Stimulus: Stuck on cars

Critics say spending focuses too much on highways and not enough on public transport.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — A major chunk of the stimulus plan dealing with transportation is drawing fire for focusing too much on building new highways and not enough on regular maintenance projects and public transport.

The House has budgeted $30 billion for roads and bridges and $10 billion for mass transport as part of a $550 spending plan designed to boost the economy.


While supporters of the plan say most of that money will be spent on repair and the money needs to be allocated quickly to jolt the economy, critics say it short changes public transportation and relies on an outdated distribution system that won’t produce the kind of green transformation promised by politicians but rather more of the same mega-highway projects that got the nation into its energy and environmental mess in the first place.

“This is a pretty big disappointment,” Robert Puentes, a fellow with the Brookings Institution’s Metropolitan Policy Project, said of the plan. “There was all this momentum for some kind of reform, but when you look at what’s in there, it just doesn’t do that.”

CNN