Traffic Gridlock Hurting U.S. Businesses

Group Says Traffic Gridlock Hurting U.S. Businesses
The American Road & Transportation Builders Association (ARTBA) President & CEO Pete Ruane said recently that traffic gridlock is driving up logistics costs for all businesses.  Ruane said the $230 billion annual economic toll of highway crashes being paid by American companies in the form of higher health care costs and lost productivity, pose an immediate and long-term threat to U.S. global competitiveness.

ARTBA joined U.S. Chamber of Commerce President Tom Donohue and Laborers’ International Union of North America President Terry O’Sullivan to announce the launch of the Americans for Transportation Mobility coalition’s “FasterBetterSafer” campaign.  The campaign will demonstrate to the presidential candidates and policymakers in Washington the groundswell of public support for repairing, rebuilding and revitalizing America’s aging transportation system.

One of the “FasterBetterSafer” campaign’s most immediate priorities, Ruane said, would be making sure the federal Highway Trust Fund is made solvent so all 50 states don’t have a 34% cut in their federal highway funding programs starting Oct. 1, 2008.  Additional information about this new campaign can be found online at: www.fasterbettersafer.org.