Posted on 07/22/2008 6:32:38 PM PDT by CounterCounterCulture
A Bay Area transportation commission is proposing the creation of a $3.7 billion, 800-mile-long network of mixed-use carpool and toll lanes on more than 12 freeways in a big new attempt to ease chronic traffic congestion.
Called High Occupancy Toll or HOT lanes because they are free to car poolers in rush hour and open to other vehicles for a toll, the network of express lanes would be developed over the next 25 years by a group county, regional and state transportation agencies.
The lanes would be established along much of Highway 101 on the Peninsula, Santa Clara County, and in parts of Marin and Sonoma counties. In the East Bay, the lanes would be along most of Interstates 680, 80 and 880, and Highway 4, and along much of I-580 in the Livermore Valley.
"We believe a network of HOT lanes across the region can reduce congestion, and speed up traffic flows," said John Goodwin, a spokesman for the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, which allocates state and federal transportation dollars in the Bay Area.
(Excerpt) Read more at mercurynews.com ...
BAH!
Silly rabbits. No map.
My friend....we will disagree on this...*IF* taxes need to be raised, a toll tax is a USER tax, and thus a fair tax. Why charge people who don’t drive?
That’s what gas taxes are for (or should be). Anything else is inconvenience and leads to more back-ups, and thus wasted fuel and more pollution (which the enviro-MENTALS ought to be against)
Government by oxymoron.
We already pay user taxes for highways, every time we buy gas. The libs then started siphoning that off to pay for money losing mass transit (and the unionized public employees that run them). Let the gas tax go to highways again, and you won’t need this crap.
This HOV thing is yet another attempt to "build a new human", in a classical Soviet style. It tries to change the habits of people, but the people don't want to change. HOV means "use carpool" - which is neither possible nor practical in most cases. How many people would want to be hostages to someone's else schedule? And if fuel is a problem, Myers Motors already has all-electric vehicles for a single occupant, just plug it in and enjoy the sun [power.] In California there is plenty of sun. Mass-produced, these little go-carts would be much cheaper than they are now.
Those roads have already been paid for with gas taxes.
If you don’t drive and use them you haven’t any say in the matter!
Go find a tax that applies to you!
“Myers Motors already has all-electric vehicles for a single occupant, just plug it in and enjoy the sun [power.]”
Just keep your stinking Tonka Toy off the public roads!!!
You can say that again.
Several years ago, I caught an interview with a Dallas (TX) mass transit official.
The subject of HOV lanes came up. In a fit of candor, the mass transit official admitted that HOV lanes had nothing to do with increasing the number of people going past a given point per minute (the logical objective in optimizing freeway traffic).
Oh, no! Quite the contrary. HOV lanes, he said, were actually a device designed to reduce the number of people going past a given point -- a measure specifically intended to reduce the capacity of the freeway.
Because, if they were successful in choking the freeway, more people would theoretically choose to use mass transit.
Was this, then, a pure marketing venture on the part of the mass transit authority -- trying to increase ridership and thus income? You could kind of respect the perverse logic of such an approach.
Oh, no! This wasn't anything so crass as a P&L consideration. Perish the thought!
Instead, this was a moral issue! People should be riding in busses. They should live closer to their work. They should not be driving cars and polluting the planet.
In other words, to a liberal, the HOV lane is just one more route to Utopia.
Califonia: 16 bill deficit, 14 bill in services to illegals and no idea how to balance the budget, but to raise taxes.
Ok, then I want all the money I have paid in all these years that has NOT been used to repair the roads.
He stopped the construction of the 210 Freeway at La Verne, when there were thousands of new homes planned in the foothill communities to the east and no road but old Baseline and Hwy 66. When Gay Davis cut the ribbon 26 years later, he said "This will be the last freeway built in Cal."
Meanwhile 500,000 more people per year.
I think someone is leaving the side door open.
Have you checked the south gate lately...???
I’m investing in “Pitchfork Futures”!!
I’m not sure which capital will be marched on first, but it’s gonna happen!
>> big new attempt to ease chronic traffic congestion.
Liars.
The CA powers that be couldn’t care less about traffic congestion, or how long it takes the working class to get to work.
This is nothing but a big new naked attempt to RAISE MORE MONEY to spend.
The High Occupancy lanes were planned as toll lanes all along. The “higher ups” having to mix with the common elements of society just can’t be allowed.
That is how things are done in California by the powers that have their hands on the levers of power. The level of sleepwalking BS is indescribably high in that state.
LOL! I live in San Diego county. I’m going to start charging a head tax.
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