Governor Spitzer’s 2008-2009 executive budget released last week largely focuses on health care, education, and economic development, though a closer look offers a few noteworthy transportation items. Broadly, transportation has a decent showing in the budget, which calls for a 5% overall increase in spending.

In good news for congestion pricing advocates, the budget creates a new MTA fund which enables the agency to receive revenues generated by New York City’s congestion mitigation plan. A final plan from the NYC Traffic Congestion Mitigation Commission will be released tomorrow and must be approved by March 31 for the city to receive $354 million in federal revenue.

Farther north, the Governor slated $1 billion for an Upstate Development Fund, including $30 million to improve Amtrak service between New York City and upstate. The budget also calls for a transit procurement consortium, or incentives for smaller transit providers throughout the state to take advantage of economies of scale when they purchase replacement buses.

In total, the budget recommends $7.7 billion for the state Department of Transportation, an increase of $369 million from the previous budget. This total includes a new $140 million local bridge preservation program which encompasses bridge oversight, repair, and inspection. The budget slots 55 new positions for jobs currently held by consultants, and 339 new staff positions for the local bridge preservation program. There is also $300 million to keep on schedule “Projects of Statewide Significance” (as defined in a 2005 Memorandum of Understanding between then-Gov. Pataki, NYSDOT, and the State Legislature), such as the conversion of Route 17 to Interstate 86, a project strongly opposed by environmentalists who worry it will induce sprawl.

For the MTA, the 2008-2009 budget calls for use of $1.3 billion from the Renew and Rebuild New York Bond Act that was passed in 2005. The MTA will also receive $2.56 billion in direct aid from NYSDOT’s Aid to Localities budget (an increase of $173 million over last year), and a $636 million “contingent” appropriation for FY 2009-2010. State support for chronically underfunded suburban bus systems, including Long Island Bus in Nassau County and Bee-Line in Westchester County, seems to be up.

To pay for the increases, Spitzer recommends a number of changes, most significantly, indexing a newly unified state petroleum tax (including the Motor Fuel Tax, the Petroleum Business Tax, and the State sales tax on fuel) to inflation. This change would produce $13 million in new revenue in 2008-2009. The budget also calls for an increase on auto insurance fees from $5 to $20 and a broadening in scope of the eligible uses of this revenue to include bridge and highway safety initiatives, a change that would provide $145 million in additional revenue.

Environmentalists were pleased with the plan, which includes an increase in the Environmental Protection Fund and raises business eligibility requirements for the broken Empire Zone tax credit program. While the program was designed to attract commercial development to areas in economic stress (including many struggling downtowns), it has in many cases been abused by businesses to support relocation to suburban and rural areas, effectively subsidizing sprawl.

NYC Budget Shows Fight for Waste Plan Will Continue

Most news reports on NYC’s preliminary budget focused on across-the-board reductions proposed for city agency budgets, though overall spending would still rise by 3.7% due to non-controllable costs.

One noteworthy detail is that the 2008-2012 capital plan includes funding for the marine transfer stations called for under the city’s Solid Waste Management Plan, including the contentious station planned for the Gansevoort Peninsula in Manhattan (see MTR #558). The plan would reduce sanitation truck traffic citywide and has the support of the NYC Council, but has been held up because of objections by State Assemblymembers Deborah Glick, Richard Gottfried, and Linda Rosenthal over the Gansevoort transfer station. An amendment to the Hudson River Park Act which would allow the construction of the station died in the Assembly at the end of the prior legislative session, and has been reintroduced in both the Assembly and Senate (bills A9005 and S5988).

The capital plan also includes $500 million for transit improvements and $3.6 billion for bridge repair and the replacement of the Willis Avenue Bridge over the Hudson River. The city also requested $170 million from the federal government for East River bridge maintenance and “homeland security improvements,” and $93 million for Staten Island Ferry infrastructure and maintenance and security personnel.