Tanya Snyder

After a few false alarms, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has finally come out and said it: He's leaving the administration.

Mick Cornett, Oklahoma City's Republican mayor, has made it his mission to make his city healthier and less obese, in part by improving its walkability. The city lost a million pounds during his weight-loss campaign -- and then they took a freeway out of the middle of downtown and overhauled its built environment.

By the looks of it, my humble hometown of Washington, DC is winning the transit space race. The region currently has 45 transit projects either planned or underway -- and one that's stalled. You may have heard of the Silver Line to Dulles Airport, but a new map from Reconnecting America proves that that's just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to transit starts in the DC area.

After fighting to maintain reasonable funding levels in the transportation bill – and for the inclusion of dedicated transit funding in the first place – the Federal Transit Administration now finds itself up against almost certain funding cuts that imperil rail and bus expansion projects, as well as the agency's own staffing.

When the federal gas tax was set at 18.4 cents per gallon, it represented 17 percent of the cost of a gallon of gas. Now it's barely 5 percent.

The Republican co-chair of the Congressional Bicycling Caucus is getting a leadership position with some real gravitas. Rep. Tom Petri (R-WI) was just named the new chair of the Highways and Transit Subcommittee in the House -- the epicenter of the chamber's surface transportation legislation.

If you’ve had your head stuck inside street design manuals or engineering guides – if you’ve been thinking at the level of the bulb-out or the bollard – I’ve got a present for you.

While governors debate raising (or eliminating) their states' gas taxes, buzz is building about mileage-based fees, or a vehicle-miles-traveled charge. A House provision to ban U.S. DOT from studying such a fee has gone away (along with its sponsor), while Rep. Earl Blumenauer is trying to get the Treasury Department to look into how it could work. And a new report from the Government Accountability Office says that would be a good idea.

A White House official yesterday named three Cabinet members who are staying on for Obama's second term and set off a storm of speculation about those he didn't name -- among them, Ray LaHood.

The 15,753 golf courses in the United States take up more space than half the state of New Jersey. And though they devour so much land, much of it in suburbia, the sport is foundering -- in part because of the enormous amount of time and distance it requires. Some real estate professionals and experts on aging have come together to suggest a solution both for the decline of the game and the land use problems posed by these massive courses: Build mixed-use development inside them.