The study helps explain the current impasse in Washington as President Barack Obama calls for transportation investments: many lawmakers agree on the need for more highway spending but are averse to taking politically risky steps to raise funding, Dow Jones Newswires reported. Congress passed a bill this week that would extend for the seventh time the 2005 surface transportation authorization law known as "SAFETEA-LU" at Fiscal Year 2009 funding levels. (see related story) The federal gasoline gas of 18.4 cents per gallon has not been increased since 1993.

In the study, 71% of respondents said they wanted elected leaders to seek compromise, rather than hold fast to their position, on legislation for transportation infrastructure. That's a higher percentage than those who said the same thing for addressing the federal budget deficit, tax cuts, entitlements, and other issues.

Two-thirds of respondents -- including majorities of Democrats, Republicans, and independents -- said that improving transportation infrastructure is "important." And 80% agreed that federal funding to improve and modernize transportation systems would boost local economies and create jobs.

But only 27% said that raising the federal gasoline tax would be an "acceptable" way to provide more highway funding. Instead, most survey respondents supported more private investment as an acceptable option for raising more transportation money.

The Rockefeller Foundation study, conducted between Jan. 29 and Feb. 6, involved 1,001 telephone interviews nationally. The four-page survey report is available at bit.ly/RockFoundationPoll.