Drivers to see major toll hikes

Link to article here.

Drivers to See Major Toll Hikes
By Dennis Cauchon
USA Today
01-28-08

(Jan. 28) -- From the Golden Gate Bridge to the New Jersey Turnpike, the nation's toll booths are getting dramatically more expensive to drive through.
The sharp increases come as states endure financially lean times triggered by the housing and credit crunch and struggle to find money to maintain or replace vital infrastructure.

Big toll hikes are planned for most of the nation's signature toll roads, bridges and tunnels. The increases would add dollars, not cents, to the cost of passing through many toll booths.


For example, in March, the toll for cars driving on the George Washington Bridge linking New York and New Jersey — the nation's busiest toll bridge — jumps to $8 from $5 during peak hours. Truckers will pay $35, up from $25.
"People view highways as free, but they're not," says Patrick Jones, chief executive of the International Bridge, Tunnel and Turnpike Association, which represents toll authorities. He says Congress' decision to keep the federal gas tax at 18.4 cents per gallon, unchanged since 1993, has led to a greater reliance on tolls.

Some major toll hikes planned:

California: The Golden Gate Bridge will raise its toll to $6 from $5 if a board approves after public hearings. Separately, San Francisco is considering a new $2 toll when drivers get off the bridge.

Indiana: The cost of driving all 157 miles of the Indiana Toll Road will rise in April to $8 from $4.65 for those paying cash. The price will not change for those with electronic i-Zoom accounts.

Massachusetts: Rates for the Sumner and Ted Williams tunnels in Boston rose to $3.50 from $3 on Jan. 1. The money will help pay for the "Big Dig," a $14.6 billion downtown Boston highway project that was plagued by cost overruns.

New Jersey: Gov. Jon Corzine wants to increase tolls on the New Jersey Turnpike and Garden State Parkway by 50% every four years, starting in 2010, and add an extra adjustment for inflation.
New York: The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey will raise tolls on the Holland and Lincoln tunnels and its bridges by $2-$10 per trip on March 2. The state will impose smaller toll increases on nine other New York-area bridges and tunnels on March 16.

Pennsylvania: The state has asked the federal government for permission to add tolls to Interstate 80. The cost of driving the 316-mile road would be $25 for cars and $93 for trucks. The state will increase tolls on the Pennsylvania Turnpike by 25% in 2009, making the cost similar to the proposed I-80 tolls.

"People aren't thrilled by paying tolls, but that's no different than any other form of taxation," says Barry Schoch, a consultant heading Pennsylvania's effort to put toll booths on I-80, which is now free.

"A toll increase is always political melodrama," Port Authority spokesman Marc LaVorgna says. "The decisions are often avoided until the need is desperate."

Perry's corridor a hard-sell; Texans are still saying "NO!"

Jan. 27, 2008, 10:51PM
Perry's Trans-Texas Corridor plan is a hard sell
Officials pitch his proposed road network in packed, skeptical area meetings

By RAD SALLEE and ERIC HANSON
Copyright 2008 Houston Chronicle

Gov. Rick Perry's ambitious Trans-Texas Corridor plan, and his advocacy of toll funding for future roads, hit the skids in a skeptical Legislature last spring. The road shows no signs of getting any smoother as state transportation officials try to sell the plan to Houston-area audiences.

"This will wipe me out," Dee Bond told a panel of corridor advocates at a town hall meeting in Rosenberg last week.

The panel, which included Texas Transportation Commissioner Ned Holmes of Houston and Steve Simmons, deputy executive director of the Texas Department of Transportation, was there to explain and gather comment on a segment of the planned Interstate 69/TTC through Fort Bend County.

"How is this in my best interest?" Bond asked, to a hearty round of applause.

"We don't know where that roadway is going," Simmons replied, adding, "We don't know for sure if that roadway is going to be built."

Diane Coan of Louise, in Wharton County, suggested the decision to build the corridor should be put to the public.

"Why don't we just take a vote? Do we want this road or do we not want this road?" she said.

As proposed, I-69/TTC would run west of U.S. 59 from Texarkana to Corpus Christi, then split and head to the Mexico border at Brownsville and Laredo. Extensions would enter Houston from the north and west to serve the port and area industry.

As envisioned by Perry, the proposed Trans-Texas Corridor would be a network of these broad corridors linking major cities, with toll roads for cars and trucks, rail tracks for freight and passenger trains, and space for pipelines and power lines.

The most advanced of these projects, TTC-35, is projected to run from Oklahoma to Mexico east of Interstate 35, but no construction contracts have been signed for either TTC-35 or I-69/TTC.

Months of hearings to come

TxDOT has designated a consortium led by the Spanish company CINTRA as first in line for TTC-35 work. Two private developer teams are competing for I-69/TTC.At the Rosenberg meeting, another speaker asked if existing highways such as U.S. 59 simply could be widened instead of building the massive superhighway.

Simmons said it is difficult and costly to acquire right of way to expand highways that pass through numerous built-up areas.

"We can't widen 59 without taking a good chunk of the town," he said.

Earlier in the week, similar meetings in Hempstead and Huntsville were jammed with residents and local officials who questioned the need for the project and the motives of its supporters.

The town hall meetings will continue through the month and be followed by two months of formal public hearings on its Draft Environmental Impact Statement.

In Hempstead, corridor opponents reported a crowd of 800, filling the available parking space and the building, causing some residents to be turned away.

The Huntsville meeting drew such an audience that a second meeting is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Walker County Fairgrounds.

The Huntsville Item reported that more than 400 people attended the earlier meeting and that, for safety reasons, some 250 in an atrium could not enter.

At the Rosenberg meeting, which drew about 350 attendees, many wore anti-Trans-Texas Corridor stickers on their shirts or hats. The panel fielded questions from people who had filled out cards before the meeting.

A diverse coalition

Perry, TxDOT and the commissioners say that tolls are the only adequate way to fund most future road projects without increasing motor fuel taxes.Others say that increasing the tax and indexing it to the cost of road building could meet the state's needs indefinitely.

Critics of the idea say that most of the state's highway network is not congested except in cities and that road segments needing relief can be addressed individually.

The first parts to TTC-35 expected to be built are bypasses around Dallas and Austin, both growing urban areas where the interstate is congested.

Besides opponents of tolling, corridor plans have raised hackles with such disparate groups as farmers and ranchers who do not want their land divided, merchants who fear loss of business to new routes and others who oppose trucks from Mexico doing business in the United States, or the long-term leases of U.S. highways to foreign companies.

Developer, not residents, behind push for toll lanes on I-35 in Waco

Link to article here.

Proposal to build new I-35 bridge becomes entangled in toll road debate
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
By David Doerr
Tribune-Herald staff writer

Real-estate developer Rick Sheldon wowed Waco residents in November when he unveiled drawings of an iconic version of the Interstate 35 Brazos River bridge designed to look like the city’s landmark Suspension Bridge.

The new I-35 bridge would serve as a gateway for visitors passing through town and a point of pride for area residents. But after consulting Texas Department of Transportation officials on financing such a project in these lean times for highway expansion, it turns out there is only one way to do it: tolls.

The tolls, which proved to be a point of contention at Tuesday’s Waco City Council meeting, would be used to expand the highway from six to eight lanes between South Loop 340 and Elm Mott. The tolls would be charged only on the added two lanes.

Waco Metropolitan Planning Organization staff proposed the toll lanes in December to address area transportation needs while dealing with significant cuts in state and federal funding. Now it appears the toll lanes will be the linchpin in Sheldon’s effort to update the look of the I-35 bridge over the Brazos.

“There is still a chance that we could do it without the tolls, but it is going to take forever, and I don’t know if I will be real interested in working on it then,” he said. “I’m not going to do it in 10 years.”

Sheldon, a San Antonio native now living in Waco, has proposed developments totaling nearly $1 billion along Lake Brazos, including restaurants, housing, a new near-campus football stadium for Baylor University and a 250- to 300-room hotel. He doesn’t control all of the projects, but he is working to form a partnership to make them happen.

His bridge proposal garnered praise such as “breathtaking” from various civic leaders when it was unveiled. The toll lane proposal initially was met mostly with criticism and derision when it was announced.

But now the two projects are linked together and that could change people’s ideas about both. There won’t be a lot of time to debate their merits if the MPO’s policy board votes Tuesday to remove the toll provision from planning documents it must submit to the federal government in February.

So Sheldon is calling to extend the debate by keeping the toll proposal in the MPO’s plans. The decision whether to go ahead with the projects would be made at a later time.

“I think (the bridge proposal) starts the debate, and that is all I am asking for,” Sheldon said. “Let’s not have the debate for a week, let’s have it for a year. You can always vote to change it (later). All we’re saying is, let’s please don’t preclude this as an option because it really hurts our chances of getting this thing built.”

The rebuilt bridge would not actually be a suspension bridge, but would have beams and cables to suggest the same look, Sheldon said. The aesthetic enhancements would probably cost between $5 million and $10 million, he said.

Richard Skopik, the transportation department’s Waco region engineer, said the only way to finance reconstructing the bridge in the current transportation funding climate would be to add toll lanes. He said the transportation department isn’t planning to replace the nearly 50-year-old bridge unless the toll lane expansion project is approved.

“To add an aesthetic structure, as has been suggested, you could modify the existing bridge, but I think the intent and the vision was to have a brand new bridge that could encompass these concepts,” Skopik said.

However, he emphasized that bridge enhancements would not automatically come with the construction of toll lanes. Funding from other public or private sources would be needed to pay for the features that would make it look like a suspension bridge, he said.

Sheldon suggested that a private company could be found to operate the toll lanes and pay to make the enhancements. However, the Texas Legislature passed a moratorium on such public-private toll projects last year.

Skopik said the proposal is designed for the transportation department to manage tolling operations.

MPO director Chris Evilia has had to cut 13 out of 23 highway projects in McLennan County since transportation officials announced in late September there would be no money to add capacity to the state’s road system after this year.

State transportation officials have blamed the funding crisis on rising construction costs, federal cutbacks and state diversions of declining gas tax revenues.

Even with the deep cuts in the number of local transportation projects, Evilia still is about $11 million short to fund the remaining 10 projects on his list. The projects are designed to expand highway capacity to meet the state’s growing population.

MPO staff estimates tolls would provide up to 40 percent of the funding to expand the highway to eight lanes. Transportation officials indicate state coffers could pay the remaining 60 percent.

Tolls could also generate an additional $5.7 million to $10.9 million that could be used for other transportation projects in McLennan County, according to MPO planning documents.

Sheldon said the paradigm for funding roads in Texas is shifting whether people like it or not.

“For a lot of folks it is wishful thinking,” he said, referring to their aversion to toll projects. “They want things back to how it was in ‘Leave it to Beaver’ time. It ain’t that way anymore. Go look at the Legislature. They haven’t raised gasoline taxes since 1991. Every time it comes up, it’s a nonstarter.”

Frustration with the current transportation funding picture was evident during Tuesday’s Waco City Council meeting in which members were briefed on the issue and the toll road proposal.

Councilman Randy Riggs said it was “almost extortion” to have to choose between adding toll lanes to I-35 and losing funds for other projects in the Waco area. He blamed federal and state lawmakers for not taking action.

“(Expanding I-35) is something that our citizens need and deserve and it should be a state or a federal issue as opposed to a local issue,” Riggs said. “This is just wrong in my mind to say we will help you with your transportation issues if you do what your citizens don’t want done.”

Although most council members expressed frustration about being forced to consider the toll lanes, a majority appeared willing to recommend to the MPO’s policy board to keep the proposal in their planning documents.

City Manager Larry Groth suggested that keeping the toll proposal in the MPO’s plans would allow the transportation department to move ahead with surveying and preparation to expand the highway even if local officials decide against the toll lanes at a later time.

“If we approve this with the tolls in it, we can keep I-35 in the plan,” he said. “That means that the state can continue working on the design, layout and all that other stuff so there is not a delay, and in my mind that means we stay on this track we need to be on.”

Before Tuesday’s City Council meeting, Joe Mashek, MPO policy board chairman and a McLennan County commissioner, said he opposes the toll lanes even though Sheldon’s bridge enhancement project is linked to it.

“They are kind of holding a gun to our head saying ‘If you don’t do this, you aren’t going to get this,’ ” he said. “It’s a no-win situation because most people are against this toll road on I-35.”

Former mayor, councilman arrested for protesting toll hikes, debt

Link to article here.

New Jersey: Public Opposition to Toll Roads Leads to Arrest
Former elected local officials are arrested for opposing toll road plans at a public town hall meeting attended by the New Jersey governor.
The Newspaper
January 23, 2008

Lonegan arrestMiddle Township, New Jersey Police arrested two motorists on Saturday for speaking out at a public town hall meeting against Governor Jon S Corzine's plans to increase the use of tolling i the Garden State. Former Bogota Mayor Steve Lonegan had been standing calmly outside of Middle Township High School dressed in a suit and winter coat. He was surrounded by a handful of sign and pamphlet-wielding toll road opponents belonging to the group Liberty and Prosperity when a local official attempted to convince Lonegan to leave prior to the governor's arrival.

"It's not public property, it's board of education property," the local school board administrator explained. "You're going to have to leave the property."

The administrator walked away when Lonegan said that they had a right to protest a public meeting peacefully and that he wanted to see the board's written policy on the matter. A dozen police officers then insisted that Lonegan move at least one-quarter mile from the school. When Lonegan replied: "Nope," he was handcuffed and placed under arrest. Former Atlantic City Councilman Seth Grossman was likewise arrested for being among those holding signs that read: "No Toll Hikes!!! Repudiate Unconstitutional Debt!"

"I didn't go to Middle Township High School last Saturday to get arrested or to get on TV," Grossman explained. "I didn't even go to protest. Our Liberty and Prosperity group went there to participate in Governor Jon Corzine's town meeting."

Police charged both of the former elected officials with trespassing. The governor's office had described the town hall meetings as "part of the governor's effort to have an open and honest discussion about the state's financial problems in all of New Jersey's 21 counties."

Grossman had been distributing fact sheets that questioned Corzine's statement that taxpayers owed $113 billion in long-term obligations that could only be paid down with asset monetization and toll road price hikes. Grossman's materials claimed that under state law, taxpayers are only on the hook for debts specifically approved by voters, which amounts to just $3 billion.

Hiatt repudiates Bush-Peters toll only mantra

Link to article here.

She Brakes for Ideology
By Fred Hiatt Washington Post
Monday, January 21, 2008

The next time you are stuck in traffic (and when are you not?), you might take a moment to ponder Mary Peters's contribution to the fix you are in.

Peters is the Bush administration's transportation secretary, and her main objective seems to be blocking any increase of public contributions to the public infrastructure. The main reason you are sitting in traffic, she believes, is not that the purchasing power of Highway Trust Fund revenue has been dwindling for the past decade, not that population and freight traffic have been soaring with no government response -- but that you are not being asked to pay enough to use the road you are on.

The rigidity of the administration's ideology became clear last week with the culmination of a two-year study of the nation's transportation woes. A bipartisan federal commission came up with a comprehensive, balanced plan for the next 50 years, calling for maintenance and construction, road and rail, public and private funds.Nine of the commission's 12 members endorsed the report. A majority of the nine were GOP appointees, including commissioners chosen by then-Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R) and then-House Speaker Denny Hastert (R). But three members representing the administration, including Peters, dissented.

Peters acknowledged in her dissent that traffic congestion already is costing the U.S. economy as much as $200 billion a year. She acknowledged that growth in population and commerce is "straining our transportation system as never before," harming productivity, mobility and the environment."We believe, however, that a failure to properly align supply and demand, not a failure to generate sufficient tax revenues, is the essential policy failure," the Bush dissenters wrote. "When consumer demand determines supply, it will engender funding sufficient to meet the demand."This is an astonishingly radical view of government's role in transportation. Cast backward, it would suggest that President Dwight D. Eisenhower never should have built the interstate highway system; it should have been left to private companies to build roads wherever tolling could generate a profit, and nowhere else. The result -- an incomplete, disconnected patchwork of highways -- might indeed have suited Peters, given that another of her goals is a reduced federal role in transportation policy. But the country would have been poorer for it.

Peters is right to stress the importance of private-public partnerships, such as this area will soon see in added lane construction on the Beltway. It also makes sense to have users pay their way, and pay more at peak hours, through congestion pricing, London-style fees to drive downtown and similar mechanisms.In fact, the bipartisan majority endorses all of these. The commission stresses the need to shift from the current pork-barrel, earmark-driven spending to a more rational alignment of money and mission, and it suggests how that might be accomplished. No tax increases will or should be adopted until then, it says.But the rational majority of the commission also understands that the current underinvestment, if continued, will cost lives (see: the collapsed bridge in Minnesota in August), time and economic growth, and that the government has to play a role along with the private sector.

"We're living off investments made 40, 50 -- in New York City, 100 -- years ago," said commission member Frank McArdle, an adviser to the New York state contractors association. Added Steve Heminger, executive director of San Francisco's Metropolitan Transportation Commission: "Now we have aging pains and growing pains."You can see the effect of the Bush ideology in recent reports, as recounted by The Post's Amy Gardner last week, that the administration is yet again looking for excuses to kill rapid transit rail to Dulles Airport. Having jumped through every hoop demanded -- giving up on a tunnel through Tysons Corner, cutting $300 million in costs -- the region finds itself facing another, unexplained roadblock. But if you understand the Bush philosophy, the roadblock isn't so hard to explain: If profit alone -- and not clean air, or joining the rest of the civilized world in connecting airports to cities, or any other consideration -- matters, then Dulles rail no doubt slides down the priority list.
The Peters model might work if the only national interest were maximum efficiency. But if the nation cares about the environment, about staying connected, about balancing roads and rail and transit, then it will have to invest, as a nation, and plan, as a nation. The bipartisan nature of the commission report gives hope that the next administration, whoever leads it, will understand that.

Why the grassroots are ready to run politicians out on a rail...

The House Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) said this today...

“The American people believe Washington is broken. Middle class families see the cost of living rising. They see more and more of their hard earned dollars being eaten up by college costs, health care costs, housing costs, food costs.”

“With all this happening in their daily lives, they're watching the news — and they see politicians in Washington WASTING their money. While families are struggling to make ends meet, they look up and see politicians using taxpayer money to build monuments to themselves ... funding hippie museums ... letting entitlement spending spiral out of control. ”

The price of gasoline and threat of toll roads all over Texas (and the country) are part of what's leading to a cumulative restlessness among the grassroots. It's time for change, this is an election year, this is our opportunity.

Ft. Bend Town Hall packed with corridor foes

Link to article here.

Fort Bend folks don't care for Trans-Texas Corridor either
Friday, January 25, 2008
By Vicente Arenas / KHOU 11 News

TxDOT is finding few supporters for the plan as they conduct a series of town hall meetings
If Texas Department of Transportation officials were looking to gain support for the controversial Trans-Texas Corridor Thursday night, Fort Bend County wasn’t the place to be.

The folks who packed the Rosenberg Civic Center Thursday night were angry.

“This will wipe me out. How is this in my best interest?,” East Bernard resident Dee Bond asked of state transportation officials.

“Why can’t you work with what ya’ll got? Instead of going off in a different direction,” asked Houston resident Doug Bilbrey.

Also online
Copy of proposed route of Trans-Texas Corridor (pdf)Keep Texas Moving Web site, including schedule of upcoming public meetings
TURF, Trans-Texas Corridor opposition group Web site

Most of the 600 people who crowded Rosenberg’s Civic Center Thursday are landowners who are afraid the proposed highway will swallow up their homes and prime farmland that’s been in families for generations.

“If this is gaining so much opposition, do we want this road or do we not want this road?” said Wharton resident Dianne Coan.

The response to the state’s plan was just as hostile in Fort Bend County Thursday as residents in Waller County were the night before.

“I don’t know why they are blowing smoke and tell us what they want this road,” El Campo resident David Coan complained.

The Trans-Texas Corridor, also known as I-69, would have lanes for 18-wheelers as well as space for trains and it would stretch from the border to near Houston and on to Arkansas.

It would eventually criss-cross the state. But no one at the meeting Thursday wanted it.

TxDOT says the highways are needed to help keep up with the state’s booming population and make it easier to transport goods between the U.S., Mexico and South America.

TxDOT told the crowd the highway is still years from being built, but that was little comfort when it’s your land in the crosshairs.

Gas prices changing consumer habits, now's NOT the time for toll taxes, too

Link to article here. Given the information in this study (which common sense already told us simply by looking at one's own shrinking household budget), now is not the time for increasing our cost of transportation by from 1-3 cents a mile under the current gas tax to 20 cents - $1.50 a mile in tolls (that's the range in the current cost of toll taxes per mile around the state).

Gas Prices Changing Consumer Habits
by Jack Loechner
01-25-08

A new study from The Nielsen Company finds that 49 percent of U.S. consumers are reducing their spending to compensate for rising gas prices, up four points from June 2007. 70 percent of consumers are combining shopping trips and errands, and 41 percent are eating out less, and 39 percent staying home more often.

Todd Hale, senior vice president of Consumer Shopping & Insights, said "… Large numbers of consumers eating out less and staying home more… signal a tough year for some restaurants… there may be an opportunity for consumer packaged goods (CPG) manufacturers and retailers to find… growth in… at-home meal solutions and at-work meals."


The survey finds that record-high gas prices likely contributed to 2007's less-than-stellar holiday sales season. Sixty percent of consumers surveyed said they had less money to spend during the holidays due to increased gas prices.

Hale continued… "… our research shows a jump in consumers shopping on the Internet as a way to deal with high gas prices… a wake-up call for manufacturers and retailers alike to step up their ‘direct-to-consumer' efforts and utilize the Internet to communicate directly with consumers in 2008… "

The survey shows that 27 percent of consumers are reacting to gas prices by shopping more at supercenters, or megastores and big-box stores, where more items needed are in one store.

"Nearly a third of households still travel 11 miles or more to a supercenter, and high gas prices will likely reduce the number of quick trips these households make," said Hale.

Twenty-five percent of consumers are using coupons to save money, up from 20 percent in June 2007. Twenty-three percent of consumers indicate they will buy less expensive grocery brands to deal with higher gas prices, signaling a possible boost for private label or store-brand products and lower-priced branded products.

 

"2008 will likely be a challenging year for U.S. consumers and the economy as a whole as we grapple with growing inflation, credit card debt, declining house values - - as well as expectations for gasoline to hit $3.40 by spring," said Hale.

"Manufacturers and retailers need to be alert to the fact that consumers are looking to save by altering where they shop, how they shop and what products and brands they buy. Value, convenience and competitive pricing will be more important than ever in the year ahead.

For more information, please visit, www.nielsen.com

Kens5 News: TxDOT caught red-handed, admit to hiring lobbyists

[This video is no longer available because the YouTube account associated with this video has been terminated.]

Kens5 News, a CBS affiliate, did a fantastic story on TxDOT's illegal hiring of lobbyists. Greg Abbott happened to be in San Antonio yesterday, so perfect timing to get face time with the Texas Attorney General. TxDOT is now on notice with the highest law enforcement officer in the state of Texas. Sadly, Abbott chose the wrong side of this issue last fall when he chose to side with TxDOT against the taxpayer in TURF's lawsuit to stop TxDOT's PR campaign and political advocacy. Let's see what he does now that he knows TxDOT's broken the law!

Opposition to Trans-Texas Corridor growing

Link to story here.

Opposition to Trans-Texas Corridor growing
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
By Rosa Flores and Shern-Min Chow / 11 News

More than 800 people packed a meeting hall in Hempstead for a public meeting on the Trans-Texas Corridor. Seven more public sessions are scheduled.

Residents are speaking out about a controversial highway that would cut right through the state.The state plans to build a 4,000-mile network of super-highway toll roads. In Hempstead on Tuesday, many residents said that road could cost them their property.Odis Styers owns hundreds of acres north, east and west of town. But the traffic that now travels through on State Highway 290 could interrupt his peace.
Also online
Copy of proposed route of Trans-Texas Corridor (pdf)Keep Texas Moving Web site, including schedule of upcoming public meetingsTURF, Trans-Texas Corridor opposition group Web site
Citizens for a Better Waller County

A TxDOT super highway could soon plow through the middle of his property.

“They are talking about going through prime ranch country, prime farm country and that's limited,” said Styers. "I'm in the cattle business and that would put me out of business."

The I-69 Trans Texas Corridor would run from Mexico to Texarkana. Exactly how it will get from Point A to Point B is still up in the air. But a proposed map shows the area the state is now studying.

It’s wide swath of Texas land cutting through Waller County.

“We are looking at a new system to provide us for the next generation of jobs and congestion,” said TxDOT spokesman Norm Wigington. “If we do not do anything that means that there will be congestion. We know that people are coming here in great numbers.”

But business owners already here, don't want to see their town split down the middle.

“It’s going to be like a huge river that's only going to have a bridge every now and then,” said property owner Matthew Menke. “And it's going to isolate certain areas. And where they decide to lay it. We are going to be at their mercy.”

TxDOT officials said the highway won't be different from any other roadway that would be built through a community.

“State law requires TxDOT to build crossings for all state and federal highways and to maintain as many local road crossings as possible,” said spokesman Chris Lippincott. “We are required to work with local officials to identify all roads of significance and create crossings for them.”

Property owners have been asking questions, but, “It doesn't seem like you can find answers from the state reps or the senate,” said Styers.

And so a lot of people who live in this quiet country and starting to make some noise.

Tuesday night, they packed in for a public hearing on the Trans-Texas Corridor. Most gave state officials more than just an earful.

Property owners worry the state will shortchange them on any land it buys, even as TxDOT insists fair market value will be observed.

The Trans-Texas Corridor would eventually include rail lines, toll ways for vehicles, utility lines for water, power and even data transfer.

Opponents, including the Waller County Commissioners Court, say that is a mistake.

Opponents have spent years protesting the proposed network of roads between Mexico and Texas.

They argue the total cost of $125 billion is really to help big business and not the small towns where they live.

“The citizens here are not going to bear the burden so Wal-Mart can get their cargo into the U.S. cheaper and faster,” said Trey Duhon, one of the estimated 800 who packed into the meeting Tuesday night in Hempstead.

Gas-Tax Hikes Only Fuel the Problem

Link to article here.

Gas-Tax Hikes Only Fuel the Problem
In the era of the earmark, it would be insane to entrust any additional transportation dollars to Congress
By Phil Kerpen

The country’s transportation infrastructure has received long-overdue attention in the wake of the tragic bridge collapse in Minnesota. Throwing more money at the problem is the immediate impulse of many commentators and politicians. Unfortunately, highway funding at the federal level is rife with abuse, diversion, and mis-prioritization, mostly because of the practice of earmarking — a method by which politicians steer funds to politically favored projects, regardless of whether they are legitimate priorities.
And until earmarks are eliminated, higher gas taxes in the name of rebuilding our transportation infrastructure would simply throw good money after bad.


The Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956 established the Highway Trust Fund to ensure that revenues from a gas tax and other transportation taxes would be used only to fund the construction of the Interstate Highway System, which was considered a federal responsibility for national defense reasons. The system was supposed to be completed by 1969, at which time the gas tax would sunset. Of course, as with so many taxes, the gas tax not only didn’t sunset, it increased. In 1983 it was hiked from 4 cents a gallon to 9 cents, with 1 cent diverted to the newly-created Mass Transit Trust Fund for projects, mostly in a handful of big cities, that have nothing to do with highways.

Since then, the misuse of Highway Trust Fund dollars has only worsened. In particular, since the passage of the 1991 highway bill, funds raised from motorists at the pump have been diverted to bicycle paths, scenic landscape designs, pedestrian walkways, parking garages, and any number of non-highway projects.

This diversion of highway dollars is a bipartisan problem. One of the worst excesses of the recent Republican Congress was the 2005 highway bill, which diverted more than $20 billion in federal gas-tax dollars to 6,373 pork-barrel earmarks — including the infamous “Bridge to Nowhere,” pedestrian and bike trails, and new park signs. Many of the earmarks were for roads and legitimate bridges. But the very nature of the earmarking process results in the substitution of one lawmaker’s political judgment for the priorities of the state officials on the ground. Even those seemingly reasonable earmarks are not properly prioritized.

The change in congressional control does not appear to have improved matters. The Democratic majority’s first opportunity to set transportation funding priorities came with this year’s transportation appropriations bill. Yet that bill fails to prohibit funding for any of the earmarks authorized in the 2005 highway bill. It also spends an additional $2.2 billion on another 1,400 earmarks, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense.

The evidence could not be clearer: Motorists are not receiving good value for their federal gas-tax dollars. Under these circumstances, it would be insane to entrust any additional transportation dollars to Congress by way of a higher gas tax.

In the best-case scenario, Congress would eliminate earmarks and dedicate existing highway funds to urgent infrastructure needs. But if Congress is incapable of such fiscal responsibility, the federal gas tax should in fact be cut, which would grant states greater control over the maintenance of their highways and bridges.

U.S. Rep. Scott Garrett (R., N.J) will soon reintroduce legislation that would accomplish this goal in a very elegant way. His bill would allow states to opt out of the federal gas tax and raise their own gas taxes with a cent-for-cent offset in the federal tax. States would be permitted to shift as much as 16.4 cents of the 18.4 cent tax to the state level, with a minimum of 2 cents remaining to fund projects that are necessarily federal in scope. This approach would allow decisions on transportation priorities to be made at the state level — far away from political manipulation in Washington.

State transportation systems are hardly perfect, but the federal system is so badly broken that it’s hard to imagine Garrett’s formula not being an improvement. Moreover, shifting power to the states will allow the states to compete with each other and serve as laboratories of innovation.

The federal highway system is rife with abuse, thanks in good part to the political diversion of funds through earmarking. Increasing the federal gas tax in this environment should be off the table, while cutting it should be on. Congress must either demonstrate its ability to administer highway funds without pork-barrel earmarking, or give the states an opportunity to manage their own highway funds.


— Phil Kerpen is policy director for Americans for Prosperity.

TxDOT steps over legal line

Link to article here.

TxDOT toll efforts rapped
01/23/2008
By Peggy Fikac
Express News
Austin Bureau

AUSTIN — A state Senate committee chairman said Wednesday the Texas Department of Transportation may have stepped over a legal line as it pushes the controversial Trans-Texas Corridor and toll roads.
"There is a possibility they may well have crossed a legal threshold because of the restrictions that exist in lobbying by state agencies," said Sen. John Carona, Transportation and Homeland Security Committee chairman.

"The even greater issue is just why they would continue with an agenda that is so unpopular with the public. That is the most distressing thing of all," Carona, R-Dallas, said after an anti-toll activist group released documents obtained from TxDOT in an ongoing lawsuit against agency officials.


The TxDOT documents include invoices from a firm that the agency contracts with totaling $63,450 including lobbyists and a poll, and an e-mail on "draft quotes" sent to local officials for their approval or edits.

The poll was conducted by Baselice & Associates. Mike Baselice also is Gov. Rick Perry's pollster.

Noting a Feb. 5 joint hearing on TxDOT by his committee and the Senate Finance Committee, Carona said, "TxDOT has a lot of explaining to do.

"In this next legislative session, I look to see even tighter reins placed upon TxDOT and the commission by both the House and the Senate, and I think that's regrettable" because it shows a loss of trust, he said.

Ted Houghton of the Texas Transportation Commission, which oversees TxDOT, said he's confident the agency hasn't violated the law as it works to secure resources and inform the public.

"We rely on outside expertise to guide us and help us," said Houghton, of El Paso.

Texans Uniting for Reform and Freedom, or TURF, contends in its lawsuit that TxDOT officials violated a ban on lobbying and on using their authority for political purposes.

The lawsuit was sparked by the agency's estimated $7 million to $9 million Keep Texas Moving campaign to promote toll roads and the proposed highway network, both championed by Perry, who appoints the Transportation Commission. The lawsuit also was fueled by agency efforts to get more state tolling authority from the federal government.

Backers of the corridor and tolls say they're necessary in the face of congestion and insufficient gas-tax revenues. Critics have blasted the potential corridor route and the state's partnering with private firms to run toll roads, which lawmakers sought to rein in last year.

The state agency is holding a series of public meetings on the corridor, and TURF used one as a forum to release the documents.

The documents "show a concerted, premeditated effort on the part of our highway department to directly lobby elected officials, which is against the law. They are pushing a political agenda and legislation that would give them the Trans-Texas Corridor and privatized toll roads and an open door to an endless revenue stream from Texas taxpayers and motorists," said TURF's Terri Hall of San Antonio.

Schlafly: It’s Still the Economy, Stupid

Wonder how free trade, college, and jobs relate to toll roads? Our Nation's so-called "free trade agreements" are the reason why the Trans Texas Corridor is being built and handed over to a foreign company (Cintra) to reap MEGA profits for the next 50 years. China and multi-national corporations want a new trade corridor to ship cheap Chinese goods into the U.S. at Texas taxpayers' expense.

The project requires 580,000 acres of private Texas land to benefit Cintra and China, not Texans. It's the worst eminent domain abuse EVER to befall our country. So in the name of "free trade," we're now sending so many high paying jobs overseas, that the expensive college education you just mortgaged your home to pay for was for nothing. U.S. News and World Report is now suggesting those students take blue collar jobs. This election year we can this to the mantra: it's the jobs, stupid!

It's Still the Economy, Stupid
By Phyllis Schlafly
Monday, January 21, 2008

Bill Clinton was elected president in 1992 using James Carville's slogan "It's the economy, stupid." The Democrats thus capitalized on a temporary economic recession during the last year of George H.W. Bush's administration.

Could 2008 be a repeat performance? The falling stock market, rising unemployment, skyrocketing oil prices, subprime mortgage collapse and the Michigan recession have moved to front and center in the primaries.


Will the Republicans get it? Or will they just keep mouthing their tired mantras about free trade, the global economy, the world is flat, we have to be more competitive, send more students to community colleges and teach more math and science?

Will the Democrats get it, or just keep mouthing their Big Government mantras that we need more taxpayer-paid social services? The liberal New York Times calls on us to "embrace globalization," and to compensate for job losses (which it speaks of with elitist disdain as "dislocations") by extended unemployment benefits, more progressive taxation, tax-paid lifetime retraining of workers, socialized medicine and more income handouts to low-wage workers through the Earned Income Tax Credit.

The private-enterprise system did not cause the loss of jobs. It's the result of bad U.S. policies and one-sided trade agreements that allow foreign governments to discriminate against American workers and products.

It's a very bad U.S. policy to invite millions of illegal aliens to come into the U.S., take low-wage jobs and cash in on the social benefits that U.S. taxpayers generously provide to low-income households (estimated by the Heritage Foundation at a net cost of $20,000 per year).

It's also a very bad U.S. policy to tolerate the H-1B and L-1 racket that is bringing in hundreds of thousands of skilled foreigners, particularly from Asia, to take jobs away from Americans. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, says that the H-1B program is "now replacing the U.S. labor force."

The public is falsely led to believe that only 65,000 H-1B visas are permitted per year to take jobs for which no American can be found. The true figure is closer to 400,000 annually, because the number is increased by an additional 20,000 foreigners who get graduate degrees from U.S. universities, by foreigners who are completely exempt from the count because they work for research, educational or non-profits, and by 315,000 L-1 visas for which there is no cap at all.

The specific purpose of L-1 visas is to allow multinational companies to transfer managers and specialists within the company for a limited time. The high number now issued annually indicates that the multinationals are abusing L-1s as a back door to bring in lower-paid workers, not for a legitimate rotation of managers and specialized employees.

Tata Consultancy, for example, obtained 4,887 L-1s in fiscal 2006. Tata refused to answer questions from the tech journal InfoWorld, which called the H-1B/L-1 racket the fifth-most-underreported tech story of 2007.

Neither the H-1B nor the L-1 foreigners are expected to take permanent jobs or to get residency in the United States. But no one keeps track of whether or not they go home when their visas expire.

We can thank YouTube for posting on the Web a portion of a conference at which immigration lawyers train employers on how to sidestep immigration law. The blunt advice dished out by Lawrence Lebowitz of Cohen & Grigsby was: "Our goal is clearly not to find a qualified U.S. worker. ... Our objective is to get this person a green card."

Lebowitz also advised employers to find a place to advertise for U.S. workers where you will be "complying with the law" but hoping "not to find qualified and interested worker applicants."

Jobs losses are also caused by unfair trade agreements signed by our government that encourage corporations to close U.S. plants and move their production overseas. Chinese laborers, working under slave-labor conditions, can be hired for 30 cents an hour.

In addition to the advantage of cheap labor, our trade agreements permit massive product discrimination against us. Foreign governments are allowed to subsidize the goods they export to us, but are also allowed to impose heavy taxes on goods they import from us.

Free trade was supposed to result in a mutual reduction of tariffs so goods can move freely around the world. It didn't work out that way because our trade agreements do not require a level playing field.

The United States cut our tariffs, but foreign countries substituted border taxes that are just as high as the tariffs they supposedly eliminated. They hide these border taxes under the moniker "value added tax," and it adds up to playing us for Uncle Sucker.

Now that millions of Americans have lost the good jobs they thought had put them on the path to living the American dream, the voters are waking up. Presidential candidates beware: We want to know what you will do to protect American jobs.

Toll roads cited among reasons to move away from the northside


Link to article here.

Toll roads are cited among the reasons to move away from the northside. We've been warning of this for years. To all the skeptics who scoffed....any questions? The homes prices are taking a dive in Stone Oak (which is landlocked by the first two toll projects on 281 and 1604) and other northside areas under the imminent threat of toll taxes. Tolls on a select few neighborhoods are a targeted, discriminatory tax and our poor excuses for elected officials like Frank Corte who voted to TAX their own constituents with this, are to blame when you can't sell your house for what you paid for it!

MLK Day Success Story: East Side Development Boom
Dignowity Hill leads the effort
By Jim Forsyth
Monday, January 21, 2008

The historic Dignowity Hill neighborhood on the city's east side is emerging to become one of the most desirable older home neighborhoods in the city, 1200 WOAI's Berit Mason reports.

Named for Czech immigrant and abolitionist Anthony Dignowity, who came to San Antonio to practice medicine in the 1850s, who built a large home in the rolling hills east of downtown, the neighborhood was the grandest in San Antonio until German settlers starting building along the San Antonio River in the 1870s in what became King William, and it remained a grand area of large homes well into the Twentieth Century.

 
What attracted affluent community leaders like the Friedrichs and the Elmendorfs to Dignowity Hill before the advent or air conditioning were the summer breezes, which blew through the homes' large windows and kept them cool even in the most stifling of 19th Century summers.

Businessman Bill Ross, tired of northside traffic tie-ups, bought a century old home a few years ago and helped start a gentrification trend in the neighborhood, which for forty years has been plagued by crime and has seen the grand old homes cut up into cheap apartments or abandoned altogether.

"This is a prime area," Ross says. "Anybody looking to move back into the inner city, this is great. It's catching on."

Retired homebuilder Byron Sherous is another Dignowity pioneer.

"The neighbors are all taking an interest in repairing and improving their properties," he told Berit.

Ross says when he bought his home for $20,000, it was a former crack house which had been abandoned since being shut down by the cops. He says it is now appraised at more than $175,000.

"Prices are beginning to rise, as they generally do, in a situation like this," he says.

East side Councilwoman and community leader Sheila McNeil says the time is right for east side development.

"The time is right for the east side. We have job opportunities and economic development that we've never seen before," she says.

She points out that $2 billion plus improvements now underway at Ft. Sam Houston, combined with the new jobs coming to Rackspace Managed Hosting at the old Windsor Park Mall, make this prime time for the east side.

Sherous says enough people have now committed to moving into the old homes on Dignowity Hill that some of the 'fear factor' is gone.

"Naturally, we were a little fearful at first, but we had the courage to give it a try," he says.

Ross says his renovated east side home, with it's 'million dollar view' is the just the cure for north siders tired of the sprawl, the overcrowding, and the traffic. He says it also frees him from the looming toll roads on US 281 and Loop 1604.

Sherous says they just may have hit onto something.

"The trend now seems to be that everybody is taking an interest in the east side, and the Dignowity Hill area in particular," he says.

Other major residential developments in the east side include a high dollar high rise condominium development just north of St. Paul's Square.

Perry's Transportation Commission looks to post-Williamson future

Link to article here. Interesting that one of the heroes of the private toll moratorium, Lois Kolkhorst, comes out soundly pro-toll in this article as long as lawmakers and government gets the pot of money.

Toll road agency looking to future
01/21/2008
Peggy Fikac
Express-News

AUSTIN — The death of state Transportation Commission Chairman Ric Williamson, the feather-ruffling toll road champion who left the agency with a sweeping vision and fences to mend with politicians and the public, may change the style of debate over Texas' transportation future.But not its substance.

The five-member commission is appointed, and its new chairman will be named by Republican Gov. Rick Perry, who has made clear that his support for toll roads and state-private partnerships hasn't changed.

"In the days since his passing, there have been calls from some quarters to abandon the forward-thinking initiatives we championed to meet our state's current and future transportation needs. That would be a big mistake," Perry said in response to a national commission's call for higher gasoline taxes and restrictions on states' toll contracts with private companies.

Commission member Ted Houghton of El Paso was blunt about Perry's influence.


"This is the governor's program. If we go in and try to scrap some piece of his program, I think we're going to have hell to pay with our boss, and that's the governor," Houghton said. "He was elected by the citizens, not us. We are an extension of what he believes."

Houghton and commissioners Hope Andrade of San Antonio and Ned Holmes of Houston said they support tollways and private investment as a key part of the state's transportation funding mix.

Despite some lawmakers' support for raising the gas tax, some commissioners suggested that the needed increase would be so large as to be unduly difficult.

At the same time — and while praising Williamson's intellect and drive — commissioners said they want to communicate better with lawmakers after tempers flared last year and the Legislature sought to rein in privately funded toll roads with a moratorium.

As officials work to pave over lingering hard feelings, the Texas Department of Transportation faces the scrutiny of a "sunset" review. Some lawmakers want the appointed commission to be replaced with an elected transportation commissioner.

"We are all committed to reaching out and working closely with our legislative leaders and our communities," Andrade said. "Things haven't changed, other than Ric's not there. We still have the huge issues we need to address."

Holmes said he wants a "working-together kind of atmosphere" with the Sunset Advisory Commission and lawmakers. Still, he said, "We really don't have many choices in how we fund our system, and if we think we can depend totally on the gas tax and the current format, it is woefully inadequate."

Holmes offered a long-term idea that could prove as controversial as privately funded toll roads: eventually taxing Texas motorists per mile driven as opposed to per gallon of gasoline. He said that's likely more than a decade away in Texas but noted that it's a response to cars' increasing fuel efficiency.

Houghton said politics must be balanced against the economic reality, "and the reality of economics is ... we have hit a wall in the state of Texas" on funding growth.

"We need to hone our communication skills with the Legislature," he added.

Lawmakers, while giving Williamson respect, agree that transportation officials need to make changes.

"It is difficult, at least for this senator, to imagine TxDOT's credibility being any lower," said Sen. Kirk Watson, D-Austin, vice chairman of the Senate Transportation and Homeland Security Committee.

Sen. John Carona, R-Dallas, the committee's chairman, said TxDOT needs to listen.

"As one approach among many, public-private toll roads may, in fact, have a place in the overall funding scheme," he said. "The real issue becomes one of listening to the concerns of the citizens and the direction of the Legislature. In that regard, the Transportation Commission has been wrongheaded in the last couple of years."

Carona supports modestly increasing the gasoline tax, tying it to inflation and ending diversions from the highway fund to other state needs. He called private investment the most expensive option for taxpayers because it adds the element of profit.

Perry spokesman Robert Black disagreed, saying cost depends on how contracts are structured, citing companies' up-front payments and officials' approval of toll rates.

Sen. Jeff Wentworth, R-San Antonio, a committee member who has supported a gasoline tax increase, said the moratorium gave lawmakers a "two-year breather" to consider private equity in toll roads. He said the need to smooth TxDOT-legislative relations should be a consideration for Perry in appointing Williamsons' successor.

Sen. Tommy Williams, R-The Woodlands, a committee member, said, "I think he (Williamson) stepped way over the line on that (private equity financing of toll roads). But having said that, I think he saw a problem. He was trying to find the best way to solve that. He came up with a solution. I give him credit for that. I give the governor credit for that."

On the House side, Rep. Lois Kolkhorst, R-Brenham, a private-tollway moratorium supporter, agreed that Williamson highlighted the funding problem "in a manner that probably will never be seen again. ... I told him: 'Ric, in the end, you're going to win. We're going to fund them. Not necessarily the way you wanted them to be funded, but we're going to find a way to fund them.'"

Kolkhorst supports the use of tollways, but not having them "given away for a half a century to private companies."

The search to replace Williamson, who died of an apparent heart attack Dec. 30, "is ongoing," said Black, the governor's spokesman.

The Dallas-Fort Worth area is pushing for the representation it lacks with Williamson's passing. Carona said Erle Nye, a Texas A&M regent and former TXU Energy chief executive and chairman, would be a strong contender.

Critics of TxDOT's implementation of tollways said Williamson's absence will be felt in conjunction with the sunset review.

"TxDOT will most likely have to bend just a little more," said Sal Costello, founder of TexasTollParty.com.

Terri Hall of San Antonio, who leads Texans Uniting for Reform and Freedom, said, "I don't expect any changes until we get a new governor."

But she added, "Very few of these commissioners are going to be willing to take the hits for this governor the way Ric Williamson was willing to do. Most people are only willing to go so far for a friend."

Waco gets hits with proposed tolls on I-35

Link to article here. Now Waco gets hit with proposed toll lanes on EXISTING INTERSTATE I-35! Read the comments we submitted after this article...

Local residents comment on proposed toll lanes
Monday, January 14, 2008
By David Doerr
Tribune-Herald staff writer

Area residents have one more day to get in the last word on a proposal to add two toll lanes to Interstate 35 through Waco.

After receiving 14 submissions, the Waco Metropolitan Planning Organization is accepting written comments on the staff recommendation it made in December to build the toll lanes along the 13-mile stretch between South Loop 340 and Elm Mott. All written comments received by 5 p.m. Tuesday will be submitted verbatim to the MPO’s policy board, which will make the decision on the toll lanes later this month.

Last month, Waco MPO director Chis Evilia announced that cuts in state and federal transportation funding were forcing local road planners to look at toll roads as a possible option to finance highway expansion projects.




Evilia said the MPO was forced to ax 13 of its 23 highway expansion proposals in McLennan County after Texas Department of Transportation officials announced last fall that there would be no money available to add capacity to the state’s road system after this year.

TxDOT officials have blamed the funding crisis on rising construction costs, federal cutbacks, state diversions of gas tax revenues and new restrictions on private investment in toll road projects.

Evilia has said that while state and federal transportation funding is in turmoil, one of the only ways to pay for road construction is through publicly managed toll projects. He expects out-of-towners driving through Waco to be the motorists who most often use the additional lanes and pay the tolls.

The MPO staff estimates that tolls would provide up to 40 percent of the funding to expand the highway to eight lanes. TxDOT officials say state coffers could pay the remaining 60 percent.

Tolls also could generate an additional $5.7 million to $10.9 million that could be used for other projects in McLennan County, according to MPO planning documents.

Evilia said the Waco City Council has requested a briefing on the toll road proposal and the overall highway funding problems during its meeting Jan. 22. He said he hopes the meeting starts a discussion about the local financing of highway projects, such as the expansions of Ritchie Road and Panther Way.

Comments can be hand-delivered to the Waco Metropolitan Planning Organization office at the Dr. Mae Jackson City of Waco Development Center, 401 Franklin Ave. They also can be sent via e-mail to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

__________________________________

TURF Comments:

Tolling an existing interstate highway is a DOUBLE TAX. No matter how the pavement gets re-arranged when "new lanes" are paved down the middle, the taxpayers will be paying twice for the same stretch of road. The controversy surrounding the tolling of existing interstates has recently gone all the way to the halls of the U.S. Congress. In a recent appropriations bill, tolling existing interstates was prohibited in a one year moratorium.

Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison said this:“The purpose of having an interstate system is so that we could have seamless and free transportation into every State of our Union." She also said: "...we are one step closer to protecting Texas taxpayers from paying twice for a highway. I will continue working with my colleagues to push for a permanent prohibition of tolling existing federal highways.”

Congressman Ciro Rodriguez said this: “Using toll roads to double-tax Texans is just plain wrong...The citizens of Texas have spoken and they do not want the federal highways they have already paid for to be converted into toll roads."

Inside and outside Pennsylvania, citizens are up in arms that an interstate highway built with funds from ALL 50 states will be tolled, thereby double taxing not only Pennsylvanians, but ALL interstate traffic without voter approval by the taxpayers.

“I hate paying tolls,” said Anthony Foote. “It eats up my profit. If this goes through, you’ll have a lot of truckers avoiding Pennsylvania — including me.”

Pennsylvania officials plan to build up to 10 toll areas along the 311-mile stretch of Interstate 80 in the next three years to help pay for road, bridge and mass transit projects and subsidies.

The move has sparked a political war between the bipartisan coalition of state legislators who approved the plan and two Republican congressmen who say it is a “shell game,” taking revenue from rural Pennsylvania to bail out the state’s urban areas.

--- The Bulletin, October 9, 2007
_______________________________
"It seems that Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell is pushing a scheme to impose tolls on the Pennsylvania section of Interstate 80.

I'm pretty steamed, too. If Pennsylvanians want to charge tolls on the roads they built with their own money, such as the Pennsylvania Turnpike, that's none of my business.

But I-80 was built with my tax dollars under a program begun by the esteemed Republican president Dwight Eisenhower. Now this Democrat wants to use the road as a cash cow.

Like Rendell, Corzine also flirted with the idea of putting tolls on our sec tions of I-80 and I-78, but Jersey drivers made it plain to Corzine that this was political suicide. So Corzine has to content himself for now with making a buck off our existing toll roads." -- Paul Munshine, New Jersey Star-Ledger, August 16, 2007

No one argues that I-35 is the primary north-south artery in the state of Texas and that it needs new capacity. However, let's examine the the proposed funding. If only 40% of the project is toll viable and the state of Texas needs to subsidize the rest of it with public money, the project is not a self-sustaining toll road thereby making toll lanes on I-35 a TRIPLE TAX (one tax paid for what's there today, then more public money to subsidize the project, and a third tax, toll tax to drive on it). This is horrific public policy!

Then, TxDOT has made known that NO NEW projects will be let in 2008 and likely 2009. So makes the Waco MPO believe that the money being promised in matching funds will ever come to fruition? The Waco MPO and City Council ought to carefully consider the source of the promises that have been made to them by TxDOT. This is the agency who enticed the Capitol Area MPO (CAMPO in Austin) into casting a politically controversial vote in FAVOR of toll projects only to yank the funding a few months later (Austin American Statesman, Dec. 17, 2007). TxDOT cannot be trusted.

The Texas Transportation Institute study shows we DO NOT Need a single toll road in the State of Texas to meet our future transportation needs. All that's needed is a simple indexing of the gas tax. TxDOT didn't like those conclusions, so it tries to dismiss the report as "flawed." Also, a State Audit report last year showed that nearly HALF of TxDOT's supposed "funding gap" figures (the amount of money for road project that the gas tax can't cover) are pure fiction. The Governor even admitted in a news article in September of 2006 that the "funding gap" was based on a wish list, not needs (Austin American Statesman, August 20, 2006).

We have been hearing a steady cry for accountability and sanity to be injected back into transportation policy, not just in Texas, but the country. Taxpayers and voters see the staggering rise in fuel prices with no end in sight and can't fathom how a new tax on driving can be squeezed out of the family budget. The cost of transportation is going up at a faster rate than people's ability to pay it. TxDOT's own studies have shown toll road aren't even financially viable at $3 a gallon for gas. We are at that price today, so public servants ought to take a step back and ask themselves why are they promoting a financially unsustainable approach to transportation.

When the cost of transportation increases, it HURTS the economy. Even those who don't take the toll road will still pay for it through the higher cost of goods, not just in Waco but throughout the state since most Texas goods and service providers use I-35. The decision you will make effects motorists and taxpayers far beyond Waco. The vast majority of citizens are not even aware of the proposed toll lanes on I-35. There have been NO TxDOT public hearings or any reliable means for seeking public comment prior to the MPO's vote.

There has been no small uprising over tolls on existing corridors all over this state. Show courage and do what's right by the taxpayers and say "NO" to tolls on I-35 and elsewhere. Every project with such sweeping costs and consequences ought not to be approved without a vote of the people.

- Terri Hall
Founder/ Director
Texans Uniting for Reform and Freedom
A non-profit grassroots group defending Texas taxpayers from unaccountable new toll taxation and the Trans Texas Corridor

Study advocates tripling the gas tax; says privatized toll roads NOT the answer

Link to AP article here. This sure seems like more scare tactics or grossly overstated "needs." There is NO WAY the American taxpayers can afford a tripling of the gas tax when wages haven't gone up appreciably in 10 years and rising fuel costs are already eating a hole in the family budget. Let's get some more realistic figures.

We agree that privatized toll roads are the MOST EXPENSIVE OPTION and therefore need to be OUT OF THE MIX. But when the Texas Transportation Institute found merely indexing the gas tax to inflation is all that's needed to meet our future road needs, it's tough to believe a tripling of the federal gas tax is anything but BOGUS! When the last highway bill in 2005 had 6,000 earmarks and the recent appropriations bill had over 9,000, we DO NOT LACK FUNDS, we lack politicians with fiscal sense and accountability.

Transit Panel Urges Gas Tax Increase

Jan 15, 3:36 AM (ET)
By HOPE YEN
Associated Press


WASHINGTON (AP) - A special commission is urging the government to raise federal gasoline taxes by as much as 40 cents per gallon over five years as part of a sweeping overhaul designed to ease traffic congestion and repair the nation's decaying bridges and roads.

The two-year study being released Tuesday by the National Surface Transportation Policy and Revenue Study Commission, the first to recommend broad changes after the devastating bridge collapse in Minneapolis last August, warns that urgent action is needed to avoid future disasters.


Under the recommendation, the current tax of 18.4 cents per gallon for unleaded gasoline would be increased annually for five years - by anywhere from 5 cents to 8 cents each year - and then indexed to inflation afterward to help fix the infrastructure, expand public transit and highways as well as broaden railway and rural access, according to persons with direct knowledge of the report, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because the report is not yet public.

The report also calls for rebuilding and expanding the national rail network to meet a growing demand for alternatives to congested highways.

Continuing to apply patches to the nation's aging infrastructure is "no longer acceptable," and without dramatic changes, "the nation's system of transportation will further deteriorate," according to the report, portions of which were read to the AP.

But the 12-member commission's proposals, which are expected to cost $225 billion each year for the next 50 years, face internal division. The commission's chairwoman, Transportation Secretary Mary Peters, and two other members oppose gas tax increases and were issuing a dissenting opinion to the report calling instead for private-sector investment and tolls.

The gas tax has not been increased since 1993, and recent efforts by Congress to raise it have faltered over the objections of the Bush administration. The tax increase being proposed is designed to take effect in 2009, after President Bush leaves office.

The commission was formed by Congress in 2005 to study the future needs of the nation's surface transportation system, which includes roads, mass-transit systems, ports and rail lines - as well to recommend funding options.

The report comes as state governments and several business groups, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers, are calling on the federal government to raise gas taxes to pay for substantial transportation improvements. The Minneapolis bridge collapse, which killed 13 people and injured about 100, spotlighted the decaying infrastructure and drew new calls for additional spending.

The Bush administration has said that raising taxes won't cut congestion and creates additional risks for congressional pork, such as Alaska's infamous multimillion dollar "Bridge to Nowhere," which has been scuttled.

In its report, the commission unanimously agreed that measures of accountability were needed to keep watch over state and federal spending.

Besides Peters, the two commissioners opposing a tax increase are Maria Cino, Peters' former deputy who is organizing the 2008 Republican National Convention, and Rick Geddes, a Cornell University professor who has served as a senior staff economist in the Bush administration on the President's Council of Economic Advisers.

---

On the Net:

National Surface Transportation Policy and Revenue Study Commission:

http://www.transportationfortomorrow.org

Transportation Department: http://www.dot.gov/

TxDOT announcing "podcasting" as new way to deliver pro-toll propaganda

Link to article here.

January 11, 2008

"Keep Texas Moving": your highway dollars still at work
By Peggy Fikac
Houston Chronicle/Express-News, Texas Politics blog
Undaunted by a lawsuit filed by toll-road activists, the Texas Department of Transportation is moving right along down the road with its multimillion-dollar Keep Texas Moving campaign.

The state agency today announced a weekly podcast will cover "a wide variety of statewide transportation-related topics," including an interview with Texas Transportation Commissioner Ted Houghton on an upcoming round of town hall meetings in the Interstate 69/Trans-Texas Corridor project study area.

The Keep Texas Moving campaign plan outlined last year in a memo by the agency's Coby Chase (and obtained by your favorite Austin bureau) included efforts directed at TTC-69, so the plan appears unchanged by the lawsuit mounted by Texans Uniting for Reform and Freedom.

The lawsuit contends the $7 million to $9 million campaign violates a state prohibition on state officers or employees using their authority for political purposes.

"I think it's just another avenue where they're propagandizing to people," TURF's Terri Hall said of the podcast initiative. "It may sound great, new and exciting. Remember, it's our taxpayer money that's going to that."


The state agency contends it's a response to calls by lawmakers and the public for more information.

"There are a lot of ways to get information about TxDOT and transportation issues in Texas, but our podcasts are a good way to get that information directly from us," said Larry Krantz, the podcast host, in the TxDOT news release.
_______________________________
The TxDOT news release:

To Capital Press Corps: Jan. 11, 2008
TxDOT podcast program features transportation issues

AUSTIN -Texans have a new way to stay informed on statewide transportation issues: The Texas Department of Transportation Podcast Program.

TxDOT, through its www.KeepTexasMoving.com Web site, is offering a weekly podcast covering a wide variety of statewide transportation-related topics.

"There are a lot of ways to get information about TxDOT and transportation issues in Texas," said TxDOT's Larry Krantz, the podcast host, "but our podcasts are a good way to get that information directly from us."
The statewide podcast is part of TxDOT's efforts to find new ways to communicate transportation issues.

Each statewide podcast episode is a weekly talk-radio-style audio program downloadable from the Internet. Statewide podcasts will be less than 10 minutes long and feature an interview with an expert in a transportation-related field.

Five episodes of the statewide podcast are currently available, including the most recent episode in which Krantz spoke with Texas Transportation Commissioner Ted Houghton on the upcoming Town Hall Meeting tour, which kicks off next week in Texarkana and proceeds throughout the I-69/TTC project study corridor.

"The Town Hall meeting concept is totally different from our outreach effort for TTC-35," Krantz said. "The episode with Commissioner Houghton sheds some light on how feedback from the public has shaped - and continues to shape - the way we do business."


Krantz has also interviewed TxDOT's Randall Dillard about former Texas Transportation Commission Chairman Ric Williamson, who died in late December, Dr. Joseph Giglio, a college professor and author of several forward-looking books on the future of transportation, for an episode entitled "They Assume the Future Will Look Like the Past," and TxDOT's Deputy Executive Director Steve Simmons on why the I-69/Trans-Texas Corridor study area is so large.

For Krantz, who started the nation's first state-sponsored transportation podcast in TxDOT's Tyler District in June 2006, the challenge was a good opportunity to see if a statewide podcast could have a broad appeal.
"My little Tyler District podcast got some 5,800 hits last month alone," Krantz said. "That's not bad for something that's never been advertised commercially. Hopefully the statewide podcast will be just as successful, but on a larger scale."

Find the statewide podcast at:
http://keeptexasmoving.com/index.php/podcast
Find the Tyler District podcast at:
http://www.dot.state.tx.us/news/tyl_podcasts.htm
All TxDOT podcasts are also available on iTunes, search keyword:
txdot.

Trans Texas Corridor TTC 69 hearings make Businessweek


Link to article here.

Meetings begin in Texas toll road plan
By MICHAEL GRACZYK
Associated Press
Businessweek
January 14, 2008
The biggest construction project ever attempted in Texas comes under public debate beginning Tuesday in the first of a series of town hall meetings about a proposed 4,000-mile network of superhighway toll roads.

The Trans-Texas Corridor, or TTC, as it has become known, was initiated six years ago by Gov. Rick Perry. It has rankled opponents who characterize it as the largest government grab of private property in the state's history and an unneeded and improper expansion of toll roads.

Texas Department of Transportation officials and Perry have defended the project as necessary to address future traffic concerns in one of the nation's fastest-growing states. They also say the project is vital because of insufficient road revenues from the state gas tax and the federal government.

"This state has to look outside the box and the traditional ways we've been doing things the last 50 years," Perry spokesman Robert Black said.

The TTC would crisscross the state -- for the most part roughly paralleling existing interstate highways -- with up to quarter-mile-wide ribbons of separate highways for cars and trucks, rail lines, pipelines and utility lines. The cost of the project has been estimated at approaching $200 billion, and it could take as long as 50 years to complete.


In what the agency says is an unprecedented step, department officials were heading to Texarkana on Tuesday in northeast Texas for the first of 11 meetings over the next four weeks to answer questions about the project.

Backers of the TTC already have been accused of backroom political dealing, mounting a propaganda campaign and caving to foreign ownership.

"We really are getting ripped off," says Terri Hall, of San Antonio, who heads TURF -- Texans Uniting for Reform and Freedom. The group is suing the transportation agency, alleging its promotional campaign violates a ban on state officials using their authority for political purposes.

"Once people really understand all that's going on, and what's at stake, it really does have massive, massive implications," she said.

The first phase of the TTC, envisioned as part of a superhighway stretching from Oklahoma to Mexico, was planned by the Cintra Zachry consortium. It's composed of Cintra Concesiones de Infraestructuras de Transporte SA of Spain, one of the world's largest developers of toll roads, and Zachry Construction Co. of San Antonio.

Its legal representative is the firm of Bracewell & Giuliani, the home firm of GOP presidential candidate and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who counts Perry among his supporters.

The Spain-based company would get to operate the roads and collect tolls. State officials insist the land and road would continue to be owned by the state like any Texas road. They also say they have an obligation to make the best deal possible for financing regardless of the address of the contractor.

Hall argues elected officials in the counties affected by the project have "sold out to the road lobby" and succumbed to courting.

And Sal Costello, whose Austin-based Texas Toll Party has been opposing the TTC, speculated transportation officials should expect a cool reception at the meetings, which he said he won't attend.

"These meetings will change nothing," he said.

Some 580,000 acres will be needed for the project, primarily in rural areas that will take "some of the best farmland in the state," says Texas Farm Bureau spokesman Gene Hall.

"The fact of the matter is, every highway in the state of Texas was once private property somewhere," Black said. He noted there was opposition in the 1950s to the vast Texas farm and ranch road system and the interstates of the 1960s.

"A thousand new people are coming to the state every day," he said. "Our population will double in roughly the next 40 years. Our current transportation infrastructure cannot meet that challenge."

Other meetings this week were planned in East Texas for Carthage and Lufkin, both areas in the path of the long-anticipated Interstate 69, one of the proposed legs of the TTC. It would run from the Mexico border in far South Texas, skirt the Houston area and into East Texas toward northwestern Louisiana.

Besides I-69, the Trans-Texas Corridor as proposed also would include new superhighways that parallel existing Interstates 35 and 37, major north-south routes through the center of the state, and I-10, the 800-mile main east-west artery from Orange to El Paso.

An environmental study for the I-69 project undergoes a separate scrutiny at public hearings starting next month. The series starting this week is designed to focus more on the overall TTC project.

Trans Texas Corridor TTC-69 comment period extended

The TTC (Trans Texas Corridor) is one of the controversial, massive new tolled trade corridors under the control of foreign companies. At the Town Hall Meetings, TxDOT tried to “sell” the public on a controversial privatized, tolled trade corridor from Laredo to Texarkana. TxDOT requested proposals from two private consortiums, Cintra and Zachry, of course, who will not only build, but also buy the rights to control one of our country’s trade routes.
In documents uncovered through TURF’s lawsuit against TxDOT for using taxpayer money to promote toll roads and the TTC and for illegally lobbying elected officials, TxDOT’s response to the overwhelming opposition to the TTC 35 project is to hire a PR agency to convince the public foreign-controlled toll roads are a brilliant idea. TTC 69 plans to convert existing highways into privately controlled toll roads, making Texas taxpayers pay twice for the same stretch of road.

The TTC-69 comment period has been extended. Texans should submit comments to keeptexasmoving.com or mail them to I-69/TTC, P.O. Box 14428, Austin, TX 78761.

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