During my campaign, I repeately argued that the key to bringing jobs and improving the Mount Vernon economy, schools, and quality of life was bringing significant improvements to U.S. 1. While speaking last week at the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors Richmond Legislative Agenda meeting, I noted that I could not think of a single road in the 44th District that has been widened in my lifetime (since August, 1971) notwithstanding years of fighting for improvements by our officials. This is something that simply has to change.

While knocking doors, I also found thousands of Mount Vernon residents who were extremely worried about the traffic impacts of BRAC. The Final Environmental Impact Statement for the Belvoir BRAC improvements (see Page 4-82) predicted that commuters could be looking at three to four hour delays to get on base if U.S. 1 and I-95 were not improved. That would not help.

The biggest problem to improving our roads and Metro is revenue and the Virginia Department of Transportation's lack of it. And given our new administration, we need to work creatively to secure revenue from as many sources as possible. The very first bullet on my campaign transportation agenda was this:

Fight to ensure that the federal government adequately funds mass transit and transportation projects, especially to support the move of 19,300 jobs to Fort Belvoir.