In This Issue

	Berkshire Lawmakers Fight Gas-Tax Plan
	Commission to Recommend Higher Gas Tax, More Tolls
	Legal Issues Threaten Road Plans
	Minnesota Drive for Transportation Amendment
	AZ Rail Faces Early Opposition
	Governor Issues $8.1M for Major Kapolei Roadway
	Fearing Congestion, Court puts Annexation on Hold
	Study: Cost of Transit Higher than Housing for Some
	Nevada DOT asks for $1.38 Billion

Berkshire Lawmakers Fight Gas-Tax Plan

BOSTON – Legislators in Berkshire, Massachusetts have vowed to defeat a proposed 9-cent-per gallon increase in the state gas tax, saying the average residents are already being gouged at the pump. The proposal is expected to be released by the Transportation Finance Commission next week. It would increase the gas tax and reinstate tolls in Western Massachusetts in order to fund desperately needed transportation improvements throughout the state. The 13-member commission was created by the legislature in 2004.

“It’s mostly the rural district in the state, and my constituents are heavily dependent on their vehicles. Some have to drive 25 miles to get a gallon of milk,” said Rep. Denis Guyer, D-Dalton. “My fear is that the majority of the benefit of a gas-tax hike would go to transportation improvements in the eastern part of the state.”

He also said the removal of the western turnpike tolls was part of a deal made by Western Massachusetts legislators because they were concerned their constituents should not have to pay for the Big Dig when they derived little benefit from it.

Federal transportation funding cuts and Big Dig cost overruns have pushed back several maintenance projects and made the tax increase imminent, said Transportation Finance Commission member Mike Widmer. “I understand that this is politically very difficult,” he said, “but political leaders would pay a major price if they turned their back on this problem.”

Commission to Recommend Higher Gas Tax, More Tolls

BOSTON – The Transportation Finance Commission is expected to recommend a 9-cent-a-gallon gas tax hike and the reinstatement of some tolls in Massachusetts to help fund the state’s transportation costs, according to the Boston Globe.

The prominent state commission also plans to vote to turn over Interstates 84, 291, and 391 to the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority in order to institute new tolls in the western portion of the state.

Several members of the commission said the state needs more revenue to adequately fund its highways, mass transit, and other transportation infrastructure. “With declining federal revenues and the cost of the Central Artery, the state must find additional revenue sources to maintain and expand its highways and mass transit,” said Michael Widmer, president of the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation and a member of the commission in support of the tax increase.

The 9-cent increase could produce more than $270 million per year. The commission was still evaluating how much new tolls should be and how much revenue they would generate. The commission is also likely to recommend that the Turnpike Authority’s ability to impose tolls be extended indefinitely, rather than ending as planned in 2017.

Two stories out of Massachusetts with opposing views on the outcomes of the commission. We run both today because this is the discussion that occurs in nearly every state where revenue distribution does not seem fair between rural and urban citizens. Truth is, technology exists to make the tolls in western Mass different for residents of the area than for others thus taking some of the sting out of the toll portion of the proposal for them. TW

Legal Issues Threaten Road Plans

Washington - Politicians in Washington are hoping to ask voters next year to increase the car tab fee and sales taxes in order to raise $10 billion for transportation in Snohomish, King and Peirce counties. Elected officials are struggling with legal complications from the state legislature that forces voters to approve both measures for either to pass.

The problem began when politicians initiated two competing traffic-solving tax districts: the Regional Transportation Investment District and Sound Transit, both of which cover the areas in the three counties. Lawmakers wanted to combine both agencies’ tax proposals so voters would only have to make one decision about transportation.

That was fine for Peirce and King Counties, because the taxing areas are the same for both RTID and Sound Transit. However, in Snohomish County, Sound Transit is confined to the county’s southwest urban interior.

Projects on Highway 9 and the U.S. 2 trestle are where the Snohomish County wants to spend most of the $1.5 billion from the RTID tax package if it passes. However, this is difficult because these roadways are now outside the Sound Transit tax district. Officials believe voters may be confused by the way the linked ballot measures will appear.

Minnesota Drive for Transportation Amendment

ST. PAUL, Minn. – Authorities in Minnesota are pushing backing a constitutional amendment that would force the state to spend more money on transportation after a national report ranked the Twin Cities as the fifth worst in the country for congestion among similarly sized metro areas.

Currently, motor vehicle taxes paid by residents are split between transportation and the general fund. If the amendment passes, all of the money will go to transportation. Supporters have unveiled a major advertising blitz to endorse their cause.

An ad from Minnesotans for Better Roads and Transit says, “Doesn’t it make sense to dedicate the sales tax we currently pay on cars and trucks to improve roads and transit all across Minnesota? That will provide $300 million a year without raising taxes.”

Opponents of the plan argue that those millions are coming from other important programs such as health care or education in a tough budget year. They say the transportation financing problems are partly because lawmakers haven’t raised the gas tax – a major road funding source – since 1989.

“That’s not magic money. That’s a $300 million pothole in the general fund,” said Mark Steffer of Education Minnesota. “That’s the fund that pays for health and human services, education, and every other state expense.”

AZ Rail Faces Early Opposition

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. – An anti-rail scholar is voicing his opposition to light rail in Scottsdale even though the possibility of transit in the city is still years away. Randal O’Toole, an Oregon-based anti-rail economist who has dedicated his career to fighting light rail, came to Scottsdale to speak at an international meeting last Saturday.

Local anti-rail activists brought O’Toole to the city to strengthen their, yet, unspecific campaign, even though the City Council isn’t expected to make a decision until next summer. Currently, city transportation officials are studying high-capacity transit options along Scottsdale Road, including light rail, streetcars, and buses.

“In most cities, buses are just fine,” O’Toole said. “By the time you get to the point where you really need high capacity transit, you’ve surpassed the point where light rail makes any sense at all – you need to go to things like subways, and there are very few places in this country where that makes sense.” He claims he has never seen a proposed light rail system that will relieve traffic congestion for a reasonable price.

O’Toole has achieved varying degrees of success in his battles in Minneapolis, Denver, Orlando, Atlanta, and Marin County, California. However, he did not actively oppose the 20-mile line scheduled to service Phoenix, Tempe and Mesa starting in late 2008.

Supporters of the Scottsdale line say the construction could be used to redevelop south Scottsdale, and possibly link Arizona State University’s main campus in Tempe with the proposed SkySong Technology complex at Scottsdale and McDowell Roads.

Scottsdale has a history of opposing transportation projects which, in the end, service their community. The Loop 202 Freeway was to be partially built in Scottsdale but was so vigorously opposed that it was constructed ½ mile east on the Pima Indian Reservation. Commercial development along the corridor has been phenomenal and all that tax revenue from the Scottsdale residents who shop there goes to the tribe and not to the city. On anther note-how does one become an anti-light rail scholar?! TW

Governor Issues $8.1M for Major Kapolei Roadway

Hawaii - Hawaii Governor Linda Lingle released $8.1 million for construction of the North-South Road. Work on the next major piece of the long-term development of East Kapolei is expected to begin in mid-2007 and be completed within two years.

A total of $80 million is the state’s part of the project, which is 80 percent funded by the federal government. The road will supply another desperately needed access to eastbound H-1, and will become the main road for the University of Hawaii-West Oahu campus and the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands residential and commercial developments.

City Councilman Tod Apo said the North-South Road is “a huge piece for the planned development” of Kapolei. He also said the number of planned roadway projects in the area indicates that the government is catching up with putting in the infrastructure to keep up with growth.

Rod Haraga, the state’s transportation director, said the road will be designed for six lanes – three in each direction – but only three will be built until more funding is available. Several city, state, and private projects, including the North-South Road, announced recently are being fast-tracked to provide faster relief to traffic problems in the metro area.

Fearing Congestion, Court puts Annexation on Hold

Texas – Last Tuesday, Court Commission members put a local development annexation on hold in Fort Bend County in Texas on hold last Tuesday pending the assurance that permanent traffic problems will not be the result of the building. Officials from an entity called Tax Increment Reinvestment Zone No. 2 and the Pearland City Manager Bill Eisen plan to develop 457 acres near F.M. 518. One-hundred-sixty-nine acres of the parcel are in Fort Bend County, and the rest lie in Brazoria County.

The property would become part of the existing TIRZ and would allow Shadow Creek Ranch Development Co. to expand its Shadow Creek Ranch development, adding 1,120 homes and an additional 614,000 square feet of commercial development, according to court documents.

County Judge Bob Herbert and Precinct 4 Commissioner James Patterson want to be assured that F.M. 518 will be extended to State Highway 521 so that traffic from the new development could travel east to the South Freeway, a main route to Houston.

TIRZ representatives signified that an agreement regarding the 518 extension would be brought before the court in the future; once it has been resolved whether TIRZ tax money could fund “all four lanes” of the project. Herbert and Patterson say they support the annexation, but they want assurances written into the agreement showing how the 518 improvements will be paid for before signing off on it.

Study: Cost of Transit Higher than Housing for Some

CHICAGO – Some Americans who move to rural parts of the country to find affordable housing end up spending more of their earnings on transportation than they do for their homes, according to a recent study by the Center for Housing Policy.

The nonprofit organization that represents urban planners, developers, and other groups analyzed 28 cities. Families earning between $20,000 and $50,000 a year spent an average of 28 percent of their incomes on housing and 29 percent on transportation.

“Often they’re fringe communities, and they’re far from everything. They end up using up whatever they’re saving on housing, and then some, on transportation costs,” said Barbara Lipman, research director for the center. “Part of this is a consequence of economic vitality where people are commuting to their jobs.” Families earning under $35,000 and living in distant suburbs spent 37 percent of their incomes on transportation.

Households in New York City, where 31 percent of commuters use public transit and 8 percent walk or bike to work, spent $7,880 on transportation annually. On the opposite end of the spectrum, in Kansas City, Missouri, where 93 percent of commuters drive their own vehicle to work, transportation expenditures were $10,872. By comparison, all U.S. households spent an average of 27 percent of their earnings on housing, and 21 percent on transportation.

Nevada DOT asks for $1.38 Billion

Nevada – The Nevada Department of Transportation has requested $1.38 for its two-year budget from the governor and Legislature. Deputy Director Robert Chisel told the transportation board that the amount meets the limit of no more than twice this year’s budget as set by the governor. He told the board, headed by the governor, that two-thirds of it goes directly toward critically needed transportation projects throughout the state.

Construction costs amount to $470 million per year under the plan using highway funds from gas taxes and bond revenue. The proposal adds another $135 million in bonds, to make $1 billion in bonds to build roads vital to Nevada’s growth, Chisel said.

Chisel said that because inflation has increased construction contract prices, the proposed budget allows for $80 million in maintenance of roadbeds and bridges.

The largest chunk of money - $256.88 million – for fiscal year 2007 will go to numerous large projects in Clark County along Interstate 15 and Highway 95 in southern Nevada. Construction in western Nevada includes building the next section of the Carson Freeway from Highway 50 south to Fairview Drive. The projected $64.7 million project is scheduled to go to bid by the end of the year.

We teamed with HW Lochner to assess Nevada’s transportation plan and examine how best to proceed forward as part of the Governor’s Blue Ribbon initiative on transportation finance. The needs in Nevada are legitimate and compelling. TW