for the general fund actually died in 2008 and has been limping along ever since. That fact suggests that it’s probably way past time for rethinking the funding mechanism and the programs it funds. (Steve Davis | T4America)

Power plant regulations seen as a lynchpin: Seeking to kill climate change activism while supporting the oil and gas industry, Trump’s EPA is looking into getting rid of emissions limits for gas and coal power plants. Power plants make up 25% of US emissions. If this attempt at removing emissions limits is successful, it’s likely other rules regarding harmful climate impacts will fall as well. (Lisa Friedman | New York Times)

School enrollment falling in redeveloped areas of London: Urban regeneration schemes in London that build thousands of new units have resulted in new housing but also a large drop in enrollment of school children. The high price of housing has pushed many younger families out but increased the populations of people over 50 who can afford it. Anna Minton argues that when families with children are pushed out, the city becomes more sterile and less vibrant. (Anna Minton | The Guardian)

Quote of the Week

However, there was the fear that the architecture was not fitted for a library. As opposed to the classical postmodernist design central library that was recently built in Chicago, the Mexican modernist design was an anomaly. But part of the appeal of Legoretta’s design was that it has an open, inviting landscape.

–Carolina Flores in MySA discussing San Antonio’s now beloved ‘Enchilada Library’

This week on the Talking Headways podcast, we’re joined by Anthony Flint of the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy to talk about his book Mayors Desk: 20 Conversations with Local Leaders Solving Global Problems.

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