Dear Governor-elect Chafee,

Congratulations on your success in the recent election. The Coalition for Transportation Choices looks forward to working with your administration in the months and years to come. We recognize Rhode Island has major challenges today, and our transportation system ranks high among them, as it has critical impacts upon the state's residents and businesses.

As you begin your first term at the State House, we urge you take the steps below to help put Rhode Island in the vanguard of those states that value making their public transit efficient and economically sound, and help encourage a variety of options which can promote the health of our communities and those who live and work in them. As the overwhelming voter approval for the 2010 transportation bond on the November ballot indicates, you enjoy huge public support on these issues.

• Identify adequate, long range and sustainable funding sources for roads, bridges and public transportation and establish a dedicated Transportation Trust Fund. In 2008, Governor Carcieri's Blue Ribbon Panel developed eight recommendations to increase sustainable funding sources for transportation. CTC urges your administration to review these options and implement a plan. The funds should be directed to the proposed Transportation Trust Fund to support infrastructure investments for state and municipal roads and bridges and operations for improved public transportation.

• Examine closely the opportunity to achieve significant efficiencies and savings in Rhode Island's statewide Human Service Transportation (HST) spending. Current spending by various human service agencies is in the range of $70 million annually. The RI Public Transit Authority has recently undertaken a comprehensive study of HST program management and it is believed that savings and efficiencies could help to strengthen and enhance public transit serving all populations.  

• Support implementation of the 2008 State Employee Commuter Reduction Act. The Act created a task force to develop, publicize and implement a plan to provide incentives for state employees to reduce vehicle miles traveled, including the option to opt out of free parking in lieu of a public transit pass. Provide incentives for employees (including state employees) to utilize public transit, not commute alone.

• Support implementation of the Safe Routes to School and Complete Streets programs. CTC supports implementation of infrastructure projects in municipalities that were awarded federally funded grants in 2007 and 2010 through the RI Safe Routes to School program, and which play into the national Complete Streets initiatives, which encourage planning that unites and connects communities socially, economically and safely.

• Support alternatives to automobiles. CTC encourages the RI Department of Transportation to more aggressively implement existing public laws that support alternatives to the personal automobile, which directs the agency to provide accommodations to bike/pedestrian traffic when planning and constructing state projects. The transportation sector is responsible for 37 percent of the region's greenhouse gas emissions, more than any other individual sector (electric, residential, commercial and industrial), and alternative modes of transit can reduce those harmful environmental impacts.

The 40-plus leading public advocacy organizations that make up CTC, its individual members, and the majority of the public as a whole provide a strong constituency for these changes that will improve Rhode Island's transportation system and help boost the state's economy. CTC hopes it can partner with your administration as an ally in succeeding in doing just that.

Sincerely,

The Coalition for Transportation Choices