Tag: bridge building: Page 16

Roadbuilding

Texas lawmakers cross the aisle on plan to raise the state’s road budget by $3 billion

The Texas House of Representatives Transportation chairman and his counterpart in the state’s Senate have reached a deal to inject the transportation budget with $3 billion more each year. The Dallas Morning News reports Rep. Joe Picket (D-El Paso) and Sen. Robert Nichols (R-Jacksonville) announced May 26 that they’d agreed upon a plan to fund […]

May 27, 2015

Roadbuilding

Senate passes transportation funding patch

Over the weekend, the Senate passed a patch to extend transportation funding through July. In a Saturday voice vote just before the Senate broke for the Memorial Day holiday, Senators approved the patch to extend the Highway Trust Fund for two months, according to a report from The Hill. The Senate vote follows the passage of […]

May 26, 2015

Roadbuilding

Grass tax instead of gas tax for road funding? Michigan lawmaker calls to legalize “pot for potholes”

A lawmaker in Michigan thinks that marijuana could provide some relief for the state’s ailing roads. Rep. Brandon Dillon (D-Grand Rapids) wrote in an op-ed on MLive.com that Michigan voters have been adamant about not going deeper into their own pockets for funding on some issues—voters shot down a proposal to raise taxes for transportation […]

May 25, 2015

Roadbuilding

Nearly 450 bridges in Connecticut are structurally deficient

Connecticut’s 12 million daily drivers probably find themselves on a bridge that’s not exactly on par with construction standards. The state has 446 bridges considered to be structurally deficient, one out of every 9, according to documents obtained by WFSP in Hartford from Connecticut Department of Transportation records. The state’s DOT commissioner, Jim Redecker, said […]

May 25, 2015

Roadbuilding

Without long-term road funding, a Minnesota group has resorted to duct tape

Duct tape is a go-to problem solver in many situations. But it’s usually a temporary fix. No one is going to keep fishing out of a boat patched up with duct tape. And duct tape isn’t going to fix the Minnesota’s lack of transportation funding, no matter how big. But it is holding together a […]

May 21, 2015

Roadbuilding

National Public Works Week kicks off with “low and slow” infrastructure tour

Author Dan McNichol, who has driven a 1949 Hudson across the country to bring attention to road and bridge conditions, helped the American Public Works Association (APWA) kick off National Public Works Week with an appearance in Washington, D.C. at the city’s Public Works Fleet Campus. McNichol is driving the classic car from Brookline, Massachusetts to Los […]

May 21, 2015

Roadbuilding

This bridge is made of thousands of sheets of paper, took 3 years to design (PHOTOS)

An artist from the United Kingdom completed a project that proves once and for all that paper beats rock. Well, it proves that paper is at least equal to rock when it comes to bridge building. Steve Messam used upwards of 22,000 bright red sheets of paper to create the arch commissioned by the area’s […]

May 20, 2015

Roadbuilding

House passes transportation funding patch

The U.S. House of Representatives has approved HR 2353, the Highway Transportation Funding Act of 2015 in a 387-35 vote. The bill, introduced by Congressmen Bill Shuster (R-Pennsylvania), Transportation and Infrastructure Committee chairman, and Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin), House Ways and Means Committee chairman, extends funding for the Highway Trust Fund until July 31 through a […]

May 20, 2015

Roadbuilding

Report finds current road, bridge conditions are impairing economic growth in rural areas

Research by The Road Improvement Program (TRIP) finds that 15 percent of major rural roads in the U.S. are in poor condition, and 1 in 10 rural bridges are functionally obsolete, conditions that “slow the pace of economic growth in rural America.” “America’s rural transportation network plays a key role in the success and quality of […]

May 20, 2015

Roadbuilding

Nebraska legislature overrides governor’s veto of gas tax increase

Almost immediately after the Nebraska Legislature passed a bill to raise the state’s gas tax, it appeared the newly-approved road funding was at risk as Gov. Pete Ricketts shot down the bill with a veto. But just a week later, lawmakers struck back by overriding the governor’s veto without any votes to spare. The Journal Star […]

May 19, 2015

Roadbuilding

Work on short-term transportation funding patches heats up as deadline nears

Efforts to create at least a short-term patch for transportation funding are in the works this week, with one bill, the Highway and Transportation Funding Act of 2015 (HR 2353), set to go before the House of Representatives Rules Committee today (May 18). Congressmen Bill Shuster (R-Pennsylvania), Transportation and Infrastructure Committee chairman, and Paul Ryan […]

May 18, 2015

Roadbuilding

Illinois releases 6-year, $8.4 billion highway improvement plan

The Illinois Department of Transportation plans to spend $8.4 billion on roads in the next six years, but it’s not enough to prevent what IDOT expects to be a “rapid deterioration” of the state’s roads. IDOT plans to focus the majority of the money on maintaining the state’s 1,431 miles of highway and 357 bridges, […]

May 18, 2015