Congressman Connolly understands that reducing traffic congestion is critical to our quality of life in Northern Virginia. As a former county government executive, Congressman Connolly led major infrastructure investments, including the extension of Metro’s Silver Line to Dulles Airport – a $5.6 billion rail project, and pursued innovative Public Private Partnerships to add capacity to our regional transportation network. In Congress, he is fighting to fund new transportation projects and promote the use of telework in the federal government.
Transportation investments have the potential to realize enormous returns on taxpayer dollars. It was President Dwight D. Eisenhower who signed the Federal Aid Highway Act in 1956, and our nation continues to benefit from the legacy of that investment to this day, more than 60 years later. It would be difficult to calculate what the return on investment has been for the Interstate Highway System – a massive investment entirely financed with federal funds – but we know that, to this day, it enables enormous economic activity and touches our lives on a daily basis. Congressman Connolly proudly worked to pass President Biden's Bipartisan Infrastructure Deal, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021, which makes the largest investment in American roads, highways, and bridges since President Eisenhower first signed the interstate highway system into law. Our region will receive nearly $20 billion in new direct infrastructure investment as a result of the new infrastructure bill.
Congressman Connolly knows we need Metro to be a safe and reliable transit backbone for the national capital region. He sees a system in crisis and in desperate need of a wholesale culture change. Congressman Connolly understands that failure of Metro is not an option. It is too important to our regional mobility. He has helped lead the effort to conduct Congressional oversight of safety and accountability at Metro. He helped lead the effort to establish a new Metrorail Safety Commission. He is the author of Metro reform legislation which preserved the annual $150 million federal investment in Metro necessary to replace aging rail cars and make other needed safety and infrastructure improvements. Provisions of Congressman Connolly's Metro Investment and Accountability Act that reauthorize federal funding for WMATA through fiscal year 2030 were included in the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021.
As a local elected official, Congressman Connolly helped set and exceed teleworking goals as a way to reduce regional traffic congestion and pollution and promote employee satisfaction. Congressman Connolly has been a champion of federal telework programs since his co-authorship of the Telework Enhancement Act of 2010, and he has overseen the largest increase in federal telework in history. Long before the pandemic, he was sounding the alarm about the Trump Administration’s attacks on federal telework and the harm they would do to federal continuity of operations plans. Congressman Connolly is focused on rebuilding federal telework programs and ensuring that all federal workers who can work remotely have that option available to them.
