Secretary of Transportation Nominee Explains His Agenda

At last week’s Senate Commerce Committee hearing on the recently announced nomination of Charlotte, North Carolina Mayor Anthony Foxx to be Secretary of Transportation, the nominee laid out some key components of his agenda if he is confirmed.

Foxx told Committee members he plans to focus on three key areas:

-ensuring the U.S. transportation system is the safest in the world as it was for current Secretary Ray LaHood;
-improving the efficiency and performance of the country’s existing transportation system through better use of technology, data, economic analysis, and private sector innovation, such as public-private partnerships, to bring more private sector capital and innovation into the infrastructure market; and
-build the country’s infrastructure to meet the needs of the next generation of Americans

“The private sector cannot do this alone, and the federal government has a responsibility to help ensure our global competitiveness, by investing in a robust, multimodal transportation system, a stronger national freight network, and key innovations like NextGen and advanced roadway and rail technology,” Foxx said in prepared remarks addressing U.S. infrastructure needs. “As a Mayor who has delivered projects to my constituents, I know too well that future uncertainty at the Federal level makes it difficult to do smart cost-effective long-term planning and project development.”

When Obama selected Foxx, he stated that since Foxx took office as Mayor of Charlotte in 2009, he has helped to turn around the city at a time when both the city and the country were going through very challenging economic times.

“The economy is growing. There are more jobs, more opportunity,” he said. “And if you ask Anthony how that happened, he’ll tell you that one of the reasons is that Charlotte made one of the largest investments in transportation in the city’s history.”

Prior to the nomination of Foxx being made official, a White House official was quoted in the Washington Post as saying that “as mayor of one of America’s most vibrant cities, Anthony Foxx knows firsthand that investing in world-class infrastructure is vital to creating good jobs and ensuring American businesses can grow and compete in the global economy.”

As Mayor of Charlotte, the report noted that Foxx has been very active on the transportation front for both passenger and freight modes.

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