Against the current: Critical inland waterways fight for critical investments

President Barack Obama's Fiscal Year 2016 budget plan delivers the right message about the nation's massive and critical infrastructure needs.

'When we build roads, bridges, ports, communications networks, municipal water systems, and other infrastructure, we are not just putting construction workers and engineers to work,” says the president's budget message, 'we are also revitalizing communities, protecting public health and safety, connecting people to jobs, empowering entrepreneurs and making it easier for American businesses to export goods around the world.”

But for Americans concerned about an often forgotten and critically important piece of the national transportation network - its navigable inland waterways - the president's strong words don't match his spending priorities. In fact, the president's budget would spend less on waterway infrastructure than Congress authorized this year.

The fate of inland waterways is economically critical to Iowa, which shipped 4.5 million tons of products out on Mississippi River barges in 2013 and received 3.2 million tons in inbound products. Most of the outbound freight is Iowa grain, 2.6 million tons of it, bound for New Orleans. We received 1 million tons of coal and 1 million tons of chemicals, mainly farm fertilizer.

According to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, 26,000 Iowa jobs depend on inland freight traffic, which carries $7.6 billion worth of agricultural commodities and $7.1 billion in manufactured goods moving in and out of the state. The total revenue effect in Iowa, adding up business revenue, personal income and local purchases, tops $4.3 billion.

Experts say those numbers would be a lot higher in Iowa and throughout the country if our waterway infrastructure wasn't in such poor condition. Instead, because of unplanned outages and long delays, bulk freight that could most efficiently be shipped by barge is sent by road or rail, putting even more pressure on those transportation systems.

AGING INFRASTRUCTURE

The Army Corps of Engineers is responsible for managing locks and dams and other structures along the nation's 12,000 miles of navigable rivers. Most of that infrastructure was built in the first half the 20th Century. And much of the aging system, which carried 565 million tons of freight valued at $214 billion in 2012, is in need of update, repair and replacement.

Add up all the delays for barge freight caused by equipment failures and other issues across the entire waterways system in 2011 and you'll get 25 years of delays, according to the American Society of Civil Engineers. The ASCE grades the current condition of the inland waterway system at a D-minus. Nearly two-dozen construction and rehabilitation projects await funding and could take decades to complete without a boost in infrastructure funding.

'Our grandparents put it in place, and we have done diddly-squat to it since. It's really old,” said Norma Jean Mattei, Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of New Orleans

and president-elect of the ASCE.

INADEQUATE RESOURCES

And yet, the president's 2016 budget plan would reduce the corps' funding by 13 percent, or $722 million, compared to the current year. It reduces corps spending on construction by 28.5 percent and cuts operations and maintenance by $198 million.

Even after Congress, at the urging of inland waterway users, raised the tax on waterway diesel fuel by 9 cents, to 29 cents per gallon in December, the Inland Water Trust Fund would pay for only two projects under Obama's budget, totaling $232 million. One is the massive Olmstead Locks and Dam project on the Ohio River between Kentucky and Illinois. The project was authorized in the late 1980s and has seen its price tag balloon into the billions, sucking up much of the available and inadequate funding for the inland waterways system.

Iowa Democratic Rep. Dave Loebsack and Republican Rep. Rod Blum - Congressmen who agree on little else - each signed a letter in March calling for more funding. Blum's 1st District and Loebsack's 2nd District are bordered by the Mississippi River, the nation's most important inland water route. The Upper Mississippi has 29 locks and dams, most of which were built during the Great Depression.

'These investments are essential for our economic well-being,” wrote Loebsack, Blum and 16 other House members who signed the letter.

UNTAPPED POTENTIAL

New investments make sense. A modernized river system that eliminates costly delays and wait times could be even more economically valuable to Iowa and the nation. New investments are needed now to keep up with other nations that are pouring major dollars into their infrastructure networks.

As Mattei told us, those countries have learned from our experience that infrastructure spending reaps enormous dividends. 'They know from what we did back in the 30s, 40s, 50s - we put money into our infrastructure and our economy exploded.” she said.

Unfortunately, that's a lesson we seem to have forgotten. 'Here we are, sitting on our hands, not even properly maintaining the stuff we've got, which used to be the best stuff in the world,” she said. 'I don't think we can say that anymore.”

More barge traffic would relieve some of the growing pressure on road and rail networks. One 15-barge tow hauls as much freight, 22,500 tons, as two 100-car trains or 870 large semis.

As Mattei points out, barge transport is safer, with extremely low rates of death or injury per billion ton miles. Barges help reduce traffic congestion on clogged highways.

'You typically don't have a lot of barges sink. It happens, but it's not something that happens often,” Mattei said.

River transport is greener from an energy use standpoint. Barges rate 514 miles per gallon carrying one ton of cargo, compared to 202 for trains and 59 for trucks, and have lower carbon emission rates.

Mattei also contends that inland waterway improvements could open the door to expanded container ship traffic, loads that are traditionally taken to the coats and transported by rail. Improved waterways could tap untapped economic potential.

'We've got the room on the river to move them. We wouldn't have to add another lane to the Mississippi,” Mattei said.

A WAY FORWARD

On May 1, the House passed an Energy and Water Appropriations Bill that increases Corps of Engineers funding by $142 million over its 2015 level, boosts spending on trust fund projects to $340 million and adds $42 million for additional operations and maintenance.

We think the House got it right, and hope similar bipartisan efforts in the Senate result in a more robust investment.

Still, these efforts pale in comparison to the $18 billion in total capital investments needed over the next 20 years, according to the ASCE report, A backlog of projects has piled up, awaiting funding.

So Congress is on the right track, but we also agree with the ASCE that our leaders must create a comprehensive national strategy for freight traffic, incorporating all transport modes, including inland waterways. States and key stakeholders must be involved in crafting that strategy.

A major goal should be to prioritize projects that would give the nation the biggest economic bang for its scarce bucks.

Although the quest for highway dollars and the debate over rail have received much more attention in Iowa, the fate of inland waterways should be getting much more attention. Critical home state industries and thousands of jobs depend on it.

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