TIGER 2012 projects keep freight, economy moving

At the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy, the motto is, "Acta non verba." It means, "Actions, not words," and I've been thinking about it a lot since we announced our TIGER 2012 awards last Friday. Because, with these 47 projects, this Administration continues to take bold steps to keep America's economy moving.

Our economy can't grow if shipper can't goods to and from ports

In fact, nearly half of the projects selected for TIGER 2012 will directly improve the way we move freight across our nation.

Freight fuels our economy. So we need to do what we can to make sure American companies can ship goods over a safe and efficient transportation network. And from a railway in Oregon to a roadway in Maine, and from the Gulf port of Corpus Christi, Texas, to the inland port of Lewiston, Idaho, TIGER funding will do exactly that.

In New Jersey, for example, a TIGER award of $11.4 million will help the CIty of Bayonne expand the capacity of the largest port on the East Coast. This $125 million project, funded largely by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, will create the South Hudson Intermodal Facility. The new facility will be able to handle 250,000 shipping containers each year and will allow improved port access to new Panamax vessels.

A port that cannot accommodate the new, larger vessels cannot continue to grow and cannot transfer containers to rail or road fast enough to help other businesses grow. TIGER funding will put good men and women back to work helping to solve that problem.

Speaking in Bayonne, with US Rep. Albio Rise and US Sen. Robert Menendez (right);
photo courtesy Reena Rose Sibayan, Jersey Journal

In Oklahoma, a $6.4 million TIGER award will help renovate the main dock, on-site rail, and a 200-foot crane at the Tulsa Port of Catoosa. With an employment base of 3,700 workers, this facility at the head of the McClelland-Kerr Arkansas River system is one of the nation's largest inland ports. Upgrading the dock and rail will increase port capacity by more than a million tons each year.

An improved inland port will provide domestic shippers in the South, Midwest and West with a lower-cost option and improve Tulsa's position as a freight and logistics hub.

 

And the list goes on--in Colorado, Arizona, California, Arkansas, Ohio, Vermont, and Alabama we're taking steps to keep American goods and the American economy moving. We're not deliberating while men and women struggle to feed their families. We're not sitting on our hands while trucks sit frozen on congested highways.

America can't wait, so we won't wait. America's freight shippers needed action; DOT delivered TIGER 2012.

Workers in Bayonne applaud TIGER 2012 grant announcement; photo courtesy Reena Rose Sibayan, Jersey Journal