Transportation

Thursday, U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn, announced that he voted against the Transportation, Housing and Urban Development Appropriations Act and attacked Democrats for passing it. “This bill is just more of the same from Washington Democrats addicted to spending,” wrote Colorado’s 5th District Republican in a release. But, if this bill is any measure, Republicans are [...]

Lawmakers and policy people who advance private-sector solutions for public-service needs talk about competition– competition like maybe the kind we got with the Colorado Northwest Parkway deal signed in 2007, where the state is legally bound not to build or improve any roads that might compete with the Parkway for the next hundred years. If [...]

Two Democrats who lost out in a nasty election for the Garfield County board of commissioners last year say the main reason they were targeted by the oil and gas industry was something that happened earlier in 2008 in neighboring Rio Blanco County.

The Denver Post reported Saturday that the $400 million in federal stimulus funds Colorado will be spending in the next year or so on roads will be used to pay for work on “small jobs” instead of on “tackling the state’s most pressing roads needs,” like expanding I-70.

The Post’s regretful story has the tone right but the reasoning wrong, evincing the same kind of shortsightedness that dogs the stimulus program in general.

More people ski more days in Colorado than any other state, but you wouldn’t know it out on the open road, unless you’re stuck in weekend skier traffic on I-70.

It’s still unclear just how much of the $90.2 million in federal stimulus money headed Colorado’s way for urban transit will go to RTD’s FasTracks commuter and light-rail, but what is abundantly clear is it won’t be enough.

The Colorado Senate GOP filibuster that went into the wee hours of Monday morning makes for high political drama and probably some juicy negative ad fodder for the next campaign cycle. But there were 14 elephants who forgot their own roles in the transportation funding crisis.

Referendum D, anyone?

Republican senators in Colorado are going all out today to stop a bill that would end automatic tax revenue allocations for roads and capital construction.

Threatening long debate in the capitol tonight and a “barrage of amendments” to cripple the bill, the senators have now turned to Democratic Governor Bill Ritter to join them in defeating legislation they say would “gut” both highways and the constitution.

Heated exchange preceded today’s debate on Colorado Senate Bill 228, which seeks to repeal the the so-called “6 percent solution,” the long-established and controversial cap on General Fund growth. The new bill would give lawmakers increased flexibility to decide how to allocate Colorado’s shrinking state budget.

Animated members of the Republican minority trolled the speaker’s podium this morning, taking turns calling out House Majority Leader Brandon Shaffer (D-Longmont) on his decision to move debate on the bill to later in the day and for threatening to invoke procedural gag rule 9-C, which would limit discussion to five hours.

SB 108, the so-called FASTER plan to fund road and bridge repairs, is just a couple of minor procedural steps from hitting Gov. Bill Ritter’s desk for a signature after the state House of Representatives passed it 34-31 on final reading Wednesday.