NY Times On How Bureaucracy Slows Infrastructure Projects

See Trump Wants More Big Infrastructure Projects. The Obstacles Can Be Big, Too by BARRY MEIER.

"President Trump says he is frustrated with the slow pace of major construction projects like highways, ports and pipelines. Last summer, he pledged to use the power of the presidency to jump start building when it became bogged down in administrative delays.

“No longer will we allow the infrastructure of our magnificent country to crumble and decay,” Mr. Trump said in August.

In an executive order, the president directed federal agencies to coordinate environmental impact reviews for major projects with the goal of completing them within two years. Such reviews can often take four years and, in some cases, even longer.

Other presidents, including Barack Obama, have tried with mixed success to streamline the approvals for big infrastructure projects by pushing federal agencies to do environmental reviews faster. Frequently, delays are caused because multiple agencies, including the Environmental Protection Agency, the Bureau of Land Management and the United States Army Corps of Engineers, weigh in on the scope of an environmental review or have to issue separate permits before work can begin.

The centerpiece of Mr. Trump’s plan gives an office, the Council on Environmental Quality, within the White House, the authority to coordinate actions and direct how environmental reviews are performed. Much of the plan’s inspiration lies in a report, “Two Years Not Ten Years,” issued in 2015 by Common Good, a nonpartisan research and advocacy group.

The report estimated that the typical six-year delay in starting large building projects costs the country $3.7 trillion in lost economic activity, more than twice the amount needed to address the most urgent infrastructure needs. Along with roadblocks to speedy federal approval, the report blamed delays on such factors as fear of litigation and overly broad environmental reviews on all levels of government.

“They have embraced some of the goals and core ideas” in our report, said Philip K. Howard, who heads Common Good and is a lawyer at Covington & Burling in Manhattan. He had been a member of President Trump’s Strategic and Policy Forum, which disbanded in August after Mr. Trump’s remarks about the racial violence in Charlottesville, Va.

An analysis by the Congressional Research Service found that some of the claims in Common Good’s report, including the $3.7 trillion estimate, lacked a statistical basis, though the group had defended its work.

Infrastructure experts say that a lack of public and private funding, rather than bureaucratic delays, is the principal reason infrastructure projects stall. (In its budget proposal, the Trump administration has issued a six-page fact sheet about infrastructure funding, including private investment.) Still, they agree that the permitting process can be improved and streamlined. In addition to federal reviews, states and local governments must also approve major proposals — frequently a fraught process — and residents and other interest groups often use the courts to block or delay construction."