Traditional interest-group politics is a numbers game, with the benefits going to groups or regions who have the most voters and political clout. Hence the Legislature has gotten away with making Mass. Pike tollpayers pay a disproportionate share of the Big Dig costs because there are more voters who don’t pay Pike tolls regularly than who do.
But, as I argue in an oped in Sunday’s MetroWest Daily News,there are liberal values that should play into the discussion. Liberals care about having enough revenue to provide essential government services, but they should also care about how that revenue is raised. They should embrace the principle that the burden of paying for government services should not fall unfairly on one class of citizens or on one particular region.
Let tax-phobic conservatives look for gimmicks like privatizing services and selling naming rights in state parks to raise revenue. Let them partner with race track operators and slot machine vendors to prop up the state budget with the profits of addiction.
Liberals should get behind honest tax increases and equitable user fees. A gas tax, which hits every driver regardless of the road he or she uses, is far more fair than tolls – and a whole lot cheaper to collect.
The Pike tolls equity argument is familiar here in MetroWest, but doesn’t get much play in the Boston-centric media. With a vote coming this Wednesday over whether to increase Pike tolls, I hope more people can be brought into the discussion.
Isn’t this a case of “Socialism for you, capitalism for me”?
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A report came out today saying that the transformation of Massachusetts’ economy from manufacturing to knowledge-based occurred at the expense of the so-called Gateway Cities. In other words, the Boston area did very, very well, and other areas lagged behind.
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You seem to be proposing that it should be a liberal philosophy to socialize costs. But gains weren’t socialized. And when you look at what happened to transportation-related projects across the state, you will see that they all but ceased because of the Big Dig.
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You want the entire state to pay for the Big Dig, a project that mainly benefits the Boston area. I think a better description here would be “externalizing costs”.
If everyone who used the Big Dig had to pay tolls, it might be considered fair, but 90 percent of the Pike riders who pay tolls don’t touch wheels to the Big Dig. And most of the people who benefit from the Big Dig – South Shore commuters, downtown real estate interests, Tom Menino, etc., don’t take the Pike and don’t pay tolls.
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As for “socialism for you, capitalism for me,” that applies more to the tolls on the Pike west of Rte. 128, a section of highway that has long been built and paid for. Those tolls aren’t supposed to pay for the Big Dig, just the maintenance of the western Pike (with $8 million a year diverted to the state police budget). In that case, we have a shared road maintenance burden for every highway except one, with those who depend on the Pike forced to pay a user fee on top of their gas taxes.
WBZ has a report that Deval estimated $114 million in revenue from the western tolls. So if it is as you say about 8 million for maintenance then we’re also going to need to replace another $100 million somewhere…
You misunderstood my reference to the $8 million. Here’s how I understand the numbers being bandied about. Keep in mind we’re only talking about the western Pike, which is what the toll-removal plan involved.
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That section of the Pike brings in $114 million a year in tolls, but it costs something like $43 million to collect the tolls and run the Pike Authority. Another $8 million goes to the state police budget (Pike riders pay their state troopers twice even before they get ticketed). So only about $63 million of the $114 million collected actually goes toward maintaining and plowing the highway.
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You just claimed a statistic. I’m guessing you got it from the PIFMA source (you’re butt).
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I agree with you on the concept of eliminating the tolls and raising the gas tax, but making up numbers in this very measurable debate is foolish. The numbers exist, allowing this debate to be very quantitative. There’s no sense in muddying it up with made up statistics — even (especially!) if your intention wasn’t to do so, but just to imply “lots of” or “many.”
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That being said, the miles of road per person is much higher out in Western Mass. Sure we’ve got more roads near Boston, but orders of magnitude more people. So, why should the people in Boston pay a higher gas tax rate when, in fact, people in Western Mass are costing more in road dollars per capita in the first place? Shouldn’t they be paying more per gallon of gas, since their roads are more costly per gallon of gas sold in the area?
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On another note, the gas tax is an approximation for a use tax. Cars which use more gas each year tend to be driven more, so that’s a positive correlation. Furthermore, cars which weigh more tend to do more damage to the road and use more gas, so that’s another positive correlation. But, it isn’t perfectly correlated and linear, and therefore not perfectly “fair.” It’s a dang good estimate, and very cheap to measure and apply — but it isn’t fair in absolute terms, and it completely ignores the very realistic future of alternative fuels, including electricity and natural gas. I think it’s the best system available when weighing closeness of approximation and ease of implementation & accuracy, but it isn’t fair in the truest sense.
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So like I said, I agree with the concept of getting rid of the tolls and raising the gas tax to cover the entire revenue minus cost of the tolls, at minimum. Personally, I’d love to see the lege tack on another penny or two per gallon to fund more public transit, rail-to-trail, and other non-petroleum, non-traffic inducing, non-parking space taking modes of transportation. My fear: they get rid of the tolls and don’t make up the entire difference through auto-related fees and taxes, and therefore subsidize auto & driving costs, which is terrible public policy.
Wny lose that revenue? Besides, we are doing a terrible job maintaining our other roadways.
If you replace the tolls with a state-wide 9-cent gas tax increase, the switch is revenue neutral. Though more of it may come from Massachusetts residents, the highway budget doesn’t care where the money comes from — it’s all green and folds. So there isn’t any revenue lost.
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I’d also be greatly interested in this report — just looking at all the traffic I zip past on the train in the morning makes it hard for me to believe this factoid. I’d believe the converse more likely — 70% in-state, 30% out-of-state. Got a cite?
There’s no way that more than 2 out of 3 cars on the Pike are out of state. No freaking chance. Next time you’re on it, do an informal survey. Read license plates. Sure, it’s biased (time of day and day of week) but it’d be interesting. I’d be surprised if you got 15 out of 50, including trucks.
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It is true that some of the money is coming from out of staters. Many of those out of staters also have to stop and buy gas — and would be paying the “toll” then. Furthermore, all those out of staters who fly into Boston and rent a car and drive all over the place would then be being “tolled” too, as would all those out of staters who drive out to the Cape from RI/CT/NY via the aforementioned gas tax.
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As a not-very-often driver, is the Pike in better condition than other highways such as 95, 93, etc?
I do see many many Connecticut and New York, etc plates in Hampden and Berkshire and Franklin Counties – I remember reading the article but could not find it. If I do, I will post.
…requiring federal gas taxpayers–including those in Massachusetts, New York and California–to pay for building the Interstate highways through the cornfields and cow pastures of Nebraska?
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At some point, the implied “I don’t want to pay for it because I am not going to personally benefit gets to be a bit overbearing.
I have no problem with my gas tax money being spent to maintain roads in Nebraska, or in western mass, or Interstate 95 or 93, or Rte. 6 on the Cape. I just don’t understand why the gas taxes I and everyone else pay can’t also be used to maintain the public road I drive on.
My comment was not directed to your’s, it was directed to “nopolitician”‘s comment way up there.
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This reliance on trying to observe indenting to determine who is responding to what, with the obvious confusion, is a real problem.
That’s the question, up the gas to replace the pike tolls.
Ch. 90 is exclusively for local public roads and cannot be used on the Pike.
When are people ever going to get this in their (dense) heads…
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Without Boston, Massachusetts would be a helluva lot worse off – including Western Mass. Boston may benefit you guys less than it benefits me, but the point is it benefits EVERYONE – yet was so costly that no one region of the state could be asked to pay for it. The cost has to be shared, just as the benefits are.
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Massachusetts is so prosperous because of greater Boston. Without Greater Boston, there’d be very little difference between Massachusetts and Maine or Vermont in terms of opportunity, prosperity and culture. There wouldn’t be an Amherst, there wouldn’t be a Boston… there wouldn’t be much of anything.
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I’m not trying to say Boston is the be-all-end-all, because it isn’t. However, it’s the only really big city in New England and is the driving force of our entire economy.
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PS: You don’t see me complaining about anything I help pay for – via tax dollars – in Westfield or other W. Mass cities.
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Whoa for a minute. Get off that high horse. I think you need to get out more, or at least stop relying on state politicians for a view of this state. Massachusetts exists beyond 495. Talk to people in Pittsfield, North Adams, Greenfield, even Springfield/Holyoke/Chicopee. We’re benefiting more from Hartford than Boston out here — we’re so much an afterthought to Boston that Connecticut wants to build a commuter rail to us, and Boston is hemming and hawing about a mere $25 million project to extend service to Western MA.
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The history of Western MA is not tied to Boston. This region grew because of North-South trade down the Connecticut River, it did not grow by trading with Boston, instead it grew by moving its goods south to New Haven.
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And before you start throwing around that “tax dollars” thing, let’s discuss things like sales tax, lottery revenue, and corporate taxes on the only Fortune 100 company in the state — Mass Mutual. Maybe, just maybe once all is said and done, the Western part of the state isn’t getting subsidized after all.
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If the Big Dig only benefited South Boston, then we were sold a bridge to nowhere. That project was supposed to be for the Boston economy, so it only makes sense to have the Boston economy pay for it. It is an awfully big cop-out to say, “hey, why isn’t this cost spread out among the whole state, not just us” after the project has been completed.
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Keep in mind that the entire state is already annually paying to clean up Boston Harbor, via the $25 million MWRA subsidy in this year’s budget (and in past budgets too). Justification? Because ratepayers were mad at increases in their water/sewer fees. Sure. Angry ratepapers are a great, fair, and just reason to socialize those costs.
I said,
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However, that said, a prosperous, big city really does have a trickle-down effect. People have jobs in the city, but often live in the suburbs. Therefore, the suburbs suddenly have more potential for jobs too, be it in the service sector or businesses moving to the suburbs and out of the city. Furthermore, with the large population base around the city, there’s lots of cultural opportunity – be it the Opera House or the North Shore Musical Theater in Beverly.
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However, while New Haven certainly contributed to the development of Western Mass, Greater Boston certainly had its role to play too. Even if it didn’t, though, extremely important things in Western Mass are funded in great part through tax dollars collected all across Massachusetts, such as the state colleges – ie Westfield State, UMASS Amherst, etc.
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My only point is that while the whole state should have to help pay for the Big Dig, the whole state should also have to help pay for a railway into New Bedford, a general improvement in the infrastructure of Springfield, etc. etc. etc. I don’t consider myself “Boston-centric.” The vast majority of the past 5 years of my life have been spent in the South Coast; it’s where I’ve lived. However, I also recognize that the South Coast – just like Western Mass, Cape Cod, etc. etc. etc. are all interconnected with Greater Boston, at least insofar as we all share a tax base and depend on each other for big projects that each section of the state alone couldn’t afford to pay for.
Again, this smacks of “socialism for you, capitalism for me”. Why are benefits localized, expenses socialized? And why change the rules of the game now, after it was sold the other way? Especially since every city and town has already sacrificed in the way of fewer transportation projects so the Big Dig could be funded?
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The state helped build the MassMutual Convention center in Springfield. They also instituted a higher hotels tax in Springfield, Chicopee, and West Springfield to help pay for it, and set up some kind of “special finance district around the Civic Center to capture other tourism-type taxes for the project.” Why didn’t the state just socialize the costs of that project?
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If you’re so gung-ho on socializing costs, then perhaps you’d be game to pick up the tab to correct sewer overflows in Springfield, Holyoke, and Chicopee? We’re all paying higher and higher sewer fees out here to fix problems created a century ago, shouldn’t the state pick up the tab for that one? They’re making me pay for the Boston Harbor cleanup in the form of a $25 million annual subsidy towards the MWRA budget.
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And while you’re at it, Springfield was given a $52 million loan to help get out of financial trouble. How about socializing the cost of repaying that one? After all, we’re all scratching each others backs now, right? We’re not pointing fingers at who had cost overruns, who polluted the Harbor, or who elected leaders that ran their city into the ground, right?
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I’m really curious to know if you think our $52 million loan repayment cost should be socialized across the state, and if not, why? (Not others, just Ryan).
and I tend to agree with you. I wonder though, are there additional inside-495 examples where the state treated those towns/cities similarly to S/H/C?
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In other words, I think the state could stand to do more for S/H/C in those examples — but I also suspect that someone with knowledge of Boston suburbia/urbia could cite examples similar to those within 495, and I’d be sympathetic to those too.
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Clearly the Pike isn’t charging Boston area people to use a Boston area improvement, at least not very well. What would you propose? A gas tax increase within 495 only? Personally, I wouldn’t be opposed to that, so long as the differential between outside 495 and inside 495 was only a few cents, so as to not create an enormous arbitrage opportunity, resulting in inefficient driving around to pay less for gas.
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(and I know, I’m not Ryan)
First, again, I reject the notion that we’re localizing the benefits. It ignores two things: one, that everything we do has a large impact, even on areas that we never travel through. Secondly, that while certain projects may help one area in particular, other projects will help other areas too. There’s always a necessary balance, one that often isn’t met, but that doesn’t mean you throw the baby out with the bathwater.
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Most importantly, everything works in moderation. I’m not saying that local areas shouldn’t pay their fair share, too. In fact, if you look at it, in the vast majority of cases they do. Usually, when the state or federal government doles out money, they rarely give total grants. Typically, the money they do give only pays for a certain percent. For example, when Swampscott (the town I was raised in) built a new high school, the state agreed to reinburse about half the cost – meaning, the town had to pay the other half and all the costs up front.
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That means the burden is shared – and that’s a good thing. A town like Swampscott couldn’t build a new high school if it had to pay for the whole thing all by itself – as it was, taxes went up by about a thousand dollars a year for residents after the prop override to pay for the building.
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Similarly, the burden for the Big Dig should be shared too. However, it isn’t as easy to share it with such a large infrustructural project with the tools this state has available. In a normal situation, a town would pay for part of a transportation project, but clearly Boston couldn’t afford to pay the whole thing – and the project wasn’t really built for Boston citizens anyway, so it would be unfair to make them pay for it.
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You can’t exactly pick towns and cities in the area to pay for it, for a number of reasons. First, it would be impractical. Who would you ask? How far out from Boston should it be? Secondly, everyone is going to use the Big Dig at some point – thus, they have a responsibility to pay for it. Furthermore, even if one doesn’t use it, surely they benefit from it too – whether it’s because their co-workers use it, or it helps diffuse traffic in other areas of the city, there are myriad reasons why it benefits everyone.
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Tolls aren’t practical and, as a land of people who get to vote about how we’re taxed, we can choose better – more progressive – options. Since everyone who drives benefits from it, I think a gas tax makes sense. It especially makes sense if people are suggesting that the Mass Pike tolls should be taken down, for many of the same reasons. Taxing gas is relatively progressive in this day and age, when less expensive cars really are – for perhaps the first time ever – the more efficient ones (Civics, Focuses, Carollas, etc.)
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Furthermore, the Federal Government – necessarily so – put up a considerable portion of the funds. Since the Big Dig hugely benefits Boston – and Boston is an important American city that the country relies on in several ways – it was probably a good investment. Clearly, the federal government understands the importance of investing in infrustructure because what happens in one area at least indirectly benefits almost everywhere else.
Who said the Big Dig only helps people in Southie? I haven’t heard anyone – except for you – say that. The Big Dig is how I visit home from school. ’93 runs right through it; the Ted Williams is also a part of the project. It’s how a lot of people get to the Mass Pike. The Zakem bridge (also part of the project) is now the face of Boston on almost all forms of TV media, from pictures of Boston on the big games to talking heads on CNN from the city.
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There are lots of things that don’t help me one iota, yet you don’t see me complaining when tax dollars are invested in it. The point of collecting taxes for infrastucture is to pool resources. If each locality had to pay for its own bridges, roads, etc. all by their lonesome then the American infrastructure would be about as advanced as Iraq. If everyone had your attitude, America would be stuck 50 years in the past.
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That just doesn’t make any sense. The road that my friend lives on in Chicopee is a dead end road with five houses on it. Should only those five houses pay for it, since it only benefits the economy of those living in those five houses? It’s an extreme example, but you get the point — we spread taxes out throughout the state because we are interconnected. We have representation that approximates our population, and also approximates our contributions in taxes. Sometimes one town or region is ahead, sometimes its behind.
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Western Mass has far more miles of road per person than inside 495. Yet, I’ve never heard someone from Western Mass to offer to pay more in road taxes/fees because of this inequity.
The magnitude of the Big Dig project puts it above all others, in my opinion. It’s a real hot-button issue with a lot of people, because it consumed (and continues to consume) a lot of money that used to go elsewhere, and the benefits of that road are very highly localized. It’s hot button to me because it symbolizes the Boston-centric view that the state government possesses.
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I think that when we want the state to pay for something, we have to do a fair analysis on socialization of costs. Often times it makes sense, but sometimes, when there is a reasonable charge mechanism, and when there is highly localized benefit, it does not.
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How about this proposal — do people support a fully socialized form of auto insurance, where your city or driving record don’t matter, everyone gets charged the same? Or how about a variation, where your driving record matters (some), but other than that, everyone would pay the same from Dover to Cambridge to Lawrence?
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I doubt that people would rally behind that form of socialization. Why? Simply because most would pay more, not less. So why rally behind the socialization of Big Dig costs currently borne largely by people going into the Boston area. Sure, not all is, and not everyone pays, but since the tolls are localized to the Boston economic area, it’s certainly less unfair than spreading those costs to people in North Adams, Williamstown, Greenfield — people who Boston thinks are in another state.
insurance is optional. It’s regulated, but it’s optional. I don’t carry auto insurance, and neither does my wife.
We don’t own cars. We choose to live lives (location of housing, choice of employment, etc) that don’t require car ownership.
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That being said, and upon further reflection, so is both Pike tolls and gas tax. Interesting. Still, insurance involves a third party, and a for-profit one at that — so it does muddy things up a bit.
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I’m not sure if I completely buy your comments about magnitude though. While the magnitude of the state’s contribution to the Big Dig is quite a bit, the magnitude difference of the Boston metro with Western Mass is also significant. The four western counties of Massachusetts make up 14% of the state’s population — about 1/7th. I’d bet dollars to donuts that those four counties have more than 1/7th the miles of road. Furthermore, I’d be shocked if those four counties account for as much as 1/7th of total tax payments in the state (personal income, corporate, etc).
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Bottom line: I’d be in favor of removing the Mass Pike tolls and replace them with a two tier gas tax — one inside 495, the other outside 495 (or some other approximate boundary). The two conditions would be that (1) the tax differential couldn’t exceed 3 cents, and (2) that the total increase in tax revenues more than covers the total (revenue – cost) value of the tolls that are eliminated. Condition (1) is necessary to eliminate massive arbitrage opportunities, and condition (2) is necessary for “pay-go” and to prevent non-drivers from subsidizing drivers, since driving has detrimental externalities.
I think all this discussion is great. I’m glad it moved off the original premise of “we should socialize turnpike costs just because that’s the most fair thing to do”. That argument doesn’t hold much water with me, because we’re not applying the rules for socialization evenly. As such, the suggestion was just an attempt to get liberal support for an issue using a liberal frame, but the underlying goal seems not to be economic justice, it seems to be simple cost avoidance.
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The big problem I see is that Massachusetts is too parochial, too divided, perhaps our towns are even too small. We are finally starting to undergo regional projects, but “regional” often means that the benefits are regional, but the costs or impacts are local. A highway gets built cutting through a community, the entire region uses it, but the community it cuts through gets no benefit. Or, as is being proposed, a casino is built in a community, the revenue goes to the state, and the city gets a few peanuts but has to deal with the economic damage caused by it on local businesses.
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Homeless shelters are a great example, they take people off the streets of an entire town, or even an entire region, but their location and upkeep is usually paid by a single town, and the impact of the shelter, including the wandering of the homeless during the non-shelter hours, is very localized. Localized impact, regional benefit. That’s not socialism, that’s called externalization of costs. And most often, the group having the costs foisted on them is the least powerful (which translates to least wealthy).
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If we’re going to talk in terms of economic justice, then I think that the cost of a huge boondoggle of a project in the wealthiest corner of the state should be borne by the wealthier people that this project benefited, not by the average Joe across the entire state who will never drive one inch on the road. I agree that the Turnpike isn’t a perfect proxy for this, but it’s a better proxy than spreading the costs evenly.
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By the way, check the distributions of federal transportation dollars. I did some quick analysis a few years ago, and if I recall correctly, the dollars spent in Western MA were lower than the proportion of population in Western MA, never mind the number of roads in Western MA. Again, the dollars are following the power, not the need.
already pay the lion’s share of the state’s tax revenues–because that’s where the jobs and businesses are:
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One traffic correspondent’s opinion:
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“Metro West travelers have probably experienced the greatest benefit related to the Big Dig. Getting to and from Logan Airport is significantly faster these days. Yes there are still delays on the EB Pike approaching the Xway and South Station ramps. But travelers heading to Logan no longer have to make that excruciating trip up the NB Artery to the Callahan.”
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http://my.thebostonc…
Much of this came to the forefront in the waning weeks of the Governor’s election. Romney had pushed for removing tolls in the western part of the state. It did start discussions and friends from the right talked about the roads already being paid year ago. The question; why are we still collecting tolls? I agreed that collecting tolls to pay for salaries for toll collectors is something that can do without. But the issue is that the tolls also paid for road maintenance. If we no longer collect tolls then that revenue stream will need to come from somewhere. I asked if they were willing to pay a higher state tax to remove the tolls, the answer “No”. Well, do roads plow themselves during snow storms? We receive $114 million in additional revenue from those tolls. I do think the answer is a gas tax, it is the only fair replacement of revenue.
johnk I think you have got it right. Many of those that argue for the elimination of the tolls do not want an additional tax on anything to provide for maintenance. They believe that the money for the roads should come from general revenue. This won’t work. If you think the roads are poorly cared for now imagine if highway repairs had to fight for a priority out of general revenues.
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I presume it could be easily calculated how much revenue would need to be raised to offset the elimination of tolls. My next question would be how would you convince the Legilature to RAISE TAXES by voting for an increased gas tax?
The effect of the gas tax on those of us who live in urban areas is quite different from its effect on rural citizens for whom trips to the grocery store, work, and school are longer. Likewise, a gas tax will make a number of transportation-related businesses more expensive. Long-term, both of those effects can be good because they will create a big market for fuel efficiency.
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Aren’t there unintended side-effects of raising a gas tax? How large are they? Do any cry for mitigation?
but not always the right conclusions.
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I have no idea what the actual numbers are, but it seems to me that you’re using miles driven as a metric for gas used — but there’s another metric to be considered too: time spent in the car.
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The grocery store may be closer, but if there are more stoplights in between, it may take more gas to get there, find parking, and get home.
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Ultimately, the driver has so much control over how much gas he consumes that I’d bet that the concerns you raise are second order. MPG ranges from 8 to 50. Driving well (easy on gas and brake) can save 10-20%. Keeping tires inflated can save another 5-10%. Combining trips and buying in bulk to eliminate recurring trips saves too. Living closer to work saves oodles. These are all factors that drivers can control in the short, medium, and long term. Until gas prices are high enough that we really see a wide section of the population exercising these kinds of control, I’d argue that the few extra cents per gallon of gas tax (on the order of 1-2%) are a marginal issue.
I question whether this would affect rural residents so adversely as to require mitigation — or not.
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I don’t pretend to understand these issues well enough to claim to have an opinion. Certainly, too, there is a difference of scale between rural Massachusetts, even northwestern Massachusetts, and rural California, Utah, or Wyoming.
But then you have to answer the question, “should we mitigate for residents who live ‘out in the country'”? Because can’t that also be called “subsidizing sprawl”?
There are some economic functions, like producing cow’s milk, that it’s hard to do in Somverville or Arlington.
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I always want to know about unintended side-effects of taxes, regulations, incentives, and similar government instruments. As I’ve commented before, many things are so worth doing that they are worth the inefficiencies and even the minor inequities that they create. Evaluating that just means asking the questions.
Looking at this from another angle is macro-economics. Having toll-booth operators does not add anything to the economy, as they do not create or produce anything. Having tolls on the Masspike is one of the many things that makes our state less competetive.
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Although I raraly use the Masspike, I am ready to share the cost through increased gas-taxes. Note that the total cost of the Masspike is going to be lower if there are no tolls. And while you can call the toll a “usage fee”, ultimately, it comes out of the same pockets of the people of Massachusetts.
Replacing tolls with the gas tax increase is good for many reasons:
Economic: Don’t have to pay for toll collection.
Environmental: Starting/stopping, traffic caused by toll booths is bad for the environment.
Driving: A gas tax generally discourages driving and encourages public transit in the entire state.
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This is true sometimes, but anti-true other times. When there is ‘the right amount’ of traffic on a highway, tolls actually reduce the total amount of environmental impact. Why? They space out cars efficiently, so that (a) they can all move at about the same rate which reduces the need to press gas and brake along the entire stretch, and (b) they provide an opportunity for vehicles to safely and efficiently get around the slow poke in front of them.
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So, while often your environmental claim is correct, it is also often not correct. For more information, read up on queueing theory.
I’ll have to add that to my reading list.
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If you ever had to sit at the Sturbridge tolls on a Friday night there has to be some savings there when the tolls are eliminated.
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Any facts on how much energy wasted and pollution caused by a car moving 3 miles in 45 minutes?
Add it to your list of fields from which to get a Ph.D. It’s generally not even approached much in an undergraduate degree* because it’s so damn complex and requires such advanced math.
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This field is super hard in ideal situations — no less “real world” situations. As for how much energy is wasted… that problem is quite hard. If the tolls weren’t there, it’s entirely possible that the (now no longer spaced in a specific, predictable way and probably spaced more tightly) would actually suffer from a worse traffic jam downstream. I agree, it defies basic logic — but I’ve seen both theoretical, modeled, and live video of how spacing cars (with something very similar to toll booths) can actually reduce total traffic (time to destination) because it dramatically reduces the probability of a standing wave downstream.
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Like I said, it isn’t always the case that this works out to the system’s favor, and I’m certainly not claiming that the optimal number of toll booths are in operation at any point and time — merely pointing out the very real scenario where toll booths really do actually reduce average total system time (average time to get home from work).
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But the problem that you have is that, if people have other alternatives that are cheaper–such as town streets, they’ll be more likely to use them instead of the more expensive alternatives. That was one of things noticed in West Newton when the tolls were removed there. And Route 9 through west Wellesley and Natick has become a nightmare in the evenings. And it’s gotten so bad that it is even spilling over into downtown Wellesley (Rt. 16).
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It isn’t quite as simple as application of simple queuing theory.
It’s never “quite as simple.”
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But seriously — how much queueing theory have you studied? Do you know enough queueing theory to be able to tell the difference between “simple” (M/M/1, M/M/s), and complex (M/G/s/K/N) queueing theory? Or, are you just spit balling?
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I ask because I know quite a bit of queueing theory, and am a Ph.D. candidate in Operations Research. While my work uses very little queueing theory, I’ve taken my share of Ph.D. level courses and covered lectures for my advisor, a queueing specialist.
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In short, while there is always differences between theoretical results and applications, queueing theory does a good job modeling the behavior of vehicles in tollbooth situations, going as far back as Schwartz 1974 and as recent as Huang and Huang 2002.
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But instead, just rely on your personal myopic experience in traffic and pshaw the experts. You know best.
I skimmed the Huang and Huang paper, read the basic model and looked at the graphs mostly, but it didn’t seem to support your idea you were putting forth, as the toll booths only increased the average travel time except in a key range of densities, from my quick look through. Don’t know anything about the field, but looks very interesting (I’m a computational statistical physics PhD student, doing cell biology-ish stuff right now).
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that often toll booth make the average trip time increase, but they sometimes make the average trip time decrease. I made that point to counter a claim that toll booths always have a detrimental impact on environment (idling, wasted gas, etc).
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I’m not claiming toll booths always make things better, and I wouldn’t make that claim. I’m just claiming that, environmentally, they don’t always make things worse. Huang & Huang agree.
… queueing theory does a good job modeling the behavior of vehicles in tollbooth situations
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but what you seem to ignore is the fact that I was referring, not to tollbooth situations, but to situations in which people go to measures to avoid getting into tollbooth situtations because of the cost, in terms not only because of delays at the tollbooths, but also in because of the increases in the money that is expended in encountering tollbooth situations.
Queueing theory and systems analysis allows for items to leave and re-enter the system in different points. The models do account for people “driving around the tolls”. Are they perfect? Nah. Are they pretty good? Yip. Mostly because side roads have miserable throughput compared to interstates, and so those who do go around represent a (relatively) small amount of vehicles. That’s not to say that they have no impact, but generally they have a fairly small impact on the highway while often having a large impact on the local roads.
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Besides, some of the measures include not actually going anywhere, using public transit, or carpooling — exactly the kinds of things that are to be encouraged.
Recently in England, I noticed that speed limits on major highways are adjustable and that speed limits are rigorously enforced. That does cut down on the nimrods re-enacting car commercials, but I have no idea whether lowering the speed at certain hours makes delays less likely.
There’s two metrics that are important, both averages:
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mean, and median.
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The median is the one “in the middle” — if the commute times for a week are {26, 27, 27, 31, 45} then the mean is 27. Generally, faster speed limits can lower the median.
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The mean is the sum of the numbers divided by the number of instances. In this case, (26+27+27+31+45)/5 = 31.2. Raising the speed limit doesn’t necessarily lower the mean, because faster moving cars are more likely to get into car accidents, and those accidents are more likely to involve more cars, and those accidents are also more likely to be nastier. This means that slow/stopped traffic on highways is more likely to occur — and hence that “45” is likely to show up more often, and be “50” or “55”.
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Lowering the speed limit is really effective when you’re in traffic that seems to alternate between 30-45 mph and 55-70 mph. In those particular cases, setting the limit to 50 mph (for example) and enforcing it results in a smoother ride, which takes just as long in time but reduces the chances of car accidents, reduces wear and tear and stress, and reduces fuel consumption.
Whenever I take the MBTA with people that claim not to like it, I always make a big deal of pointing out when the train arrives quickly. (Yes, I know I can be annoying.) The trouble is that a late train is much more salient in people’s memories than months of on-time trains. No one spends half an hour meditating on the train being on time. When it’s late, we think of nothing else.
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Similarly, a big standard deviation in communte times or a distribution with heavy tails will make drivers cranky. One can no longer make promises to arrive at certain times.
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In this country, we somehow regard the freedom to speed, i.e., to violate our own laws, to be an expression of our liberty. This curious effect suggests that the British system would be slow to take route here. (I admit it: Pun intended.)
I completely agree that tolling only those who drive in from the West is unfair. However, I don’t agree that everyone across the state should be taxed equally for the Big Dig. There is a potential to kill many birds with one stone here: Tax all motorists who drive into the immediate Boston area from any direction. This charge could vary depending on day of week and time of day, so that commuters in the weekday morning and afternoon rush hours would pay the highest charge, and those driving during off-peak times would pay less.
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This would accomplish many things:
– It would more place a more direct financial cost to those driving into the city (environmental, congestion, noise, etc).
– It would help to reduce automobile congestion, since many motorists would likely switch to another mode or carpool.
– It could be used as another revenue source for the MBTA and other public transportation in the Boston area.
– It could be used to help pay off the Big Dig.
What are the chances of this happening, politically? I’d suggest close to zero.
since Boston isn’t so grid like. Then again, if they pulled it off in London, they can do it in Boston.
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One way that Boston has been able to impose a sort of congestion charge is to not allow any more downtown parking lots. This means that you’ve either got to swallow the risk of finding a meter/not get a ticket, or pay the ever increasing rates to park downtown. Menino is able to pull this off because (a) the downtown areas don’t have as many citizens as JP/Dorchester/Southie residential/etc, and (b) he’s so entrenched; a less “popular” mayor might have a hard time pulling this off.
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Want to expand the “congestion” charge? Throw on a $1/hr ($5 max) tax on parking in Boston. The more expensive it gets to drive to the city, the more people will chose alternatives.
That’s a great point about parking. Expensive parking is a very effective deterrent to driving somewhere. You’ve probably noticed that congestion is worst where parking is plentiful and free.
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When businesses don’t provide free parking, like most downtown, commuters use the alternatives. When someone is presented with the option of paying $400/month for parking or taking the subway or commuter rail, the choice becomes obvious. When businesses subsidize all or part of the cost of a monthly T pass, the choice becomes even easier.
I think subsidies are responsible for the nasty and extremely expensive parking in downtown Boston. My company, for example, will subsidize T and/or parking costs up to $250/month (the cost of the most expensive T pass). Lots of other businesses do likewise.
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Suddenly, parking downtown is effectively $250 cheaper for lots and lots of people. Prices rise to accomodate their willingness to pay subsidized rates. So if the “average” person was willing to pay $100/month for parking without a subsidy, garages now find lots and lots of people willing to pay $350.
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Just an example that subsidies can cut both ways. Widespread subsidies of T passes can — and probably do — inflate prices there as well.
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Ultimately this all affects those who don’t get corporate subsidies by driving parking and T prices through the roof and lending more credence to Boston’s reputation as an expensive city.
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Just something to bear in mind — I’m not sure what, if anything, would be a feasible “solution” to something I’m not even sure is a problem…
…the office hours are tied to, for example, the commuter rail schedule. Which, quite frankly, is lousy. (And that’s aside from the fact of the few commuter rail stations in Boston.) If someone misses the next to last train to his or her destination, he or she will be cooling his or her heels for a long time on the platform.
lots of chicken and egg here. People avoid the commuter rail because the schedule is less than great, and the commuter rail can’t offer more trips because they don’t have the ridership.
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Incidentally, a North South Rail Link would really help with Commuter Rail scheduling, and would reduce some of the overcrowding on the T between North and South Stations during rush hours.
this is a common economic problem with subsidizing good behavior — sometimes the results are worse.
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As for subsidizing parking, so what? From the perspective of traffic engineering, it doesn’t matter if supply hits demand at $100/mo or $350/mo. The same goal is met.
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An enlightened company would subsidize parking less. Two possible ways: (1) look at the T pass that person would use and only subsidize that much value in parking. In other words, don’t give a Beacon Hill employee a $250 parking subsidy; give him a $59 subsidy good for a monthly T pass or for parking. (2) Just subsidize parking less. Hey — neither life nor benefits have to be fair, and there’s no reason why they can’t be unfair in the direction that encourages socially good behavior. (3) Over-subsidize mass transit choices. Pay people 120% of the cost of their mass transit option, effectively bribing them to take the T.
Penalizing people who work in Boston as a solution is a horrible idea. That’s basically the concept, if your proposing charging an inflated amount during rush hour. It’s not Boston, it’s Massachusetts. It is also shortsighted. Yes, we have the big dig fiasco, but we also have bridges throughout the state that are in need of maintenance and repair.
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We instead need an equatable solution that is fair to everyone in the state. Penalizing Boston and people who commute to the city is just an awful idea. A gas tax on the other hand I see as fair. You buy gas, then you drive on the roads. Why not have that as a basis to tax to road maintenance?
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I still think some kind of toll for our out-of-state friends is still needed, maybe some tolls near borders can remain. They should pitch in for maintenance if they use the roads as well.
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The proposal doesn’t penalize people who work in Boston. The proposal penalizes people who choose to drive in and out of Boston every day, thereby increasing congestion, air pollution, dependence on foreign oil, sprawl, parking woes, etc instead of taking mass transit, or, to a lesser extent, carpooling.
But it doesn’t kill two birds with one stone. It penalizes those who drive into Boston specifically and not other towns or cities in Massachusetts. My argument is that the state infrastructure is in need and to specifically target Boston today because of the big dig is shortsighted. People use cars, that’s not going away. Putting up tolls around the city to pay to get in and out is not a very good idea, nor is it very realistic (to me anyways).
I would not envision charges from those driving into Boston funding roads across the state. It would fund roads and public transportation in the Boston area.
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With that additional source of revenue in place to fund Boston transportation, the existing transportation funding could be more equitably distributed across the state. The rest of the state is suffering because of the expensive projects in Boston. If we want other towns to see better funding, we need to take care of funding Boston properly without making the whole state pay for it.
and also not addressing the toll revenue that needs replacement. This is not a Boston issue, it’s a state issue. There could be different needs outside of the state that needs addressing in the future. Also, guess what? Bridges have been deficient for years, that had nothing to do with the big dig. It’s just a cheap and easy answer, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.
And for every well paid exec that drives into Boston, there are 3-4 bottom of the barrel corporate slaves making barely over 30gs with 10 days off a year. Taking the bridge or tunnel into Boston 5 days a week adds up to almost a thousand dollars a year – an amount that people from the South Shore don’t have to pay, but people from the North do (and people who take the Pike probably pay something similar).
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Tolls in general are a bad idea. They’re not progressive, they slow traffic down and people generally just hate them. I think a lot of people in this state could get behind eliminating tolls – but if you eliminate one, you have to eliminate them all. People using the Pike have paid for the Pike several times over, but so have people driving the Tobin.
I’d respectfully refer you to stomv and the amusing discussion of “queuing theory” that follows.
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As to whether tolls “in general are a bad idea,” I’m not sure I follow (do people hate them? Yes, but they hate paying taxes too). Sure, in the case of the Pike or the Tobin, it’s easy to argue they’ve been abused. But in general, how is it a bad thing to charge the people who use a particular road for paying off its construction and maintenance? Let’s posit that a new toll road makes use of the spiffy new technologies that allow tolls to be collected without the cars having to slow down. What’s unfair about that?
I just don’t buy the queuing theory… tolls can create massive, massive traffic… and when there’s three lanes of traffic (or even two) you can still pass the slow pokes. Slowing down from 55-60 to a complete stop, then speeding up all the way again… plus waiting in a small line, of even 4 or 5 cars, should add about 2-3 minutes to a commute per toll. In that 2-3 minutes, you could pass those slow pokes fairly easy.
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I’d like to see who paid for those studies suggesting otherwise and see how they were done, because I’m extremely skeptical. Furthermore, while yes lots of people get pissed about paying taxes in general, that ignores the point that tolls aren’t progressive at all and certainly impact a lot of people by a large amount. If I were paying rent in some modest apartment in the North Shore and communiting to Boston, it would amount to almost a month’s rent over the course of a year. For someone who will probably be earning less than $35k when I get out of school, that’s a serious dent that could easily be more fairly redistributed via a slightly higher gas tax – which would have the added benefit of reducing the amount of gas this state uses.
you’ll note stomv essentially said ‘under certain situations.’ I’d concede that, under low traffic densities, tolls shouldn’t slow down traffic – and may even hasten it, given a limited amount of lanes for passing. However, I think it’s safe to say that the vast majority of Boston exceeds that density. We are, after all, the second most dense state in the union. The areas in question are even more dense. Furthermore, every time I’ve used the Pike tolls in Boston I’ve hit at least reasonable traffic – often massive traffic. The traffic at the Tobin is never all that great either, except at late hours.
isn’t tolls. The problem you’re complaining about (and it’s a damned fair complaint) is that there aren’t enough toll booths.
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It takes an average of x seconds to collect the toll, including slow down, pay, asking directions, and speeding up. The throughput of the road 2 miles before the toll (at full speed) at any given time t is y(t) cars per second. Then, at time t, you’ve got to have at least x*y(t) toll booths open. If you have fewer than that, you get traffic.
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The problem isn’t the toll itself — it’s an insufficient number of toll collectors at time t. That is a very real problem.
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So — just pretend that the problem of insufficient number of toll collectors (the “S” in an M/M/S queue) is solved; that is, that traffic just before the toll booth was never worse than traffic just after the toll booth. Would you still feel that all toll roads/bridges/tunnels were a bad idea, or just some toll roads/bridges/tunnels?
How do you squeeze more tolls in on Route 1 or the Tobin bridge?
The state gives everybody a FastLane pass as part of registering their car in MA. Then you set up lanes like they have on the New Jersey Turnpike — two or three lanes wide of traffic just zip through the “tollbooth” and collect the toll even at 70 mph. Set aside a lane or maybe two to collect tolls from out-of-staters who don’t have FastLane.
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Voila — it becomes not a matter of increasing the number of tollbooths, just a matter of decreasing the amount of time necessary to collect the toll.
It certainly isn’t free. While it isn’t expensive either (about $25), I can’t justify it based on how rarely I drive. Furthermore, there’s a real technology gap in America and I think expecting everyone to get those devices would leave a lot of people behind, probably a disproportionately high number for just leaving one or two tolls open.
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Furthermore, Fast Lane still doesn’t stop traffic from forming – and it won’t help when there is considerable traffic. I speak from experience there, including on the New Jersey Turnpike (I was just on it this past weekend).
get E-ZPass. It’s free, and it works the same way (though you may not get the MassPike Fast Lane discounts – I’m not sure about that).
I was proposing that the state should give everybody with a car a FastLane device. The boost to the economy could probably justify the cost of giving them away. Eliminate the “technology gap” (at least in this specific area) and toll booths at one swell foop.
after all, there are plenty of people who simply don’t use the Pike (or toll bridges/tunnels).
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I’d like to see the gadgets to be easier to get, and not cost $30 (deposit, sure. Purchase? Nah.). That’d be a huge step in the right direction.
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I am curious though: of those who don’t have the gadget, why not? From out-of-region? No credit card? Fighting the man/privacy advocate?
Again, you’ll have to take that up with the expert. My guess is that the studies stomv relies on are way too theoretical to have been commissioned by the National Association of Toll Collectors or some such. But you’ll have to ask him.
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By the way, it’s “David.”
If we bought the queering theory argument, then we should put up stop signs every 50 miles on every major route in America–just to make traffic flow better.
you mean the “old” definition of queer, having nothing to do with homosexuality. Still, you’re right there on par with creationists here.
if by ‘creationist’ you mean people who own a dictionary, then yeah. You’re niggardly finding pc unnecessarily.
By creationists, I mean people who discount and disparage science because it doesn’t fit with how they’d like things to be, ignoring overwhelming evidence and pretending to be specialists when the reality is they’ve read a few wikipedia articles at best…
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which is how you behaved when you suggested the stop signs every 50 miles.
I thought you were talking about my typo.
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but in some places. They’re called ramp meters, and are used in LA, SF, Phoenix, Twin Cities, and Chicago.
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They make sure that vehicles entering the highway are coming in a “drip, drip” pattern. They accomplish much of the same benefits as tolls, which have a “drip, drip” pattern of exiting vehicles.
Which made for a very long and frustrating drive along the coastal route from NY to Boston.
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But to be fair, traffic flowed freely and smoothly for the two miles before the next toll barrier traffic jam.
Though I think it was more like every 5 or 10 miles. At least it seemed that way as I drove through it at 2 am on two days before Thanksgiving. In any case, it seemed awful foolish and really annoying to have to stop every few minutes to throw in 35 cents.
And they are still there, no?
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L-O-N-G childhood rides in the car to Asbury Park and Belmar.
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Thankfully I have never had to deal with the Garden State Parkway on a regular basis.
You’ll have to excuse me, I actually know you don’t like “Dave,” I just have a 10 year old brother with the same name… so Dave snuck out.
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I’m going to make sure to name my kids weird names that no one else has… because the other day, when I went to dinner, there were literally 3 other Ryans in line at the same time! It always gets confusing with nicknames and the like when there are lots of Davids, Ryans, Williams, Bryans, Brians, etc. etc. etc.
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That’s my random, off-topic comment of the day.
That would stand out, and might give them a jump on the competition should they choose to run for office in some parts of the Commonwealth 🙂
Apple is already taken… so who knows!
…has instituted technologies like those described in your link on their Autobahns, at least for trucks.
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Regarding your
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But in general, how is it a bad thing to charge the people who use a particular road for paying off its construction and maintenance?
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it is my understanding that the bonds for originally contructing the MA turnpike were paid off years ago. And, regarding maintenance, why should TP users pay extra for “special” services that drivers on other roadways get for “free” (or that are included in the gas tax that they pay). I recognize that the turnpike drivers theoretically can get a refund of the gas tax for the miles driven on the turnpike but it should be obvious that the record-keeping hassle in order to do that would dissuade anyone from doing that.
my point to Ryan was a general one, not with respect to the specific situation regarding the western part of the Pike and the Tobin Bridge, where (as I said) it’s easy to argue that the tolls are unfair.
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You don’t have to go to Germany to see the high-speed toll gizmos in use — some roads in the good old U. S. of A. are using them now.
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As for the hassle of keeping records, it’s actually not that hard, is it, especially for a regular commuter? Use the odometer on one trip to measure how many miles you drive on the Pike on the way to/from work, then at tax time just count up the number of days you drove to work in the past year, multiply, and you’re done. I do something like that every year on my taxes to claim my standard mileage deductions for business trips. I have only modest sympathy for the argument that relatively simple paperwork associated with a tax deduction is too burdensome.
If you’re using the standard deduction, you’re also entitled to deduct tolls in addition to the standard.
But I cannot, I assume, also claim a refund of the money I pay in gas tax.
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Can I?
But, it’s probably more trouble than it’s worth. I’ve never tried it.
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You can get a rebate of 21 cents per 15 miles traveled. (Who wrote that?!) Then, the Revenue Department takes 5 percent sales tax on the refund check.
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That corresponds to a deep pattern of the universe.
…the difference is that to get the rebate, you would have to show that you actually drove on the turnpike–receipts would do, but I doubt that many people ask for receipts at tollbooths. You wouldn’t have to do that for the deduction for the business use of the automobile–all you would have to do is to show that the auto trips were used in business.
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I suppose it should be easier for Fastlane users to do that, provided the turnpike authority were to program their computers to keep track of turnpike usage for the cars, but I wouldn’t hold my breath expecting them to do something like that any time soon.
The paper FastLane statements sent to users now include miles traveled. However, to get the tax refund, in addition to reporting the number of miles traveled, you must submit receipts for the gas you purchased in Massachusetts that you used for driving those miles on the Turnpike. So basically, without being very diligent about this all year long and saving all the appropriate receipts, getting the refund is just about impossible.
charging the users of one and only one highway an extra fee on top of the other taxes they already pay, if drivers on all other highways don’t have to pay an extra fee yet also get road construction and maintenance from general revenues.
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I don’t have any problem with a toll on the Ted Williams tunnel to pay for its construction costs. But no one has been able to explain to me why it’s fair that many drivers on the ultra-expensive depressed Central Artery pay no toll, while commuters between Newton and Framingham are asked pay extra tolls to pay for that road WHEN MANY OF US AREN’T EVEN DRIVING ON IT.
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For pity’s sake, it’s not about whether the suburbs benefit economically from being close to Boston. It has to do with the fact that people in one and only one suburban area are being asked to pay an extra user fee for a road most of us don’t use, while many drivers on that actual roadway aren’t asked to pay an extra user fee. If the argument is that the entire eastern Mass. area benefits economically from that new road, then make the whole area pay somehow. Not just communities along the Pike.
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Besides that, though, I’d agree it’s fair to put a toll on roads to pay for new construction, but the toll has to be on users of that actual road, not on a separate road 20 miles east. And then the toll has to come down once the bonds are paid off. Period.
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Why are Pike drivers still paying tolls while drivers on Rte. 495 aren’t? Why wasn’t there a toll instituted to pay for building the 495/290 connector? Actually, my tax dollars paid for those roads.
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If you’re for user fees for roads, then find a way to make everyone pay user fees for their highways. Not just for one roadway. A gas tax is the fairest way to do that. The more you drive, the more roadways you use. If this encourages people to buy more fuel-efficient vehicles so they get to use more roadways while paying less taxes, I think there’s enough public good associated with that, that it’s a good outcome as well.
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2. As I’ve pointed out numerous times, you aren’t alone in paying tolls. If you think that only people who drive the Pike are paying tolls, people aren’t going to take your points very seriously, because it simply isn’t true. Heck, you even mentioned the Ted Williams, but there’s also the Tobin (which has also been paid for long ago).
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3. While people who pay toward the Ted Williams may not necessarily use the TW, other people help pay for road construction in other areas of the state who also don’t use it. It’s not a bad system as the people who use Ted Williams clearly couldn’t afford to pay for the entire project on their own – while your neighborhood probably couldn’t afford to pay for your street when it needs repair every few years. That’s the concept of shared responsibility – of a social contract with our government.
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Where things have gone wrong is that we’ve allowed the Big Dig to be built at the expense of other necessary projects. That only means there’s been an imbalance. However, now that the thing is mostly finished, the state will be in a position to play catch up and get to the other projects. Will you be complaining when I’m helping to pay for some new road near your neck of the woods?
I’m talking about highways. Please tell me other highways in the state – not the Tobin bridge, not the Callahan/Sumner tunnel, but just a highway – that has a toll.
…I do not understand your required categorization. People drive over roadways. People also drive over bridges and through tunnels–i.e. over roadways constructed over bridges and within tunnels. All were constructed with money coming from somewhere.
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As far as I can tell, people do not drive over the Charles River–except possibly over boats, and, regardless, the Charles River was not constructed with money coming from much of anywhere.
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So, what is the purpose of your required categorization, limiting the question to roadways presumably constructed on solid ground instead of roadways constructed on bridges and tunnels?