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June 25, 2015 03:21 PM UTC

So You Don't Like Toll Roads? Well...

  • 8 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols
U.S. 36 Express Lanes Project.
U.S. 36 Express Lanes Project.

The Colorado Statesman’s Vic Vela has a story up today about the long-term shortage of federal funds for transportation projects, and what that’s forcing states like Colorado to do to provide for the infrastructure needed to sustain economic growth–not to mention keeping your commute from driving you totally insane:

Congress faces a July 31 deadline to pass legislation addressing the country’s transportation needs. But recent history suggests lawmakers will fall short of passing a long-term funding bill, instead opting for yet another stopgap measure.

Over the last six years, Congress has passed short-term transportation funding extensions 33 times.

The temporary funding measures are unsustainable, Mendez said, if Congress intends to repair roads and bridges…

[Deputy Transportation Secretary Victor Mendez] called on Congress to take action on the Grow America Act, a six-year, $478 billion highway funding bill supported by President Obama and Mendez’ boss, Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx.

According to Deputy Secretary of Transportation Victor Mendez, passage of the Grow America Act would bump Colorado transportation funding up 20%, with an even bigger increase for transit projects. As you can imagine, though, the measure is going nowhere in the Republican-controlled Congress:

“There’s difficulty getting it through the Republican House right now, which is sort of par for the course,” said Democratic Rep. Ed Perlmutter, who represents the 7th Congressional District.

The U.S. Senate has introduced a more modest bipartisan proposal, cosponsored by GOP Sen. Cory Gardner, that would increase transportation funds by a smaller amount via a relatively gimmicky incentive for corporations to repatriate overseas earnings at favorable tax rates. Anything would help, of course, but the huge long-term deficit in funding for transportation projects, both to maintain current infrastructure and to provide for the future, is much bigger than what Gardner’s bill would provide for.

But there’s another big difference between the two proposals: the President’s bill relies on provisions that Coloradans may not like, even though they are being embraced by cash-strapped Colorado transportation officials right now. The Grow America Act would significantly ease restrictions on tolling of existing interstate highways, as well as encourage so-called “public-private partnerships” to build new transportation projects. In Colorado, the new U.S. 36 Express Lanes Project is an example of what the future would look like under the Grow America Act–new infrastructure, but at a significant long term cost and loss of control:

The massive U.S. 36 Express Lanes Project is an example of that kind of funding. In fact, it’s Colorado’s first-ever public-private funding partnership.

The $500 million project will bring express lanes, bus rapid transit and a commuter bikeway that will connect Denver to Boulder…

Hickenlooper acknowledged that it might take some time for motorists to accept the reality of having to pay to drive on a metro area highway they frequent. [Pols emphasis]

You’ll recall that the agreement between the state and the private consortium Plenary Roads Denver for the U.S. 36 toll lanes was highly controversial, but under Colorado’s legendary fiscal constraints, and with nothing but stopgap temporary transportation measures passing in Washington, Gov. John Hickenlooper argued successfully that it was the only way to get the project built. Unlike President Obama’s Grow America Act, the bipartisan Invest In Transportation Act doesn’t encourage more such public-private partnerships–just providing a new revenue source for the federal Highway Trust Fund.

Bottom line? President Obama faces enormous obstacles getting any kind of comprehensive transportation funding plan through Congress. The Grow America Act would raise revenue by a significant degree, but would further embrace controversial public-private partnerships and reviled toll roads in order to get there. The real issue here is the lack of political will to raise taxes to properly fund these desperately needed projects, and you can’t really blame Obama for that.

What’s the solution? In the short run, it’s quite possible that Gardner’s bill is the better answer–especially if you oppose the funding gimmicks and private-sector giveaways we’re seeing with the U.S. 36 toll lanes. Obama is doing what he can with the constraints placed on him by a hostile Congress–a situation not altogether dissimilar from Colorado’s artificially cash-strapped reality under the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights (TABOR). But in the long term, legitimizing broad expansion of tolling and Faustian private-sector deals to fund road projects is a troubling prospect.

“No one likes to pay a toll,” [Hickenlooper] said. “Nobody likes it. I can’t stand it. But I also don’t like being stuck in traffic for an hour or two. And right now people don’t want to raise their taxes, so having a tollway is the best way to get this infrastructure built.”

It would be wrong to blame Hickenlooper or other reluctant supporters of the U.S. 36 model for doing what they have to do, since they are making the best of limited resources. To his credit, Hickenlooper has become increasingly vocal about loosening the constraints imposed on our state by the TABOR and other competing constitutional fiscal mandates and limits.

In the end, at least for Colorado, therein lies the answer for building our infrastructure. Depending on what happens in Washington, maybe the only answer.

Comments

8 thoughts on “So You Don’t Like Toll Roads? Well…

  1. Thanks for this, I completely agree re: PPPs. As for Gardner, he's just glomming on to Barbara Boxer's bill. Rand Paul gets more credit for reaching across the aisle.

    1. WOW, you partisan Democrats are ridiculous. Even Colorado Pols gave Gardner a little credit. Why can't you? He's not up for election for years. Are you so blinded by partisan hatred that you can't give him the slightest praise when he does something you want?

  2. It's a shame we aren't willing to publicly fund infrastructure anymore as both Republicans and Dems were willing to do during the days we built the greatest infrastructure in the world with public funds. It's shame what was considered reasonable taxation even under St. Reagan is considered socialist now. Just one more category in which the we're number one crap is a joke. But it is what it is so pols can only do what they can do and we'll have more toll roads and even those won't save us from having infrastructure that the world's only remaining superpower should be ashamed of.

    We used to be the premiere nation of the big accomplishments. Now our elite gets the biggest share of the pie they've ever enjoyed, whines that it isn't enough and we don't aspire to anything bigger than barely keeping our infrastructure from collapsing. A lot of good living in the world's only superpower is doing the struggling middle who are less prosperous with less opportunity for upward mobility and educational opportunity, lower quality health care, less chance of a secure retirement than the middle classes of far less powerful European nations. I guess we should be proud that we're making the world safer and more luxurious for our tiny elite class on our dime while our infrastructure crumbles. But "liberty" and all that. God I hate stupid so called libertarian conservatives more every day.

  3. There is only one presidential candidate who is advocating massive investment in infrastructure. The same one who is the only one who spoke out against the jobs-stealing TPP. That would be Bernie Sanders, #Bernie2016. So regardless of your party affiliation, if you don't want all of our roads to become toll roads then participate in the Democratic Party caucuses (change your party if you must) and support Bernie Sanders.

    1. Thank you Vic. I hope you'll try again running for your district against Buck. You have a lot of ammo, and hopefully with help, have funds to beat Buck with a trout.

       

  4. I wouldn't mind at all if all road became toll roads. Drivers need to pay for their environmental damage, as well as for the mental damage caused by sitting in traffic on their commute. The gas tax is apparently not going to get any higher for some reason, so this is the only way to actually try and change behavior. 

    Obviously it would be nice if they gave us honest bus rapid transit to actually encourage people to switch their transportation routes, but Colorado Democrats are obviously too incompetent for anything that intelligent.

    Look at me, commenting on a 3-week-old thread! 

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