No one knows more about the crumbling state of municipal roads than Mayor Chris Coleman, who has famously labeled St. Paul's most notoriously rocky streets the "Terrible 20."
So Coleman, serving this year as president of the National League of Cities, is in the perfect position to bring those concerns to Washington in hopes of securing more federal funding for roads and infrastructure.
Coleman is meeting Tuesday with U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx in Washington as part of an "Infrastructure Investment Summit" at the Treasury Department.
Among the topics: how to jumpstart movement on President Obama's surface transportation plan, which would dedicate billions to filling the funding gap in the Highway Trust Fund and addressing deteriorating roads and infrastructure across the nation.
Coleman also plans to tell Foxx about the coalition of Minnesota mayors being formed to lobby the state for additional funding for local streets.
Repairs began Monday on 11 of the "Terrible 20" St. Paul arterial streets most in need of work. Coleman and the City Council agreed to spend $2.5 million to scrape and repave those streets for now; that work should be finished before winter sets in.
In the long term, the mayor has proposed $34 million in new funds next year to begin rebuilding the worst streets from the ground up.
City Council members, who have gotten an earful from constituents this year about the streets and as a result proposed their own aggressive program to address the road problems, are convinced that St. Paul needs to act now before more tires go flat and suspensions are busted.
