Issue Position: Transportation & Infrastructure

Issue Position

For as long as he has been in public office, Jerry has been especially concerned with regional and national transportation policy. Jerry believes that transportation, and the efficient movement of people and goods, affects virtually every aspect of our daily lives -- our work, the economy, the environment, our quality of life, and the cost of every consumer good we purchase. He believes that federal investment in transportation and other key infrastructure is not only good policy, but essential for creating jobs and economic productivity. He has also long argued that we must use transportation policy to retain and grow vital maritime, manufacturing and industrial sectors if we are to sustain a healthy and diversified regional economy in New York.

As New York's senior member on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, Jerry considers it his duty to ensure that urban areas receive their fair share of federal transportation dollars and, to that end, has led the national effort to rebalance the country's discriminatory transportation funding formulas. And he has brought home billions of dollars of that funding. As the Chair of the House Transit Caucus, he is also the leading House advocate for New York's mass transit systems. He has fought for monies for improved roadway infrastructure, and is nationally known as the leading voice for a more efficient and centralized policy guiding the movement of freight. Former House Speaker Dick Gephardt once said that Jerry is "the best advocate for public works and infrastructure we've ever had in the Congress. He gets it!"

Jerry has long championed critical policies and initiatives for the region, including his signature issue -- the development of a Cross Harbor Rail Freight Tunnel connecting the metropolitan region east of the Hudson River to the national rail network in New Jersey. This essential project would reduce our region's overdependence on trucking and decrease air pollution, traffic congestion, delivery time and the cost of doing business, all by removing a million trucks from our roads and 120,000 tons of carbon dioxide from the environment each year. He has also long supported New York's shipping ports, including an envisioned major deepwater container port in Sunset Park, Brooklyn in order to accommodate regional increases in cargo, to keep New York's ports competitive, and to continue to reduce truck traffic and pollution in the region.

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