Houstonian Corner (V13-I45)

Needs Outweigh Resources for State Infrastructure

Former Transportation Secretary calls report ‘blinding flash of the obvious’

The message was clear from two committees reporting to the Texas Transportation Commission on Thursday – there are no one-size-fits-all solutions to the state’s infrastructure needs and the wants and needs for creation and maintenance of highways throughout the state are much greater than the state’s ability to finance them.

In addition to the committee reports, the Commission also heard an update on the Texas Department of Transportation’s (TxDOT) ongoing modernization plan. “The process is beginning to move forward,” said Eric Gleason, TxDOT’s Director of Public Transportation. He said implementation of some of the projects is coming into focus and “the pace is quickening.” However, Gleason, noted that human resource availability to put some of the recommendations into place timely while continuing to fulfill day-to-day operations of the agency is a concern.

Three members of the Strategic Research Program Advisory Committee testified before the Commission Thursday. According to Rick Collins, director of the Research and Technology Implementation Office at TxDOT, the committee is charged with making recommendations to TxDOT regarding research topics that should be explored relating to transportation in the state. Those research projects will be awarded to universities throughout the state who respond to an upcoming request for proposals. Through these topics and the research, the committee will help prepare the department for some of the challenges the state and TxDOT will face in the future.

The committee held its first meeting in August and told commissioners this week that they quickly realized there was a lack of sustainability for maintaining and creating new infrastructure.

Committee member Mary Peters, former U.S. Transportation Secretary, said the committee’s report might appear to be a “blinding flash of the obvious.” She said it would be important not to reinvent the wheel but to “bring data to bear and focus on where this industry and the state can get more money” for its transportation infrastructure needs.

Another committee member, Ken Allen, told commissioners that as the committee was putting together its “wish list” for research projects that might result in a better way to use transportation funding for more projects, it narrowed the scope to three subjects, which he said were “deliberately kept very broad for the researchers.”
 
Among the topics was what he called “demand leveling,” or getting the most out of existing infrastructure, as well as innovative financing options and “managing the decline,” or prioritizing the use of limited funds. Regarding funding, Hall said the question becomes “how to best spend the money we have,” which he said would have to be “spent incredibly wisely.”

Similar messages were brought to the commission by Tim Brown, Bell County commissioner, who serves on the I-35 Advisory Committee.

Brown told the Commission that his group initially came up with little more than a list of projects. However, he said that illustrates that there is no one-size-fits-all solution because the solution changes from one geographic region to another.

Saying a variety of rail components will have to be part of the future solutions for the I-35 projects, the county commissioner said it became glaringly obvious that “we’ve got to find some more ways of funding those projects.

“Funding seems to be the common denominator we keep coming back to,” he said. Brown noted that the committee came up with “appropriate solutions, but no funding stream.”

The challenge for the committee, he said, is to “identify what needs to be done” and then come back to try to find ways to fund it.

“Transportation is so important that we’re going to have to get serious about funding,” said Brown.

In other action, the Transportation Commission took action to add Interstate 69 to the state highway system, allowing TxDOT officials to label the first Texas stretch of the nearly 1,000-mile interstate since I-69 received federal high-priority route designation more than a decade ago. This action will allow TxDOT to add the concurrent designation of I-69 to a 6.2-mile section of US 77 between I-37 and SH 44 in Nueces County without additional funding, right-of-way or construction because the existing highway already meets interstate standards.

Well Attended ICNA South Central Region Conference

Theme: Quran – The Scripture That Saved The World

Sheikh Omer Suleiman Speaks at the Sixth Annual ICNA-MAS Conference at University of Houston

Thousands of Muslims from the US South Central Region (Texas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Kansas) attended the 6th Annual Conference of the Islamic Circle of North (ICNA), and the Muslim American Society (MAS) at the University of Houston, on Saturday October 22nd.

Theme of the conference was: Quran- The Scripture That Saved Humanity. A parallel Youth Conference was organized by Young Muslims (YM), on the subject of “Peer Pressure – Peer Power”.
Prominent speakers and scholars spoke, including Sheikh Nauman Ali Khan, Sheikh Omer Suleiman, Imam Khalid Griggs, Qari Qasim Mazhar, Dr. Mohammad Yunus, Mustafa White, Hafiz Tauqeer Shah, Dr. Shahid Rafiq, Dr. Mohammad Shalaby.

Speakers were quite interactive and their presentations were practical, inspirational, and made the people happy.

Some of the subjects that were discussed and presented included: “Islamic Sharia: A Divine Legal Framework for a Prosperous Society”; “Speaking to Your Lord”; “Quran: Theory and Practice”; “The Vision & Mission”

In the Youth conference, the various themes that were touched included: “Jumping on the Bandwagon”; “A change is gonna come”; “What about you?”; “Take-home Message”; and “Will you be Missed?”

At the eve of Eid-AL-Adha, the bazaar at the conference had many Islamic Garments and Gifts stalls.

By the Grace of God, a successful fundraising for ICNA was done by Sheikh Omer Suleiman, where around $100,000 were raised for the Learning, Dawah and Community Services funds of ICNA.

For more information, one can visit www.ICNASouth.Com

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