COMMENTARY THE EMERGING CONSENSUS ON SURFACE TRANSPORTATION

This article discusses the issues confronting Congress as it prepares to authorize the federal surface transportation program in 2003. Unlike the last reauthorization cycle, there is a large degree of consensus among the stakeholders on what the reauthorization should accomplish. We enter this surface transportation reauthorization cycle with fewer issues that mightdivide the transportation community and with a larger measure of a consensus among major stakeholders than at any other time in recent history. Unlike the last reauthorization cycle, when interest groups jockeyed for position and floated a number of competing proposals, this time around I find near-universal sentiment that we ought to build on the combined legacy of Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act and the Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century rather than engage in a bruising fight to reinvent the federal surface transportation program. To be sure, there will be some proposals for changes, but these are likely to be refine-ments to program delivery rather than radical changes in the program structure itself. There is a large degree of consensus within the transportation industry and among major stakeholder groups on several policy directions. 1. Protecting the Highway Trust Fun