Finally, a Five-Year Highway Funding Law

It was not a smooth ride, but a five-year highway funding bill became law last week.

The $305 billion plan, known as Fixing America's Surface Transportation Act, or FAST Act, is celebrated for offering assurance and stability after years of short-term funding extensions for highways.

Jay Timmons, President and CEO of the National Association of Manufacturers, described the bill as a "big step forward in a desperately needed long-term investment in our nation's infrastructure."

The law calls for spending $205 billion on highways and $48 billion on transit projects through September 2020. It designates $6.5 billion for a national highway freight program, which will allocate money for states based on a formula.

Another $4.5 billion will fund a competitive grant program for nationally significant freight and highway projects, or freight corridors.

The Act also allocates $200 million to help commuter railroads install positive train control (PTC) technology.

Lawmakers formally reauthorized collection of the 18.4-cent per gallon gas tax to help fund the bill. Since automobiles have become more fuel efficient, the gas tax has not generated enough revenue to cover the annual cost of national transportation projects. That does not change with the FAST Act. The law includes $70 billion in offsets from elsewhere in the federal budget.

While critics say the budget maneuvering is evidence of overspending and misallocations, a bipartisan statement issued by members of Congress said that "a safe, efficient surface transportation network is fundamentally necessary to our quality of life and our economy."

The statement came from Sens. James Inhofe (R-OK), and Barbara Boxer (D-CA) and Reps. Bill Shuster (R-PA) and Peter DeFazio (D-OR). S