Expensive vehicle registration

[Westerner92]

Just curious, how much in tolls would you estimate you paid per year in Florida? It seems like most of their limited-access highways and many of their larger bridges are tolled.

Gas taxes have conventionally been the main source of road funding in the US. Colorado's gas tax has been at $0.22/gal since 1991. The federal gas tax has been at $0.184/gal since 1993. Inflation in tandem with improving gas efficiency means the per-capita purchasing power funded by gas taxes has decreased drastically. Another thing that doesn't help is that freight trucks keep getting bigger. Pavement damage as a function of axel weight is a quartic function (x^4), and freight trucks are so much heavier than passenger vehicles that all other vehicles combined might affect lifecycle costs and pavement stress analysis at the 4th or 5th digit. I estimated it one time in a previous post, and the per capita funding is somewhere around half of what it was in 1993 while pavement stress per capita has increased.

Over the last 20 years or so, transportation agencies around the country have been responding to this with either tolling or registration fees, and those measures still fall short of what's needed to maintain the road standards of the late 20th Century.

Another thing to consider is that, compared to Florida, two environmental factors make Colorado roads more expensive: mountains and freeze/thaw cycles. Rugged terrain is more expensive at every step of the lifecycle cost of a road, and the erosion caused by Colorado's intense temperature swings causes roads to break down faster too. One winter storm where semis on I-70 have to chain up and crawl up a 6% grade will noticeably cut grooves into the right lane, and pavement laying season is maybe 4-5 months long, 1 or 2 of those being iffy.

IMHO, I-70 being free at point of use is actually among the more impressive feats of civilization. The I-25 corridor from Broadway to Castle Rock is one of the nicest, best designed freeways in the world, and it's used as a go-by around the world. The Central-70 project seems to have the potential to be the same. A lot of the roads here could stand to get maintained more often, and CDOT needs to pay more attention to signal optimization, but overall, it does more impressive work with the money it has than most places.

[bluescreen73]

Originally Posted by Westerner92

Just curious, how much in tolls would you estimate you paid per year in Florida? It seems like most of their limited-access highways and many of their larger bridges are tolled.

Gas taxes have conventionally been the main source of road funding in the US. Colorado's gas tax has been at $0.22/gal since 1991. The federal gas tax has been at $0.184/gal since 1993. Inflation in tandem with improving gas efficiency means the per-capita purchasing power funded by gas taxes has decreased drastically. Another thing that doesn't help is that freight trucks keep getting bigger. Pavement damage as a function of axel weight is a quartic function (x^4), and freight trucks are so much heavier than passenger vehicles that all other vehicles combined might affect lifecycle costs and pavement stress analysis at the 4th or 5th digit. I estimated it one time in a previous post, and the per capita funding is somewhere around half of what it was in 1993 while pavement stress per capita has increased.

Over the last 20 years or so, transportation agencies around the country have been responding to this with either tolling or registration fees, and those measures still fall short of what's needed to maintain the road standards of the late 20th Century.

Another thing to consider is that, compared to Florida, two environmental factors make Colorado roads more expensive: mountains and freeze/thaw cycles. Rugged terrain is more expensive at every step of the lifecycle cost of a road, and the erosion caused by Colorado's intense temperature swings causes roads to break down faster too. One winter storm where semis on I-70 have to chain up and crawl up a 6% grade will noticeably cut grooves into the right lane, and pavement laying season is maybe 4-5 months long, 1 or 2 of those being iffy.

IMHO, I-70 being free at point of use is actually among the more impressive feats of civilization. The I-25 corridor from Broadway to Castle Rock is one of the nicest, best designed freeways in the world, and it's used as a go-by around the world. The Central-70 project seems to have the potential to be the same. A lot of the roads here could stand to get maintained more often, and CDOT needs to pay more attention to signal optimization, but overall, it does more impressive work with the money it has than most places.

Those tolling "solutions" are my absolute favorite - the Public-Private Partnership toll road/managed lane con job. Texas has them everywhere. Private business comes along and says "we'll help you build that road faster...but you have to"

• subsidize a large chunk of our construction costs
• let us profit off the road as we see fit with little-to-no oversight or input for 35-99 years
• help us make our revenue goals by ensuring toll lane usage is maximized (e.g. don't build any competing roads that will divert traffic away from our toll lanes)
• pay us if something happens that causes us to lose revenue

"In return we'll give you 5% of our toll revenue. Sweet deal, right?"

Then the supporters of this dumbassery will say things like "only the people who use the toll lanes pay for the toll lanes." False. If the private entity had to pay 100% of the construction costs they wouldn't do it, and if they did the tolls would be so high that nobody could afford to drive on them. Instead, taxpayers pay 30-60% of the construction costs and are the last in line to get repaid. Privatize the profits; subsidize the losses. Lemon socialism.

[COcheesehead]

As a bond holder for C 470, I thank you all for the tax free revenue that helps fund my retirement