Our Accomplishments

Accomplishments

• Annually award scholarships to students pursuing transportation studies. In 2018, the MBTA Educational Foundation awarded $44,000 to 43 Maine students.

• Since 1999, MBTA has advocated and campaigned for more than $1 billion in supplemental bond funding to support critical investments in Maine’s roads, bridges, ports, rail, transit and other transportation infrastructure. Transportation funding is immensely popular with Maine citizens and these bonds have passed with an average of 72 percent voter approval.

• Over the past two decades, MBTA has advocated for dredging the Searsport channel and port infrastructure improvements in Portland, Searsport and Eastport in order to spur international marine trade.

• In 2013, MBTA successfully advocated for the Maine Legislature and the Governor to reapportion the amount the Highway Fund pays for Maine State Police operations, bringing it in line with the amount of time the police spend on highway-related activities.

• MBTA joined the coalition of supporters of the state’s 2011 purchase of 233-mile rail network in Aroostook County, an essential transportation corridor for Maine manufacturers.

• In 2008, MBTA backed Governor John Baldacci’s bridge funding initiative, LD 2313: An Act to Keep Our Bridges Safe. This legislation provided $160 million for bridge reconstruction and repair.

• Led efforts to draft and pass LD 1790: “An Act to Secure Maine’s Transportation Future” in the Maine Legislature in 2007. The landmark bill provides the framework for major changes in how Maine finances its transportation infrastructure.

• Initiated and led 1997 referendum campaign to widen Maine Turnpike and pass transportation bond issue resulting in $350 million for statewide transportation improvements.

• In 1983, we expanded our mission to include marine, rail, aviation and other forms of transportation and vowed to promote multimodal transportation and all it does for Maine’s economy.

• Led effort for passage of a 1944 state constitutional amendment protecting the state Highway Fund and ensuring that revenues are used solely for transportation and not diverted for other items in the state budget.

• MBTA joined other groups around the country calling for passage of President Eisenhower’s vision for an interstate highway system (signed into law in 1959) and its development in Maine.

• In 1941, MBTA supported passage of An Act to Create the Maine Turnpike Authority and the subsequent building and completion of the Kittery-Portland section of the Maine Turnpike in 1947.