Trump administration cites augmented reality, satellite broadband as ‘transformative’ infrastructure projects

The Trump administration wants to spend $20 billion on a range of risky but potentially “transformative” infrastructure projects, such as satellite networks to provide rural broadband, new launchpads for private rockets, and “augmented reality” technologies to visualize and manage urban traffic congestion. The administration “is already prepared with ideas” for “surgically-targeted” projects, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross told senators as part of a broad, multiagency push for momentum on a 10-year, $200 billion infrastructure proposal facing head winds on Capitol Hill. Sec Ross was joined by the secretaries of transportation, agriculture, energy and labor for testimony before the Senate Commerce Committee, and offered new details on “bold and innovative projects … that would not otherwise attract private investment without federal incentives because of the risk.” But the phalanx of cabinet chiefs provided no new information on the more pedestrian but pivotal question of how the president’s team would pay for its infrastructure aspirations.