What the 2024 Election Could Mean for Transportation Policy

Most urban voters want to pay higher taxes for better transportation infrastructure.

It may seem surprising, given the broader political shifts illustrated last week. But in most cases where voters had a choice, that’s the message they sent. According to the American Public Transportation Association, 18 of the 25 transportation-related funding measures that appeared on ballots last week passed. Voters approved more than $50 billion in new revenue for transportation infrastructure, including everything from street repavings to light rail operations. About half of the total revenue is dedicated for public transit.

Local transportation plans also rely on funding and support from state and federal governments. And the results of last week’s elections could alter the long-term funding environment and policy priorities for transportation projects of all types in ways that aren’t totally clear yet. But we shouldn’t expect an immediate sea change: When it comes to the Highway Trust Fund, the primary source of money for highways and mass transit, “it does not change a lot or quickly with politics,” says Beth Osborne, director of Transportation for America.

Transit Wins and Losses

One of the biggest wins for public transit on Tuesday night was in Nashville, where voters approved a new half-cent sales tax to fund better bus service, new transit hubs, new sidewalks and more infrastructure improvements. The plan, a first-year priority for Mayor Freddie O’Connell, passed with nearly two-thirds of the vote. Voters had overwhelmingly rejected a different plan in 2018 that called for five new light rail lines and a tunnel underneath downtown Nashville.

Transit-related measures won in other cities as well. Maricopa County, Ariz., voters extended a half-cent sales tax that will pay for road building, 12 miles of new light rail and some bus rapid transit projects. Columbus, Ohio, approved a half-cent sales tax increase to pay for five new bus rapid transit lines and improvements to existing bus service. Denver voters elected to exempt the Regional Transportation District from certain spending limits related to Colorado’s Taxpayer Bill of Rights, avoiding a threat to the local transit budget. A San Francisco measure to pay for local transit improvements with a tax on ride-share companies failed to pass the threshold of support needed to win, but still earned a clear majority of votes. Seattle voters approved a $1.55 billion transportation levy focused on improvements to street infrastructure, partly to improve connections to transit capital projects that are in the works.

Transit fared more poorly in other areas. Some of the biggest losses were in Gwinnett County and Cobb County, Ga., in suburban Atlanta. Proposals to raise taxes to improve bus and microtransit service, and to build new high-capacity bus routes, failed in both counties. Leaders in those counties have tried repeatedly to expand transit for decades, but voters have consistently rejected the measures. They’re bound to try again.

“The county needs transit to remain innovative and preserve the high quality of life our residents have come to expect,” Gwinnett County Chairwoman Nicole Love Hendrickson said in a statement after the vote. “Most importantly, we need to continue providing an essential service — ensuring residents who rely on public transportation have affordable and reliable transit options.”

Voters in both Charleston County and Beaufort County, S.C., rejected extensions of sales tax measures that would support transit service. Voters in the Columbia area elected to keep a Richland County penny tax that funds transportation projects.

Environmental Policies and the Electric Vehicle Shift

While local elections on transit-funding measures will have more or less immediate impact in cities, voters’ decisions in state and federal elections will affect transportation and infrastructure in less direct but longer-lasting ways.

State legislative races, for instance, have proven to be hugely consequential for transportation choices in recent years. Minnesota voters gave full control of the state government to the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party in 2022, and the following year, party leaders pushed through a long-sought increase in public-transit spending, changes to the gas tax and new policies aimed at reducing the environmental impact of transportation. Divided government will return next year; Democrats lost control of the Minnesota House on Tuesday. In Pennsylvania, Democrats narrowly retained control of the state House. They have so far been unable to strike a deal with Senate Republicans to save SEPTA, Philadelphia’s transit system, from steep fare hikes and cuts to transit service. Other urban transit systems from San Francisco to Chicago and Washington, D.C., are looking to state governments for support as they manage budget crises stemming from pandemic-era ridership losses.

State legislatures and the federal government also have wide-ranging influence over environmental policy in transportation and incentives for electric vehicle adoption. Colorado, for example, has pushed forward a slate of policies meant to reduce the carbon impact of the transportation sector. Texas, meanwhile, has invested record sums in highway construction and maintenance. Overall, there hasn’t been a major shift in party control of state legislatures.

While states like California and Vermont have led the pack in promoting electric vehicles, the federal government has created incentives for EV adoption as well. The White House and Congress have increased investment in electric vehicle infrastructure and rebates for EV purchases in recent years. The Biden administration has touted an uptick in EV sales as a benefit of its climate and transportation policies. Red-state leaders and Republicans in Congress have generally been less supportive of pro-EV policies.

President-elect Donald Trump has floated the idea of ending federal tax credits for electric vehicles. But he has also formed a close partnership with Elon Musk, the owner of Tesla, one of the biggest EV manufacturers in the world. Observers project a period of “uncertainty” for electric vehicle sales. The Trump White House and Republican Congress may also roll back emissions standards for gas-powered vehicles.

Long-Term Transportation Spending

The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), one of the Biden administration’s signature achievements, included lots of new funding for transportation infrastructure. Some of the funding is for novel programs. Those include Reconnecting Communities grants, which are meant to help cities address problems related to past infrastructure projects like urban highways, and the Safe Streets and Roads for All program, which funds planning and implementation of street safety improvements. Those programs offer competitive grants, and are scheduled to sunset in 2026, along with the rest of the IIJA. The future of those grants and other discretionary transportation spending programs will be negotiated by Congress in the coming years.

But the biggest source of transportation spending, the Highway Trust Fund, has been characterized by its durability during the political shifts of the past few decades. The fund is reauthorized by Congress every half-decade or so. During the 20th century, Congress made periodic changes to the way highway funds were apportioned to states, weighing various factors like land area, population and road mileage. But for the last several reauthorizations, Congress has essentially extended the existing apportionments. Individual presidents and Congresses haven’t put much of a stamp on the program in the last few decades, says Beth Osborne.

The Highway Trust Fund is funded primarily by gas taxes. Because the gas tax hasn’t been raised since the 1990s, the trust fund is insolvent; it ran a $17.8 billion deficit last year. There’s a political constituency for everything the Highway Trust Fund pays for, Osborne says, including road paving in Democratic districts and rural transit in Republican districts. The pressure will keep building on Congress to develop a long-term solution for the fund’s solvency issues. But recent history suggests leaders will be tempted to allocate additional general fund spending to plug in the gaps and put the problem off for a few more years.

“From administration to administration, it hasn’t really changed much in my career,” Osborne says.