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There have always been champions who help get things done in our country and soon-to-retire Congressman Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.) is one of those. He has spent years advocating for sustainable federal dollars for modernizing infrastructure and knows that every dollar invested yields far more in economic returns.

The United States has lagged, in recent decades, behind its peers in the developed world when it comes to infrastructure, according to the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). The U.S. began investing less in transportation, as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), than many other wealthy countries. Data from 2021 showed that China was spending 10 times more than America by percentage of GDP at 4.8 percent, and at 0.5 percent, America follows other nations, such as Japan, Sweden, the United Kingdom (U.K.), France and Canada.

In a new podcast interview with No Time For Delays, Blumenauer spoke with Maury Tobin and infrastructure change-agent Ed Mortimer who is Vice President of Government Affairs for NextNav and previously was Executive Director of the Americans for Transportation Mobility (ATM) Coalition.

“These [trade, the energy sector, foreign affairs, climate change, health and infrastructure] are interconnected and they are profoundly influencing the livability of our communities, the strength of our economy, the quality of life. I have worked on these issues for years and I’m excited at where we are now. … For decades we’ve been trying to get an administration to help us with the infrastructure funding conundrum but for the first time, we actually have an administration — and we’ve worked with all of them with varying degrees of success — that is absolutely committed to rebuilding and renewing America in a low-carbon equitable path,” says Blumenauer.

At the end of 2021, the Biden Administration passed the bipartisan $1.2 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), a new milestone in boosting federal investment in America’s infrastructure and beleaguered transportation system.

The goal is to broadly modernize infrastructure and rebuild a network whose roots date back hundreds of years to rail rights-of-way and the Interstate Highway System, which America began constructing in the 1950s. The United States is tackling issues that range from replacing lead pipes, public services being delivered to Native Americans, faster trains, determining future federal revenue streams, and fixing crumbling roads. The push to raise the federal gas tax to buoy the Highway Trust Fund (HTF) has not prevailed.

Also, in the face of costly climate change and the impacts of a reliance on fossil fuels, American leaders are working to reshape our power grid, and compete in the electric vehicle (EV) sector.

Twenty-eight months after the Biden Administration reset the infrastructure clock, the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapsed over the Patapsco River in Baltimore.

This resulted in a fierce focus by the world, the media and the U.S. on the importance of modern infrastructure in the face of strained and declining roads, bridges, rail systems, airports, ports, waterways and public transportation. Multiple news outlets reported on the more than 42,400 bridges in America in “poor condition” (according to national inventory data) as well as the factions of Republicans downplaying the importance of infrastructure funding.

Blumenauer, however, points out that infrastructure is important to a range of stakeholders, companies, labor, state and local governments, and advocacy groups.

“I’m leaving Congress at a time when most of my colleagues are not very happy. They don’t like the tone, the direction, the acrimony and the negative performative politics,” he explains. “We’re all in this together, and we need to redouble our efforts because politics are so fraught. But one of the nice things about working in this space [transportation and infrastructure overall] is that this tends to unite people rather than divide them. … I am absolutely convinced that we can sustain this effort and it will be one of the more rewarding parts of public service.”

Prior to the bipartisan infrastructure bill being passed, the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) estimated that the funding gap for physical infrastructure over a decade was $2.1 trillion based on current trends.

The IIJA has been heralded as a success but a new federal funding bill, in the form of a reauthorization, will still be needed in 2026. And people are wondering who the next Blumenauer — who set up a working group that met at the Library of Congress — will be as D.C. remains splintered and concern over the national debt persists.

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