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(AP) - Rep. Jim Oberstar has backed off his proposal
for a five-cent gas tax increase to fund $25 billion worth of
bridge repairs, instead offering a $2 billion plan targeting the
most dangerous bridges in the country.

      The House Transportation Committee, which Oberstar chairs, is
scheduled to take up the bill on Wednesday.

      Oberstar, D-Minn., made the original proposal after the deadly
collapse of the Interstate 35W bridge in Minneapolis in August. But
it ran into stiff opposition from the White House and congressional
Republicans, and even some Democrats were cool to the idea.

      In addition to authorizing $2 billion, Oberstar's pared down
bill, The National Highway Bridge Inspection and Reconstruction
Act, would require states to provide better training for bridge
inspectors and would require that all bridges found to be
structurally deficient be inspected every year.

      States that don't meet the requirements wouldn't be eligible for
federal bridge funding.

      "This is not the bill I hoped to introduce," Oberstar said.
"Anyone who claims we can fix over 73,000 structurally deficient
bridges without additional revenue is not telling you the whole
truth."

      Oberstar spokesman John Schadl said the idea isn't completely
off the table, but said the most important thing is to get bridge
inspections started.

      Oberstar said in a news release that the funding for bridge
repair and reconstruction would be allocated based on a public
safety formula and couldn't be diverted to other purposes by
Congress or the president.

      "The collapse of the I-35W bridge has demonstrated that we have
to act decisively on this issue," Oberstar said. 


The Aug. 1 bridge
collapse in Minneapolis killed 13 people.


      The American Society of Civil Engineers estimates it would cost
more than $188 billion to fix all of the nation's 73,784 bridges
that have been rated structurally-deficient.

 That designation is
based mostly on a visual inspection and doesn't mean a bridge is
about to collapse.

      Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., "is particularly pleased to
see there is not an increase in the gas tax in this bill," said
his spokesman, LeRoy Coleman. 

Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., noted that the Senate had approved
$1 billion to help repair the nation's bridges as part of a larger
transportation funding bill.

      "I would welcome more money," she said.

Gallery

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Rep. Jim Oberstar of Minnesota has backed off his proposal for a five-cent gas tax increase to fund $25 billion worth of bridge repairs, instead offering a $2 billion plan targeting the
most dangerous bridges in the country.


Oberstar's stripped-down bridge bill gets hearing today

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