Transportation congestion most likely will be a major issue for Congress as it considers reauthorization of the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act—A Legacy for Users ( SAFETEA), P.L. 109-59 , which is set to expire on September 30, 2009. By many accounts, congestion on the nation's road and railroad networks, at seaports and airports, and on some major transit systems is a significant problem for many transportation users, especially commuters, freight shippers, and carriers. Moreover, trends underlying the demand for freight and passenger travel—population and economic growth, the urban and regional distribution of homes and businesses, and international trade—suggest that pressures on the transportation system are likely to grow in the years ahead. A number of experts and organizations believe that congestion has reached crisis proportions. In announcing a new National Congestion Strategy in May 2006, then Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta stated that "congestion is one of the single largest threats to our economic prosperity and way of life." In a similar vein, the Transportation Research Board (TRB) currently has congestion on its "critical issues" list as one of the most pressing problems of the transportation system, arguing "if the 20 th century can be called the era of building, the 21 st may be called the era of congestion." More recently, in January 2007, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), for the first time, placed transportation financing and capacity on its list of high-risk federal programs and operations. Not everyone agrees that congestion is a major, national problem. Some see it as a minor impediment to mobility, others as an unfortunate by-product of prosperity and accessibility in economically vibrant places. Several environmental groups argue that congestion is less the problem than the over reliance on the cars and trucks that cause it. Indeed, this over reliance on highway transportation, they believe, leads to more important problems, such as suburban sprawl and air pollution. Furthermore, because the problem is geographically concentrated, most places and people in America do not suffer noticeable levels of congestion. Thus, many might question to what extent transportation congestion is a national problem warranting a federal government response. In uncongested regions, transportation problems are more often to do with basic connectivity of the transportation system, system access, and economic development. Connectivity, system access, economic development, and congestion relief are some of the objectives of national transportation policy that also include mitigating the negative effects of transportation, such as deaths, injuries, and environmental damage. According to 49 U.S.C. § 101, The national objectives of general welfare, economic growth and stability, and security of the United States require the development of transportation policies and programs that contribute to providing fast, safe, efficient, and convenient transportation at the lowest cost consistent with those and other national objectives, including the efficient use and conservation of the resources of the United States. To accomplish these objectives, the federal government regulates transportation activities and provides funding to encourage states and local governments to build and operate transportation infrastructure. Since the beginnings of this "federal-aid" system, there have been major debates about how these funds should be distributed and spent. An underlying tension throughout these debates has been whether to distribute funds to encourage the pursuit of nationally defined transportation goals, such as the building of the Interstate system, or to distribute funds equally between the states (according to a predefined formula) and allow them to pursue their own objectives. In SAFETEA, about 90% of highway funds are authorized to be distributed by formula, and states are guaranteed by FY2008-FY2009 a 92% return on money paid into the highway account of the Highway Trust Fund. Because transportation congestion is geographically concentrated, Congress has tended to favor a state and local approach to solving transportation congestion in the recent history of the federal surface transportation program. This has been accompanied by several sizeable boosts in funding for public transit and traffic reduction measures directed to major metropolitan areas in an attempt to curb the negative effects of cars and trucks, including road traffic congestion. Congress also has enacted a patchwork of other programs to deal with congestion at the national level, with some success, but these have generally been relatively modest efforts. Consequently, the flexibility provisions of recent federal laws, and with them the equity provisions that attempt to return to each state the taxes paid by its highway users into the highway account of the Highway Trust Fund, have largely left it to the states, and in some cases metropolitan planning organizations, to decide funding priorities. The extent to which Congress decides congestion is a national problem to be solved by federal dictates, and funding may be a major issue in reauthorization. Congress may decide its current "bottom-up" approach to planning and programming transportation improvements, with some modifications, is the best approach to congestion in the broader scheme of transportation priorities. Conversely, Congress may decide that congestion warrants a stronger role for the federal government. Three broad elements of the issue are discussed here: overall levels of transportation spending, the prioritization of transportation spending, and congestion pricing and other alternative rationing schemes that require limited government spending. Although congestion is being experienced throughout the transportation system, including at ports and airports, this report is limited to a discussion of congestion associated with the surface transportation system—highways, public transit, and freight and passenger rail. Because these modes connect with ports and airports, there is some discussion of intermodal issues at these nodes as well, but the report does not discuss congestion in the waterway or airway systems per se. This report begins by outlining in broad terms some of the issues that Congress may face in the reauthorization debate. This is followed by a brief history of transportation congestion in the United States, and how Congress has dealt with the issue in the recent past. It then goes on to discuss transportation congestion concepts, measures, and trends, followed by information on the national costs of congestion. The final section lays out some of the major types of congestion remedies that have been proposed by transportation engineers, planners, and policy makers. Most experts agree that surface transportation congestion has grown over the past few decades and, moreover, that the demand for surface transportation services is likely to continue growing over the next few decades. According to one national assessment of highway congestion by the Texas Transportation Institute (TTI), total delay in 437 urban areas increased five-fold between 1982 and 2005, and delay per peak-period traveler almost tripled. Anecdotal evidence suggests that overcrowding is a growing problem in some major transit systems and that conflicts between freight and passenger rail trains (commuter and intercity) are an issue for both. In the freight rail industry, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) notes that average speeds, one indicator of congestion, are lower now than at anytime since the early 1980s except for the 1997-1998 period following the merger of Union Pacific and Southern Pacific. With dramatic increases in foreign trade, many fear that ports and border crossings have become significant bottlenecks to the flow of commerce. Despite these trends, the question remains as to whether or not congestion is a national problem and, therefore, should be a specific goal of national transportation policy. Although congestion has intensified and spread, congestion is geographically concentrated in major metropolitan areas, at international trade gateways, and on some intercity trade routes. Because of this geographical concentration, most states and localities do not suffer any appreciable transportation congestion directly. Moreover, some argue that even in places with relatively intense congestion problems, it only adds a few extra minutes to daily travel and that many actually enjoy the extra time alone in the car away from the pressures of work and family. Seen in terms of an entire trip, including the time it takes to park and walk to the office, one expert believes the extra time caused by freeway delay is relatively minor. Some even go so far as to suggest that much like a crowded restaurant or nightclub, congestion is a sign of success and its costs must be balanced against the benefits of access to jobs, stores, recreational amenities, etc. that congested regions provide. Environmental organizations generally argue that road traffic congestion results from an unbalanced transportation system, one that favors cars and trucks, and that urban sprawl, air pollution, and noise, not road traffic congestion per se, should be the focus of national policy. The alternative view is that transportation congestion is a major problem, national in scope, and, if unchecked, a problem that will intensify and spread over the next 25 years. Many experts point out that although congestion may be highly localized, because transportation is a network that serves the U.S. population in a variety of ways, its economic effects are national. Most obviously, freight movement is largely dependent on a national transportation network in which a bottleneck in one place, such as southern California, may affect businesses and consumers in largely congestion-free Nebraska. Moreover, these experts point out the national network effects are becoming increasingly important as supply chains lengthen and become more complex. Similarly, although passenger transportation is mostly a local affair, congestion on roads that service airports and other passenger terminals may also result in inefficient intercity passenger travel, dragging down the productivity of businesses that rely on it for managing far-flung operations. Local congestion may also be thought of as a national issue in that the places where it is found tend to be the hubs of the national economy and its costs, therefore, are not inconsequential in terms of the national economy. For instance, the 28 metropolitan areas that experienced 40 hours or more of annual delay per peak-period traveler (as measured in 2005 by TTI) account for more than 45% of total personal income in the United States (in 2005). Most businesses rely, to one degree or another, on the efficient transportation of people locally, whether it is the transportation of managers to business meetings, workers to work, or customers to places where products are consumed. Research has shown that metropolitan areas with the largest labor markets tend to have the highest productivity.