Highway construction dollars, local police protection clash

The Carlisle Sentinel ^ | March 13, 2016 | Marc Levy (AP)

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

The Feds rejected it three times, because it would have been a “public-public partnership”, wherein PennDOT would let the PA Turnpike authority run the road, while the latter would pay the former nearly a billion dollars a year for various transportation uses throughout the state. Thus, some of the toll money would NOT be used on I-80. Pennsylvania tried twice during the Bush administration, and one more time after 0 came into office.

The law that attempted to create this partnership, Act 44, is still in force, so the turnpike authority still must pay some $450 million to PennDOT each year, some of which is used for transit projects. Fortunately, Act 89 reduces this payment to $50 million a year beginning in 2023. It should be $0, IMO.

[BobL]

Thanks Tol, that matches my understanding too. The states COMPLAINED about pass-through traffic not carrying their ‘weight’ regarding the cost of operating the road.

But, given the chance to make drivers pay the cost of the road, they instead have PROVED that they were only interested in FLEECING people that were driving through.

The BOTTOM LINE is that operating a highway is NOT EXPENSIVE, relative to the amount of money you can wring out of people needing to use it. PA attempted that extortion, and they were called on it.

It’s not often, but once in a while the feds do get it right.

[Olog-hai]

Well, either way they didn’t get it right here. They just left it dependent on the federal Ponzi scheme as the default instead of encouraging actual privatization.

[BobL]

“Well, either way they didn’t get it right here. They just left it dependent on the federal Ponzi scheme as the default instead of encouraging actual privatization.”

You don’t SERIOUSLY want to privatize the highways, considering the UNMITIGATED DISASTER it has been where its been tried (in the US and elsewhere).

We (i.e., the country) went through that phase a decade ago, and no one wants to get near such a hair-brained idea anymore.

Tolerance can tell you all about it, if you need details.

[Olog-hai]

Where has it been an “unmitigated disaster”? We did not attempt en-masse highway privatization a decade ago, so I don’t know where you got that from. The few projects touted as “privatization” were not; public-private partnerships are not privatization. The railroads (before the federal and state governments started interfering with them) have proven for decades that private infrastructure crossing state lines is more than viable.

Frankly, the highway trust fund is an impending disaster that cannot be mitigated. I didn’t call it a Ponzi scheme for no reason. All fuel and other taxes collected go right into the general fund and are transferred “on paper” to the supposedly dedicated fund; sounds like some other “lockbox” schemes that we all know about.

[BobL]

Yea, I know the CATO talking points, but they DO NOT WORK in the real world. Look up ETR 407, for an example, not to mention what that druggie Mitch Daniels did to the Indiana Toll Road.

Anyway, later...and don’t forget to VOTE LIBERTARIAN - they’re really into that crap.

[Olog-hai]

They are not “Cato talking points”. There is only one reason for the government to run anything, and that’s control. It was so when Woodrow Wilson took over the railroads under the USRA and it’s still the same today. When the majority of California’s roads were in private hands, they were not ruled by libertarians.

And again, what happened in Indiana was not privatization, never mind Ontario which is less disposed to such a concept as private ownership of roads (the province’s lease terms demand control over toll increases among other things).

32. Support any socialist movement to give centralized control over any part of the culture—education, social agencies, welfare programs, mental health clinics, etc.

Government ownership of transportation infrastructure is part of the et cetera, make no mistake. Especially federal ownership thereof, or in our case executive-branch ownership.

[BobL]

I realize that it’s pointless to argue with an Ann Rand type...so I’m done with you, but I given what has happened around the continent with privatization on this continent, I’ll keep fighting these silly schemes until I’m off the air.

[Olog-hai]

Impossible to “argue” therefore label?

I’m just looking at the history here. Especially in context with the rise of the left all around the world. And also in context with the Constitution’s Postal Clause, which gives the establishment of “post roads” solely to Congress and not to the executive branch.

And again, what you are calling “privatization” was/is simply not privatization at all.