(Washington, DC) Mayor Anthony A. Williams and Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton co-hosted an event today with Senator Jim Jeffords, ranking member of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, and Congressman Don Young, chair of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, highlighting the need to pass and fund the Transportation Reauthorization Bill to meet the pressing needs of the nation's bridges and transportation infrastructure.

The event, at the Kennedy Center, spotlighted the Roosevelt Bridge, which will lose travel lanes because of about-to-begin emergency repairs. This all-too-common condition across the country highlights the need to pass and fund the Surface Transportation Reauthorization Bill (i.e. renewal of TEA-21.)

"Passage of the Surface Transportation Reauthorization Bill will restore the nation's commitment to mobility, economic growth and homeland defense first made in 1956 with the Defense Highway Act that gave us the Interstate Highway System," said Mayor Williams. "As the condition of the Roosevelt Bridge demonstrates, without federal funds the nation's transportation investment will deteriorate, gradually losing capacity and not be renewed to meet the needs of the 21st century."

The bridge is not only a crucial regional and commuter artery carrying 100,000 vehicles every weekday, it is also a key part of the homeland defenses of the nation's capital. By connecting downtown Washington with Fort Myer, the Pentagon and other important federal installations in Virginia, it supplies redundant transportation capacity in case of a 9/11-type event or other emergency.

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