Shaky platforms

By the time this column appears in print, the country will have chosen its next president. Leading up to this, we've heard a tremendous amount of rhetoric from each major candidate about the Mideast, the economy, oil, jobs, and other issues that are critical to the country's future. But we've heard little, if anything, about their plans to address the nation's deteriorating transportation infrastructure.

It is difficult to imagine that anyone in this country wouldn't be concerned about the issue. Our river dams and locks are old and crumbling; our highways in many cases are inadequate or in a state of disrepair; and the railroads need more infrastructure to meet the demands of the next several years. This country has no truly high-speed rail system. The system that controls our aircraft in flight is 50 years old, but we are more concerned about seats coming loose on airplanes.

Fixing the problems won't be cheap. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that we need to spend an additional $20 billion annually just to maintain the current, inadequate system. That sounds like a staggering sum until you consider the alternative. The American Society of Civil Engineers has estimated that failing to invest in the country's bridges and roads will cost us $3.1 trillion in lost GDP growth by 2020.

The effects are already being felt in our industry. For evidence of that, you need look no further than the recently released **ital{2013 Third-Party Logistics Study} conducted by C. John Langley. When asked to identify the most common sources of supply chain disruption, the third-party logistics service providers who participated in the study put infrastructure at the top of the list. Yet the government seems to view infrastructure improvement as simply a vehicle to provide jobs.

In an effort to get some clarity on the subject, the National Industrial Transportation League sent excellent letters to President Obama and Mitt Romney asking them to outline their plans for shoring up the nation's transportation infrastructure, but to my knowledge, no response has been forthcoming. I thought I might get a clue by reading the Republican and Democratic platforms and see what each had to say about infrastructure. (I am not taking a political position—just calling it as I see it.)

First of all, both platforms address the subject, although the Democrats had less to say about it than the Republicans. They both support infrastructure improvement; and interestingly enough, both take credit for the recent highway funding bill. Considering the content of the bill as it was finally enacted, however, I'm not sure I would be taking credit for it.

Neither party seems to have a firm plan for funding the improvements. The Republicans accused the Democrats of spending stimulus funds on cosmetic, "shovel ready" projects rather than on real structural improvements. The Democratic platform suggests that a portion of the money we have spent on wars will be diverted to infrastructure, and reforms will be initiated that will "better leverage government dollars." The Republicans stated we will have to make some difficult choices in spending. They got that right anyway.

What no one seems to grasp is the importance of a seamless, well-functioning national transportation infrastructure. Abraham Lincoln understood it when he encouraged the building of the first transcontinental railroad. Dwight Eisenhower got it when he envisioned the interstate highway system. But given Congress's apparent inability to make sense out of this issue, whoever our new president is, I'm a little pessimistic about this problem being resolved any time soon. I simply don't think either party has a good handle on the issue. But hey, as the Cheshire Cat told Alice (in Wonderland), if you don't know where you want to go, it doesn't matter which road you take.