President Donald Trump signed an executive order today which he claims will streamline processes for building infrastructure in the United States. Flanked by Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao, Trump, standing in the lobby of his eponymous New York tower, claimed that his executive order will reduce processes for approving road building from decades to two years.

Central to the president’s plan is the provision that for each project, a single agency will serve as a centralized manager. That, he argued, will streamline the process for building out US infrastructure and that US citizens will enjoy new infrastructure that is “the  best in the world.” “And if doesn’t meat environmental safeguards,” the president added, “it won’t get approved.”

The president’s executive action comes to fulfill, in part, one of his campaign promises, which called for a $1-trillion program to build and rebuild infrastructure. But before the sounds of shovels and bulldozers are heard across the country, Congress must appropriate some money in that direction. Trump has suggested his infrastructure program would be based on public-private partnerships, in which the federal government would provide a small portion of the capital to kickstart projects.

Some find it dubious to believe that private US companies wold be interested in equity participation in projects such as roads, airports, and hospitals. But regardless of the details, any infrastructure program will require appropriations by Congress of hundreds of billions of dollars. But the way Trump’s agenda has stumbled through the legislative process so far – and how his infrastructure message has been drowned out by his perceived support for right wingers in Charlottesville – it’s equally dubious to suppose that a Trump infrastructure program will be getting off the ground anytime soon.