Memorandum From the President on Transportation Policy

Memorandum for the Secretary of Transportation

In my Environmental Message of August 2, 1979, I recognized that our transportation systems can greatly affect, for better or worse, our nation's environment, our utilization of energy, and our urban areas. I also recognized that it is my Administration's policy to enhance environmental protection, energy conservation, and urban revitalization and that the nation's transportation system must provide greater support for these national goals.

I fully support the reorientation of urban transportation programs and projects to meet energy and urban goals and to improve overall environmental quality. I am directing you to act immediately to assure that:
• transportation funds are used to promote energy conservation through such energy saving features as special lanes for carpools, vanpools, and transit vehicles, and that encouragement be given to applying funds to public transportation projects;
• careful review is given to any transportation proposals which would encourage urban sprawl—one of the major causes of our high energy consumption-or which would tend to attract jobs out of our urban centers;
• consideration is given to the improvement and rehabilitation of existing facilities and the use of non-construction methods as alternatives to constructing new facilities;
• major transportation projects are utilized as a positive factor for improving the urban economy and attracting jobs to the nation's urban cores; and
• firm actions are taken to mitigate adverse effects of transportation projects on the environment—both the natural environment and the urban environment—and that the environmental commitments that we make in approving transportation projects are carried out when the projects are built.

Please report on your progress in implementing this directive to the Chairman of the Council on Environmental Quality and the Director of the Office of Management and Budget on February 1, 1980 and August 1, 1980.

JIMMY CARTER