Today's editorial cartoon by local artist Chris Smigliano captures perfectly the sense of frustration those who live and do business in Salem are feeling over the lack of progress on long-promised improvements to the city's transportation infrastructure.

Most have long since given up on ever seeing a "connector road" linking the city with the regional highway system. That project was viewed as the downtown's savior back in the 1970s and had the backing of several administrations before falling victim to opposition in Peabody and, finally, a lack of funds and interest.

But what of the "bypass road" that was supposed to link the new Veterans Memorial Bridge with downtown Salem? The span opened in 1996, and the original plans called for the new road running parallel to Bridge Street to be completed about the same time. Many false starts later, that right of way along the North River still stands vacant, a sharp turn and a few graffiti-scarred concrete barriers at the Salem end of the bridge marking where the road is supposed to begin.

This week, members of the city's business and political communities cheered passage of a bill in the closing hours of the legislative session that authorizes money for the construction of a new parking garage at the Salem train station. Forgive our skepticism, but this too is a project that was supposed to have been completed many years ago.

There is no question the garage is needed. Hundreds of commuters who might like to take the train to Boston are discouraged from doing so knowing that if they don't arrive at the station by 7:30 a.m. or thereabouts, there will be no place to park.

Now there is an opportunity to incorporate this new facility into the expansion and renovation of the courthouse complex across the street for which funds were also authorized last week thanks to the efforts of state Rep. J. Michael Ruane and Sen. Frederick E. Berry. But now it's up to the Romney administration to move those projects forward.

Mayor Stanley J. Usovicz and his community development staff must press upon the administration the importance of these projects to the future of their city's historic central business district and the region as a whole. With a burgeoning cultural economy led by the expansion of the Peabody Essex Museum and a residential boom that has seen many former office and retail buildings converted into apartments and condominiums, the type of changes taking place here seem to model the "smart growth" Romney has said he would like to see occur statewide.

Completion of the bypass road would be a major step toward improving the viability of the residential neighborhoods along Bridge Street on the outskirts of downtown Salem; and construction of the garage would not only encourage more people to use public transportation, but also help solve the city's vexing parking problems.

Perhaps Usovicz can call on his colleague across the bridge, Beverly Mayor William Scanlon, for some advice in dealing with the powers that be in Boston. Less than a year after recapturing the corner office, the latter has managed to make another worthwhile project that was going nowhere - the construction of a new access road over Route 128 for the North Shore Music Theatre - one of the top priorities for regional transportation planners.

It's that kind of intelligent and forceful advocacy Salem needs now to put these projects over the top.