Free Republic

Humans need rules. Rules make life more predictable. But when the rules multiply, the world needs some rule-breakers. The creator of the underground website Silk Road, Ross Ulbricht, was sentenced to life in prison for creating an online space that allowed people to use bitcoins to buy and sell things. Some used Silk Road (named after Marco Polo's trading route from China) to sell illegal drugs. People do that anyway, even without Silk Road; since the site's closing, numerous similar websites have taken its place. The prosecution implied (but never really argued) that Ulbricht planned murders. That would certainly be...

Indiana is known for its targeting of truckers relative to the behavioral aspects of on-highway safety — no state devotes a larger share of its focus to ticketing and issuing warnings to drivers for moving-type violations. When officials in the northern part of the state in late June announced a weeklong “Operation Truck Stop” three-county enforcement effort during the July 4 holiday week along U.S. 20, a common Indiana Toll Road alternate, in late June, regular readers could have been forgiven for seeing little news there. As Overdrive‘s reports on the state made clear in the last year, such efforts...

(CBS) – Corey Brooks, the “Rooftop Pastor” from Chicago’s South Side who endorsed Republican Bruce Rauner for governor, now has a paid appointed position with the Rauner administration.Gov. Rauner’s office on Friday announced Brooks, senior pastor at New Beginnings Church, will be a director on the Illinois Tollway Board, the Downers Grove-based authority that controls toll roads.Brooks was among a group of African-American religious leaders in Chicago who backed Rauner, a wealthy businessman, over incumbent Democrat Pat Quinn, saying Democrats had taken black political support for granted.The tollway appointment would seem an odd fit for Brooks, a social crusader who...

Interstate 11 is getting another boost with execution of a memorandum of understanding between Arizona and Mexico. One of the four international cooperation agreements to be signed by Gov. Doug Ducey and the Mexican Secretary of Foreign Affairs Jose Antonio Meade extends I-11 from Nogales into Mexico to Hermosillo and Mexico City. The international commerce corridor MOU grew out of a conversation between Arizona business leaders, Ducey and Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim at the Phoenix Business Journal’s Global Market Discovery series earlier this year. People on the Move Victor Foggie Victor Foggie Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central Arizona Brian...

Few things are as essential to economic growth and development as our nation’s roads. In a state as expansive as Arizona, riders understand the importance of having sound infrastructure, especially when it fails, as it did with the recent bridge collapse on I-10 in California not far from the Arizona border that continues to impact travelers across our state and region. Throughout history, providing for our nation’s infrastructure has been a central priority for both political parties. And, since President Dwight Eisenhower created the Interstate Highway System in 1956, our roads and bridges have served as the backbone to our...

It turns out that because of the emissions of extraordinarily potent greenhouse gases NF3 and SF6 and energy during the manufacture of solar modules, solar energy ends up being worse for the climate than burning coal (assuming the global warming hypothesis is valid). A Swiss engineer has made a thorough analysis of the greenhouse gas emissions caused by the manufacture, transport and operation of solar panels. His conclusion: Ferrucio Ferroni writes here how China is the number 1 manufacturer of solar panels globally and that the production of solar panels there requires immense amounts of electricity, which in China is...

HARRISBURG, PA. (JULY 23, 2015) — The Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (PTC) recently approved toll rates for a cashless, nonstop tolling point for westbound motorists crossing the Delaware River Bridge from New Jersey into Pennsylvania on Interstate 276. E-ZPass customers, who make up more than 80 percent of traffic at the bridge, will pay $5 for a two-axle vehicle; non-E-ZPass customers will pay $6.75 via Pennsylvania Turnpike TOLL BY PLATE, a system that will take an image of the license plate and mail an invoice to the vehicle's owner. Each additional axle will cost an additional $5 for E-ZPass customers and...

President Obama signed a three-month highway bill Friday while chastising Congress for failing to approve long-term transportation funding and other legislative business before lawmakers’ summer vacation. “We can’t keep on funding transportation by the seat of our pants,” Mr. Obama told reporters in the Oval Office. “It’s a bad way for the U.S. government to do business. I guarantee you that’s not how China, Germany and other countries around the world handle their infrastructure.”

Everything I needed to know about why the European Union would fail I learned at a truck stop. It was in 2001 when a bus tour I was on stopped at a truck stop on the German Autobahn. For the American readers, you must understand that European truck stops are much different from what you get in the states. In Europe, the facilities are clean and the food is actually decent. They don’t have the same hot dogs sitting in the cooker for five days. And no, you can’t buy six gallon soda cups. As it were, in this truck...

Public attention on Maryland transportation planning issues has primarily focused on the Montgomery and Prince George’s Counties’ Purple Line and Baltimore’s Red Line since Larry Hogan became governor. The largely limited impact these two projects would actually have on congestion has often been lost. Planners estimate that the Purple Line would add only 11,800 new daily transit riders by the year 2040, less than a one percent increase (0.8%) in metro area ridership.Earlier this month Virginia Deputy Secretary of Transportation Nick Donohue released the results of VDOT’s Potomac River crossings study.[1] Their main recommendation is to extend the Beltway’s HOV/toll...

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said a vote to begin debate on a massive highway bill he is pitching is "an important first step" toward solving a transportation funding shortfall that has bedeviled Congress for a decade.  "There are lot of tired cliches about not giving up after an initial set back," McConnell said, referencing a failed test vote on Tuesday that placed the Senate's ability to pass a long-term highway bill in doubt.  "I won't subject our colleagues to any of those this morning, but I will say that last night's vote represents an important first step toward...

If I don't have time to read legislation before voting on it, my default vote is no. We received the highway bill today at 3:06 p.m., and it is over 1,000 pages long. Our first vote on this legislation is scheduled for 4:00 p.m.

I was interested to read the article from The Sun News on Thursday about the last-minute delay of the permit to pave International Drive. This project will take thousands of cars off of the gridlock of Highway 501, and relieve congestion in Carolina Forest. On the day before we were to receive the permit from the Army Corps of Engineers, the Coastal Conservation League filed an appeal. It seems they want the road to be redesigned to include multiple bear crossings, at a cost of millions of dollars to the taxpayers of Horry County. That’s millions of scarce taxpayer dollars...

Construction on the new Interstate 74 Bridge is supposed to be done by 2020, but money – and time – is running out. On Saturday, July 11th, 2015, Representative Cheri Bustos visited the Quad Cities to meet with local leaders about federal funding. Right now, Congress is trying to pass a highway bill to fix and fund our area’s infrastructure. However, if they don’t find a solution by July 31st, 2015, federal funding for those projects – like the I-74 Bridge – will end. Monday, July 13th, 2015, a spokesman for Bustos said that if federal funding for the project...

In recent decades, there have been many ways to make money and one virtually infallible formula for losing it: running an airline. At times, it might have made more sense for the major carriers to set up bonfires of cash on tarmacs rather than actually transport people. Lately, though, they have figured out how to avoid squandering huge sums. Hint: It involves charging more for their services than it costs to provide them. This strange development has set off alarms among people in Congress who think aviation should be a charitable activity. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., recently charged, "Consumers are...

United Airlines flights have been grounded nationwide due to a computer system glitch. Millions of passengers are currently stranded at airports across the U.S. after the airline requested that all planes be prevented from taking off, according to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). In a statement, United spokesman Luke Punzenberger told Bloomberg that the company had experienced a 'network connectivity issue' and was 'working to resolve this' as quickly as possible. '[We] apologize to our customers for any inconvenience,' he added.

The problem is clear: Traffic congestion will become significantly worse and more widespread without big changes in how people and products get around. Build more roads. Build more public transit. Rely on new technology. The possible solutions are many, but none is easy or cheap. A few ways to ease the nation's gridlock: ——— PUBLIC TRANSIT RENAISSANCE Ridership on public buses, trains and subways has reached its highest level nationally since the 1950s, and transit boosters cite this as evidence that expanded service and routes is a good investment. The nation's driving capital, Los Angeles, is making a multibillion-dollar investment...

ANNAPOLIS, MD – Following through on his campaign pledge to provide funding for highways and state-owned local roads, Governor Larry Hogan today announced $1.97 billion for highways and bridges from Western Maryland to the Eastern Shore. The priority projects, which will get underway by 2018, include $1.35 billion in new projects going to construction and $625 million in preserved projects. The $1.35 billion in new projects includes $845 million for major projects and $500 million to fix bridges and improve roads. “Today, I’m delivering on my promise to provide nearly $2 billion in funding to our highways and bridges across...

Dashing Baltimore's hopes for an east-west light rail line, Gov. Larry Hogan said Thursday that he will not build the $2.9 billion Red Line. "The current proposal makes no sense whatsoever," the governor told a State House news conference. But Hogan, making his first appearance since announcing Monday he has cancer, gave mass transit advocates a limited victory by giving the green light to construction of a slimmed-down version of the Purple Line light rail project in the Washington suburbs. During his campaign last year, Hogan had said the state could not afford either project. After he took office, however,...

Gov. Larry Hogan announced Thursday the state will move forward with the Purple Line. The Republican governor made his decision after months of speculation about whether he’ll kill the $2.45 billion light-rail project. Hogan said the state will fund the project with $168 million, “a fraction” of the cost of what could have been up to a $700 million state investment. The governor said he will ask Montgomery County and Prince George's County to increase the size of their investments. “The Purple Line is a long-term investment and will be an important economic driver for Maryland,” Hogan said. “It will...