While the nation’s roads continue to decline, improvements in rail and some other categories raised the nation’s overall infrastructure grade to C-, a very modest improvement from the D+ grade in the 2017 report card from the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE).
Andy Herrmann, a professional engineer, past president of ASCE and a member of the report card committee since 2001, says he is optimistic that Congress can agree on an infrastructure package.
He echoed U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, who told the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) last week, "I'm looking forward to a day when infrastructure week is no longer a groundhog's day joke but something that delivers investments to the American People."
In 11 of the report card's 17 categories, the grade was in the ‘D’ range: aviation, dams, hazardous waste, inland waterways, levees, public parks, roads, schools, stormwater, transit, and wastewater.
The study concluded that, overall, the long-term investment gap continues to grow as we lose value in our infrastructure. That gap grew from $2.1 trillion over 10 years in the last report to $2.6 trillion, meaning the need now is $259 billion per year.
In terms of funding solutions, Herrmann explained why he thinks a shift away from the fuel tax and to vehicle miles traveled (VMT) makes the most sense. In his remarks to AASHTO, Secretary Buttigieg suggested a usage levy is necessary.
A Tax Foundation report in August 2020 thoroughly explores the VMT option, observing that only three states raise enough dedicated transportation revenue to fund transportation spending.
The last Michigan-specific report card, in 2018, assigned a D- grade to roads and gave the state a D overall for infrastructure. That report concluded, simply, that "Michigan's infrastructure is old and outdated. We're now faced with pothole-ridden roads, bridges propped with temporary supports, sinkholes destroying homes, and closed beaches." The report highlighted Michigan's 21st Century Infrastructure Commission conclusion that an additional $4 billion annually is needed to maintain our infrastructure.
"Michigan must support innovative policies leading to cleaner water, smoother highways, and a safe environment that will attract business and improve our quality of life," the report said.
View a nationwide map of Dedicated Transportation Tax Revenue, fiscal year 2017.
Jeff Cranson: Hello, this is the Talking Michigan Transportation podcast where we talk about all things related to mobility. I'm Jeff Cranson. This week I’ll be speaking with Andy Herrmann, who is a past president of the American Society of Civil Engineers which, this week, released their quadrennial report card grading the nation's infrastructure. While it appears that the overall grade inched up, if you call C- inching up, roads are still rated very poorly—that's true in Michigan and several other states. Hi, welcome again to the Talking Michigan Transportation podcast. I’m Jeff Cranson, and today I’m pleased to be talking with Andy Herrmann, who is a past president of the American Society of Civil Engineers and has tremendous experience with report cards that the society puts together to rate our nation's infrastructure. I’m amazed that he's not a very depressed individual given the way the scores have trended these last few years. Andy, thank you so much for taking the time to do this.
Andy Herrmann: Well, depressed is an interesting word. Hopefully I’m optimistic that something's going to come out of it.
Jeff Cranson: Well, okay, let's start right there before we even get into the latest grades and where things are. What gives you optimism?
Andy Herrmann: Well, what gives me optimism is think I think that this year we're going to have an Infrastructure Week just once and not four or five times as the last couple of years.
Jeff Cranson: Well, yeah, you probably heard Secretary Pete Buttigieg last week, when he spoke to AASHTO, say that Infrastructure Week is no longer a ‘Groundhog's Day’ joke but something that delivers investments to the American people, so we all hope he's right.
Andy Herrmann: I think everybody's on the same page. We don't have any political party bridges or roads. I think it's American roads and bridges, so it's time to fix them.
Jeff Cranson: Yeah, I kind of feel like, you know, it's kind of like the weather, everybody complains about it, but nobody ever does anything about it. So, doing something about the roads requires and requires revenue one way or another. Do you feel like there's a chance to get bipartisan agreement, not on the need, but on the funding?
Andy Herrmann: Well, that's the optimistic part of me. I sure hope we do because we do have a backlog. As part of our report card for America’s Infrastructure, we take a look at what we need to spend to get grades up to the level of B. Overall, over the next ten years for all seventeen categories of our infrastructure, we need $2.6 trillion dollars. The sad thing is that in 2017, when we did that report card estimate, it was only $2.1 trillion dollars, so that's half a trillion dollars we lost by doing nothing.
Jeff Cranson: Yeah, that's a point that I think is really lost on people, and, you know, our governor decided, after not being able to raise any revenue in 2019, to do an aggressive bonding plan in 2020, which the market received even better than we dreamed of, actually paying a premium on the first segment of bonds that were sold. People are saying, you know, you're putting debt on our kids, but not doing anything is also putting debt on our kids, right?
Andy Herrmann: Definitely, one of the publications that ASCE sponsors is an economic series called Failure to Act. Basically, what it does is looks at how much it'll cost us if we do nothing, and those numbers are quite large. I mean, we're talking about a family of four having to spend another $3,300 dollars a year by 2029. We're talking $10 trillion dollars in gross domestic product that we're going to lose, and that's by not investing. So, the cost way exceeds what we would actually have to put into it to get the infrastructure in good shape.
Jeff Cranson: So, having worked on these report cards for, you know, a couple of decades now, what's your sense, and obviously you study this at a pretty high level, why is the U.S. having such trouble funding our basic infrastructure compared to other developed countries, you know, our neighbors in Canada, certainly, what do you think it is about us that makes it so hard?
Andy Herrmann: Well, we're still trying to use the gas tax as a way to fund federal work on infrastructure on our roads and bridges. We haven't raised the gas tax since 1993, so just think of the inflation loss alone on it. The other thing is that we're starting to get into more electric cars. We're trying to get better gas mileage on our cars, so that whole gas tax concept is really old-fashioned. It's not serving the purpose anymore.
Jeff Cranson: I don't know that ASCE has taken a particularly specific approach on that. What do you think should be on the table? I know that Secretary Pete talked about that and sort of had to rethink whether we completely take the gas tax out of the mix right now or raise the gas tax, but certainly charging based on miles traveled, tolling, those things are talked about. What do you think it needs to be?
Andy Herrmann: I think the vehicle miles traveled is a great concept because then everybody is contributing to the use of the roads and the bridges. It’s not based on your gas mileage or if you have an electric car, and you just pay a small surcharge per year. I think that's a good universal way of looking at it.
Jeff Cranson: So, this year we're looking at a D+ nationally, right? Oh, no, that's actually—I’m looking at Michigan in 2018. Talk a little bit about this year's report from a national basis.
Andy Herrmann: On a national basis, we actually—and this is the first time in 20 years—the grades went up. They went from a D+ to a C-. Now, to put that in a little perspective that's the grade point average of 11 D’s, four C's, and two B's. So, it's still in poor shape, and I wouldn't want to bring that home to my parents if I had a report card like that.
Jeff Cranson: Right, so, what does account for a little bit of that improvement?
Andy Herrmann: We found an increase in aviation, in drinking water, in energy and inland waterways and ports. So, those actually went up slightly, and the only one to go down was really bridges. That went down from a C+ to a C.
Jeff Cranson: Yeah, and roads certainly didn't show an improvement. I think that the overall grade for roads was a D.
Andy Herrmann: And it stayed there.
Jeff Cranson: Yeah, and that's, you know, I mean, it's good that we improved in some of those areas, especially drinking water, obviously, that touches our health, but the things that people see the most, the roads and the bridges, that's not showing tremendous improvement.
Andy Herrmann: No, not at all. The bridges went up slightly—I’m sorry, the bridges went down slightly, and that's because the whole inventory of bridges across the country are just getting older.
Jeff Cranson: Yeah.
Andy Herrmann: And with the lack of the maintenance that we've been putting in and the repairs, for the first time, we've actually seen the number of bridges rated fair increase and become larger than the number of bridges that are rated good, and that's scary in an aging inventory.
Jeff Cranson: And that's interesting because in Michigan we recently put together a supplemental request from the legislature. The governor wants to put $300 million dollars in general fund money into local bridges. We've got 59 closed across the state and another 60 or 70 that are in serious or critical condition, so, I mean, this plays out on a national level too.
Andy Herrmann: Well, and if you compare the 2018 Michigan report card it was a D+ to the nation's presently C-, and bridges came in at a C- to our national C, and roads were D- to the national D, so you're a step behind the state, overall, on the condition of those categories.
Jeff Cranson: Yeah, it's not anything to be proud of, that's for sure. Well, tell me what do you think is the value in this? We hear about these report cards from various agencies, and, you know, I worry this starts to become background noise to a lot of people in the public. It's like ‘yeah, I know there's another report card that says we're bad.’ What is the value in continuing to do this and to talk about it?
Andy Herrmann: Well, it's keeping track of the condition of infrastructure over a couple decades now. You can see how it's going up or mostly going down, but the thing is—and today we had a Legislative Fly-In virtually to Washington, D.C. where we tried to meet with as many legislators and senators that we could to bring them their own copy of the report card. They appreciate it because they use this to make decisions on where to invest and what's more important than the other. It also gives them ammunition to be able to talk about how bad the condition of infrastructure is.
Jeff Cranson: So, I see that Representative Garrett Graves from Louisiana, a Republican on the House Transportation Committee, said ‘it's millions now or billions later,’ which kind of goes to what you and I talked about earlier, but have you heard or seen anything that he would support in terms of revenue?
Andy Herrmann: They're just talking about the infrastructure package right now. When we talk to the office of our local legislative congressman, they're just starting to look into that. One of the things that—they don't call them earmarks anymore, they call them a different notation, but there may be some local projects that get included in these infrastructure bills which may help push it along a little bit.
Jeff Cranson: Yeah, so, tell us, where you are coming from, Andy? I probably should have started with that.
Andy Herrmann: I’m in a suburb of Boston, Massachusetts, right now.
Jeff Cranson: So, how do you feel things are in Massachusetts in terms of investment in infrastructure?
Andy Herrmann: Oh, we're there with the rest of the country. The northeast is, in terms of roads and bridges, in pretty bad shape. It's the same as Michigan because of all the weather and the salt that gets thrown down on the roads and the bridges. It starts accelerating the deterioration.
Jeff Cranson: Yeah, you know, and talk from an environmental standpoint. I mean, that's those are some of the categories in this report, so if we if we take it beyond roads and bridges what do you think is it going to take some other catastrophe to really get people's attention, or is your optimism going to rub off on others?
Andy Herrmann: Well, I think they finally are going to get together because it's not Democratic, or Republican, or independent infrastructure anymore. I think they believe all their constituents want to improve it. They're all suffering. It's costing them, you know, you look at some of the Texas Transportation Institute costs and depending on what stage it could cost you $700 bucks a year or $1,000 bucks a year in maintenance and extra sitting in congestion. So, it's actually costing us to do nothing, and wouldn't you rather put that into fixing it and enjoying it rather than just paying for nothing?
Jeff Cranson: Yeah, it's a very logical argument, but, boy, when you get down to talking about what that investment's going to be, you know, especially the point that you made that we're making a shift to more electric vehicles, more fuel-efficient vehicles. I mean, that's all good, especially good for the environment, but, you know, we still need the pavement, so—
Andy Herrmann: Yeah, also mention that they may use the, I guess, it's budget resolution or—
Jeff Cranson: Reconciliation.
Andy Herrmann: Reconciliation, I’m sorry, to get the infrastructure built through. So, I’m hoping that's in there too, so that it is a little bit easier to pass.
Jeff Cranson: That would be something if we did two major spending bills within a few months of each other that that way. It'll be interesting to watch going forward.
Andy Herrmann: Well, the COVID bill also has infrastructure money in it. There's some mass transit money in that, so—
Jeff Cranson: Yeah, no, we're watching that closely for sure, yeah.
Andy Herrmann: Also, help to states and cities, so that should help.
Jeff Cranson: Yeah, so, you're optimistic, so you think before you give this up you're going to see a positive report card at some point?
Andy Herrmann: I just want to see an infrastructure bill, and that'll help get that positive report card.
Jeff Cranson: Okay, you're not thinking in terms of the letter grade. You're just thinking let's get some kind of spending bill over the finish line.
Andy Herrmann: And the spending bill will affect the report card, definitely, because we've seen in the areas where they have made investments, you get a positive grade on the report card. I mean, take a look at the rail, and that's mainly freight rail, and it's independently owned. Since it's independently owned, they're working on a profit factor and they realize that their infrastructure has to be in good condition to make money, so they invest and keep it in good condition. That's why you got a rail grade of B.
Jeff Cranson: Yeah, I think the rail grade of B, and in Michigan, I think the private railroad system got a C- grade. Yeah, like you said, these are private, and these are the sum of a lot of private decisions. So, I’m not sure how to parse that, but no, this is good. I do appreciate your optimism, and it'll be interesting to follow this and maybe talk to you in a year if we get a real spending bill. Thank you very much for taking time to talk with us.
Andy Herrmann: Thank you. I appreciate it.
Jeff Cranson: Thank you again for listening to this week's edition of the Talking Michigan Transportation podcast. I would like to thank Randy Debler and Corey Petee for engineering this week's podcast. To subscribe to show notes and more, go to Apple Podcasts and search for Talking Michigan Transportation.
