DOT's proposal completely rejects the Trust Fund legislation's mandate to reduce the backlog of structurally deficient bridge repair projects in half as "not feasible." The agency did not provide a plan to ever reach the goal in any year, and asserts that fixing the road pavement surfaces would require an additional $400 million and fixing the bridges would cost $2.6 billion. It dispensed with the required explanation of how the annual capital program met the "fix it first" goals and priorities of the Trust Fund law.

In fact, NJ DOT actually reduced the amount of money it plans to spend on bridge repairs for FY2002 from last year's 2002 projection. In FY2001, DOT proposed to spend $458 million on bridges, and expected to spend $295 million in 2002. DOT now proposes to spend just $276 million on bridge preservation in FY 2002. Road preservation figures remained largely the same, at about $185 million.

Meanwhile, NJ DOT is proposing to spend $71 million on new sprawl-inducing highways in its "strategic mobility" category, and tens of millions more for added lane capacity in another category.

"The law was intended to make DOT to change its spending priorities to meet specific bridge and road repair goals. DOT has to stop making excuses and start fixing the roads and bridges," Tri-State Campaign director Janine Bauer said in a release last week.

Signed into law last July, the Transportation Trust Fund Renewal Act assigns additional portions of gas and sales taxes to transportation capital budgets, amounting to about $4 billion for NJDOT and NJ Transit over four years. The law requires DOT to create a "capital investment strategy" that charts reductions in "the backlog of projects, including one-half of structurally deficient bridge repair projects and [road] pavement deficiencies," and to "increase…lane miles of bicycle paths, with a goal of constructing an additional 1,000 lane miles of bicycle paths in five years." DOT was required to fund projects to meet these and other goals such as reducing vehicular and pedestrian accidents in its annual capital program.

The budget will now be reviewed by the Legislature. Public hearings will follow in April and May. The entire plan must be approved before June 30, 2001, the end of the fiscal year.

Read more about the Transportation Trust Fund spending goals and legislation:  MTR # 276, 277, 291