Gas taxes don’t cover upkeep for roads

WASHINGTON — Understanding the traffic congestion that smothers most major U.S. cities is a simple numbers game: Since 1960, the U.S. population has grown by 235 million, the number of vehicles on roads has increased by 179 million and they travel almost 2.2 trillion miles farther.

Yet the network of roads to handle those burgeoning numbers grew by just 15 percent during those 55 years. Already lagging behind the demand, and with hundreds of thousands of miles in need of repair, the roads will be asked to absorb a population expected to swell by an additional 100 million in the next 50 years.

“Highways are incredibly important, but we have spent decades trying to solve every mobility need with big roads, and it hasn’t worked,” said Kevin DeGood of the Center for American Progress. “What we need is a system that provides people with real choice.”

DeGood co-wrote a report to be released Wednesday that challenges the status quo in transportation thinking and debunks the belief that highways can pay for themselves while public transit cannot.

“While roads have never paid for themselves, there was a time when user fees covered a larger share than they do today,” he said.

The report arrives at a time when traditional thinking on transportation is under challenge, an era that may be viewed in hindsight as pivotal in reshaping the transportation landscape.

If that becomes its legacy, the moment was born out of necessity. The systems that allow people to get from place to place are pinched between a critical need for fresh cash and a reality that the approaches that have worked for 60 years may not sustain future growth.

Throw into the caldron technology’s proven ability to alter everything, and the stage is set for an evolutionary approach.

“The growth we’re having in this country can’t be met with current resources,” U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx said in an interview this month.

The need for a new source of transportation funding is under discussion in Washington this week, where lawmakers face a May deadline to come up with a plan before current funding expires.

Foxx is preparing an outline for the nation’s transportation future that he hopes will start a discussion on how to shape transportation planning.

“The idea that we’re looking at the system comprehensively is the thrust of this report,” he said. “Transportation is a system of systems. They connect and they’re related. What happens if we mesh these trends?”

Some trends already seem established. People are moving back into cities, and driving has declined by almost 9 percent since 2004. Suburbia, however, hasn’t lost is allure, and projections suggest that much population growth will come in existing urban areas.

In calling for a different approach, the Center for American Progress, founded by John Podesta, a counselor to President Barack Obama and chief of staff to former president Bill Clinton, joins a spectrum of other groups and elected officials in questioning traditional wisdom.

The Eno Center for Transportation last month suggested a shift from the gas-tax-based Highway Trust Fund to a system that draws transportation money from general tax revenue.

“Maintaining the status quo will continue to produce funding uncertainty,” Eno said in a report.

The CAP report says the fund should be renamed the Transportation Trust Fund to reflect an expanded scope that would cover not just highways and transit systems, but railroads, ports and multimodal facilities.

“Renaming the fund would powerfully reinforce the broad mandate of the federal program,” DeGood said. “We need to make smart investments across surface modes, including highways, transit, freight and passenger rail, and multimodal projects.”

He suggests that federal funds should be allocated through a competitive process and that states be granted more flexibility in deciding how money should be spent.

In saying that 40 percent of U.S. roadways don’t generate enough gas tax revenue to pay for their maintenance, DeGood’s report uses that argument as the fulcrum for another.

“In many urban areas, transit, passenger rail, or other multimodal projects are the most effective means of achieving an efficient, economically productive, equitable and environmentally sustainable transportation system,” he writes. “Beyond the issue of funding, transit provides significant benefits for people who exclusively drive, as public transportation lowers roadway congestion.”

He and co-author Andrew Schwartz advocate big-picture “scenario planning” that echoes Foxx’s desire to “focus on the horizon.”

The CAP report says, “Rather than starting with a narrow review of existing transportation assets and lists of project requests from local communities, scenario planning asks more fundamental questions about what a community should look like 10, 20 or 30 years in the future and then works backward to find the appropriate mix of projects to achieve that vision.”

Talk to us

> Give us your news tips.

> Send us a letter to the editor.

> More Herald contact information.

More in Local News

A firefighter stands in silence before a panel bearing the names of L. John Regelbrugge and Kris Regelbrugge during the ten-year remembrance of the Oso landslide on Friday, March 22, 2024, at the Oso Landslide Memorial in Oso, Washington. (Ryan Berry / The Herald)
‘Flood of emotions’ as Oso Landslide Memorial opens on 10th anniversary

Friends, family and first responders held a moment of silence at 10:37 a.m. at the new 2-acre memorial off Highway 530.

Julie Petersen poses for a photo with images of her sister Christina Jefferds and Jefferds’ grand daughter Sanoah Violet Huestis next to a memorial for Sanoah at her home on March 20, 2024 in Arlington, Washington. Peterson wears her sister’s favorite color and one of her bangles. (Annie Barker / The Herald)
‘It just all came down’: An oral history of the Oso mudslide

Ten years later, The Daily Herald spoke with dozens of people — first responders, family, survivors — touched by the deadliest slide in U.S. history.

Victims of the Oso mudslide on March 22, 2014. (Courtesy photos)
Remembering the 43 lives lost in the Oso mudslide

The slide wiped out a neighborhood along Highway 530 in 2014. “Even though you feel like you’re alone in your grief, you’re really not.”

Director Lucia Schmit, right, and Deputy Director Dara Salmon inside the Snohomish County Department of Emergency Management on Friday, March 8, 2024, in Everett, Washington. (Ryan Berry / The Herald)
How Oso slide changed local emergency response ‘on virtually every level’

“In a decade, we have just really, really advanced,” through hard-earned lessons applied to the pandemic, floods and opioids.

Ron and Gail Thompson at their home on Monday, March 4, 2024 in Oso, Washington. (Olivia Vanni / The Herald)
In shadow of scarred Oso hillside, mudslide’s wounds still feel fresh

Locals reflected on living with grief and finding meaning in the wake of a catastrophe “nothing like you can ever imagine” in 2014.

Imagine Children's Museum's incoming CEO, Elizabeth "Elee" Wood. (Photo provided by Imagine Children's Museum)
Imagine Children’s Museum will welcome new CEO in June

Nancy Johnson, who has led Imagine Children’s Museum in Everett for 25 years, will retire in June.

Kelli Littlejohn, who was 11 when her older sister Melissa Lee was murdered, speaks to a group of investigators and deputies to thank them for bringing closure to her family after over 30 years on Thursday, March 28, 2024, at Snohomish County Superior Court in Everett, Washington. (Ryan Berry / The Herald)
‘She can rest in peace’: Jury convicts Bothell man in 1993 killing

Even after police arrested Alan Dean in 2020, it was unclear if he would stand trial. He was convicted Thursday in the murder of Melissa Lee, 15.

Ariel Garcia, 4, was last seen Wednesday morning in an apartment in the 4800 block of Vesper Dr. (Photo provided by Everett Police)
Everett police searching for missing child, 4

Ariel Garcia was last seen Wednesday at an apartment in the 4800 block of Vesper Drive. The child was missing under “suspicious circumstances.”

The rezoned property, seen here from the Hillside Vista luxury development, is surrounded on two sides by modern neighborhoods Monday, March 25, 2024, in Lake Stevens, Washington. (Ryan Berry / The Herald)
Despite petition, Lake Stevens OKs rezone for new 96-home development

The change faced resistance from some residents, who worried about the effects of more density in the neighborhood.

Rep. Suzan DelBene, left, introduces Xichitl Torres Small, center, Undersecretary for Rural Development with the U.S. Department of Agriculture during a talk at Thomas Family Farms on Monday, April 3, 2023, in Snohomish, Washington. (Olivia Vanni / The Herald)
Under new federal program, Washingtonians can file taxes for free

At a press conference Wednesday, U.S. Rep. Suzan DelBene called the Direct File program safe, easy and secure.

Former Snohomish County sheriff’s deputy Jeremie Zeller appears in court for sentencing on multiple counts of misdemeanor theft Wednesday, March 27, 2024, at Snohomish County Superior Court in Everett, Washington. (Ryan Berry / The Herald)
Ex-sheriff’s deputy sentenced to 1 week of jail time for hardware theft

Jeremie Zeller, 47, stole merchandise from Home Depot in south Everett, where he worked overtime as a security guard.

Everett
11 months later, Lake Stevens man charged in fatal Casino Road shooting

Malik Fulson is accused of shooting Joseph Haderlie to death in the parking lot at the Crystal Springs Apartments last April.

Support local journalism

If you value local news, make a gift now to support the trusted journalism you get in The Daily Herald. Donations processed in this system are not tax deductible.