Trump Signs Executive Order to Accelerate Road, Bridge Construction

The order requires a single federal authority to be the lead on approvals for environmental and other permitting mandates.

August 18, 2017

WASHINGTON – This week, President Donald Trump signed an executive order to streamline and quicken the process to build the nation’s infrastructure, the New York Times reports. The “Establishing Discipline and Accountability in the Environmental Review and Permitting Process for Infrastructure Projects” executive order slashes some of the red tape that can hold up road and bridge construction projects.

“We used to have the greatest infrastructure anywhere in the world, and today we’re like a third-world country,” Trump said during a news conference announcing the executive order. “No longer will we allow the infrastructure of our magnificent country to crumble and decay.”

The new executive order undoes some of the standards former President Barack Obama set in place that mandated the federal government consider climate change and sea-level rise in infrastructure plans.

The plan has a “one federal decision policy” that puts one federal agency as the lead on each project, which will then work with other agencies on environmental reviews and permitting. The order also accelerates the time period on federal permits, asking that they be made within 90 days. Agencies will have a goal of 24 months to review environmental concerns for major projects.

“It’s going to be a very streamlined process, and by the way, if it doesn’t meet environmental safeguards, we’re not going to approve it,” Trump said.

Rep. Bob Bishop (R-UT) said the infrastructure bill laid a strong foundation. “It’s encouraging to have a president who understands that regulatory reform is a precondition for any successful infrastructure policy,” he said.

However, environmental activists and others took issue that the order reinstated the previous flood management standard put in place by former President Jimmy Carter in 1977. Republican legislators and building contractors claimed that following Obama’s Federal Flood Risk Management Standard was expensive and onerous. 

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