1) What is the northeast?
A close geographic match to many of the 13 colonies that formed the United States more than 200 years ago, the Northeast Corridor today is 50 million people strong and can boast a $2.7 trillion economy, 27 percent of the nation's output. In finance, media, health care and higher education, it still trumps many newer regions of the nation.2) Who is the northeast competing with? It's not only California or the Midwest anymore.
But there are serious threats. A high cost of living makes it tough for firms to attract talented workers. Climate change, including rising seas and storm surges, threatens the Atlantic coastline. The environment is imperiled by sprawling growth that in recent decades has consumed as much space, including vast stretches of open land and farms, as the prior three centuries of settlement. Washington, New York and Boston may seem to be thriving, but not such cities as Philadelphia, Baltimore, Newark, N.J., and Bridgeport, Conn.
The 200 summit attendees, including two nationally known former governors — Massachusetts' Michael Dukakis and Maryland's Parris Glendening — reached an audacious conclusion. Projected to grow by 18 million people in the next decades, the Northeast states need to coalesce, with joint goals and programs, if the region is to compete globally and offer an attractive place to live and work. The chief competition is no longer simply with the Midwest or California. Rather, it is with regions ranging from China's Pearl River Delta to Europe's London-to-Milan corridor.3) What about transportation challenges?
Top on the agenda: radical expansion of rail service to allow for high-speed trains competitive with new world standards, plus expanded lines to accommodate massive new freight demands. Auto and truck traffic is close to congealing around every metro area; road stretches such as I-95 are often at a standstill; truck traffic on the crowded New Jersey Turnpike is increasing an unsustainable 3 percent a year.4) How might the northeast improve its prospects in the 21st century?
Dukakis, a former vice chair of Amtrak, trumpeted welcome news for the Northeast: "We have the best rail Congress in my lifetime." Top evidence: New Jersey Sen. Frank Lautenberg's bill to infuse close to $20 billion into new Amtrak equipment over six years, plus repairing the Northeast Corridor's dangerously outmoded tunnels, track and catenary wires.
France, noted Dukakis, is spending 20 times per capita on rail as the U.S.; new funding of $3 billion to $4 billion a year, combined with state collaboration, "can get us cracking," building a quality nationwide rail network for less cost than a week or two of the Iraq War.
But for true breakthroughs, said Glendening, the time is at hand for the region's governors, and the mayor of Washington, to "think outside the box," perhaps undertake a common "visioning" process on how this mega-region develops, even consider a regional fund for major transportation and conservation initiatives.Another question: will Congress let them?
Would independent states ever do that? It's a long stretch. But the timeliness is beyond question.
Some of these ideas don't seem all that bad. However, I would sort of contest that the northeast is in terrible shape. If anything, it's probably just more developed than the rest of the country. Hot real estate markets alone tell me there's at least some interest in the region.
The region, as a whole, should do what it can to lower costs of doing business and improve transportation ties throughout. There is very little desire to try to do something revolutionary anymore. The Erie Canal made New York State important. It'll take something else of that magnitude in today's terms to make the region get ahead of the competition. What if the transportation system improved so that most of the region could work within three miles from home? The region needs big ideas.
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