[JayCT]

Originally Posted by Henry10

What happened with "Gas Tax will pay for highways" BS? Where did that money go?

I don't trust CT politicians with any money, period. Yet, we want to entrust them more. So will collect tolls, throw them in the "General Fund," politicians will re-distribute it to their constituents, like welfare, programs, etc. Same-old same-old.

Who will suffer? The working stiffs again. Not only their tax burden is going higher, but drivers have to deal even with increased congestion that tolls indirectly cause.

Report Shows Washington Toll Road Caused Congestion
Independent traffic survey finds high occupancy toll lanes in Washington state increased congestion in the general purpose lanes.
https://www.thenewspaper.com/news/48/4898.asp

Lets start with your first question. Highways are primarily funded by the gas tax. The amount of revenue from the gas tax has been dropping as cars have become more efficient and driving has overall dropped. The gas tax is a fixed amount and has not been raised in MANY years. In fact it actually was lowered a number of years back. This, plus the impacts of inflation, have meant that there is less money to fund our highway system. The legislature has been resistant to raising the gas tax to compensate for the reduced revenue and yet there is an increased need for more money to improve our highways. Implementing tolls is one way to help provide money to fund highway improvements.

Second, I do not trust politicians either, Democrat or Republican. This is why Governor Malloy is also pushing for a lockbox to be set up to protect highway funds. A lockbox would guarantee that funds from tolls and the gas tax would be used only for transportation and not to fund shortfalls in the budget as they have in the past.

You are correct that working stiffs will suffer but so will the wealthy and the poor since tolls do not know who is paying them and does not give different rates for different people.

The article you posted is interesting but what you fail to realize is that I-405 was not a project that added lanes to a highway and used tolls to pay for them, it was a project that took an existing lane and converted to a High Occupancy Tolls lane. The purpose of this was to discourage single-rider vehicles from the highway during peak times. It does not take a rocket scientist to realize that if you take a lane of highway away, it will make congestion worse. In this case, drivers refused to give up driving alone so congestion of course got worse. Connecticut is NOT proposing to do this.

Right now Connecticut is looking to use tolls to make improvements (a.k.a. rebuild and add capacity) to our highways. As I noted above, FHWA has only approved the use of tolls on I-95 from New Haven to New York and I-84 west of Hartford. If the use of tolls is approved for these projects, it will likely mean they will get built faster than if they had to wait in line for funding behind the MANY other projects (like bridge repairs and repaving) that are needed in our state.

If you have a better suggestion on how to handle this problem, then please let us know. Jay

[Henry10]

Originally Posted by JayCT

Lets start with your first question. Highways are primarily funded by the gas tax. The amount of revenue from the gas tax has been dropping as cars have become more efficient and driving has overall dropped. The gas tax is a fixed amount and has not been raised in MANY years. In fact it actually was lowered a number of years back. This, plus the impacts of inflation, have meant that there is less money to fund our highway system. The legislature has been resistant to raising the gas tax to compensate for the reduced revenue and yet there is an increased need for more money to improve our highways. Implementing tolls is one way to help provide money to fund highway improvements.

Second, I do not trust politicians either, Democrat or Republican. This is why Governor Malloy is also pushing for a lockbox to be set up to protect highway funds. A lockbox would guarantee that funds from tolls and the gas tax would be used only for transportation and not to fund shortfalls in the budget as they have in the past.

You are correct that working stiffs will suffer but so will the wealthy and the poor since tolls do not know who is paying them and does not give different rates for different people.

The article you posted is interesting but what you fail to realize is that I-405 was not a project that added lanes to a highway and used tolls to pay for them, it was a project that took an existing lane and converted to a High Occupancy Tolls lane. The purpose of this was to discourage single-rider vehicles from the highway during peak times. It does not take a rocket scientist to realize that if you take a lane of highway away, it will make congestion worse. In this case, drivers refused to give up driving alone so congestion of course got worse. Connecticut is NOT proposing to do this.

Right now Connecticut is looking to use tolls to make improvements (a.k.a. rebuild and add capacity) to our highways. As I noted above, FHWA has only approved the use of tolls on I-95 from New Haven to New York and I-84 west of Hartford. If the use of tolls is approved for these projects, it will likely mean they will get built faster than if they had to wait in line for funding behind the MANY other projects (like bridge repairs and repaving) that are needed in our state.

If you have a better suggestion on how to handle this problem, then please let us know. Jay

Jay: I can post a thousand other articles saying the same thing - tolls increase congestion in untolled roads. In NYC that was a major reason why opponents beat Congestion Pricing plan. What's the cost of more congestion? Where are the greenies on this?

There are solutions and I have provided them here. Capitalism, economic growth will bring more revenues and we can built better roads and bridges. We have done it before. We know how to do it. No secrets. Instead we are accepting the status quo, throwing more good money after the bad.

Who said that future politicians will not raid the "lockbox"? What happened to the Constitutional Amendment for this? Even then I would still have a hard time believing that this time, just this time politicians will change their ways.

Throw these politicians out, then we can talk about more money to them.

[Henry10]

Jay, come to think of it -- remember a couple of years ago the talk about Constitutional Amendment for the "lockbox?" Most politicians didn't want it. Why? Their main objection was that politicians would no longer have the "flexibility" (i.e. free reign to raid) the lockbox. Remember that talk ended with "nothing is off-limits, these are dire times"

[JayCT]

Originally Posted by Henry10

Jay: I can post a thousand other articles saying the same thing - tolls increase congestion in untolled roads. In NYC that was a major reason why opponents beat Congestion Pricing plan. What's the cost of more congestion? Where are the greenies on this?

There are solutions and I have provided them here. Capitalism, economic growth will bring more revenues and we can built better roads and bridges. We have done it before. We know how to do it. No secrets. Instead we are accepting the status quo, throwing more good money after the bad.

Who said that future politicians will not raid the "lockbox"? What happened to the Constitutional Amendment for this? Even then I would still have a hard time believing that this time, just this time politicians will change their ways.

Throw these politicians out, then we can talk about more money to them.

I believe you are confused about the type of tolls being proposed. They would not be toll plazas which do create congestion. They would be Open Road tolls which are gantries over they highway which read transponders in vehicles and charge the driver accordingly. This type of system has been used very successfully in other parts of the country and do not even require vehicles to slow down. The Massachusetts Turnpike has just been converted to this type of system.

I don't blame you for not trusting the politicians. They want to be able to use transportation funds when they feel like it but "other solutions" are not going to solve anything in our lifetime. The transportation funding issue is real and cannot wait for an "other solution" whether you like it or not. Plus how can you support economic growth if our highway system is crumbling or congested? Would a company consider moving to say Stamford, Bridgeport, Danbury, Waterbury or Hartford if the highways serving these cities are clogged with traffic or even worse falling down? I don't think so. Jay

[Henry10]

Jay: I am not confused. I am talking about congestion on untolled roads that tolls create. Not toll plazas. Which by the way have other issues such as toll jammers, but I won't get into those.

People will go into local streets to avoid paying tolls. In NYC communities adjacent to toll electronic readers were very concerned that people would travel thru their residential streets to avoid paying tolls. And as tolls become pricier, motivation to avoid toll roads becomes stronger.

[Henry10]

On my windshield I have EZ Pass and SunPass, which covers entire I-95 corridor in the country. My EZ Pass replenishment threshold is $ 250. So, I am more familiar with tolls than I want to.

[GeoffD]

Originally Posted by JayCT

The Feds has already approved using tolls to fund the widening of I-95 from New Haven to New York.

Why doesn't Connecticut replace all the overpasses and widen the Merritt? 4 lanes each way and modern on ramps/off ramps would be an enormous improvement. While they're at it, they can run high speed rail up the median strip. Is it a rich people NIMBY problem?

[Wilton2ParkAve]

No tolls. CT needs to reign in spending. CT tax revenues in 2015 were $15.7 billion, $12.0 billion in 2007 and $9.0 billion in 2000. Tax revenues are up 74% since 2000 while our population has only added 4.98%. Inflation over the same period was only 30%. Where does it all go????

[HumpDay]

Originally Posted by GeoffD

Why doesn't Connecticut replace all the overpasses and widen the Merritt? 4 lanes each way and modern on ramps/off ramps would be an enormous improvement. While they're at it, they can run high speed rail up the median strip. Is it a rich people NIMBY problem?

The state has contracted Manafort Brothers into renovating and fixing the overpasses on the Merritt. I don't know when that'll begin though. Hopefully this summer.

[htfdcolt]

This is great news, long overdue! Bradley's coming of age...

gov malloy announces launch of nonstop service between bradley and san francisco