“If you look at my post 14, you will notice that the Verrazano Bridge in NY alone sucks about 1/2 billion dollars a year out of the economy. If you added all the TBA and PA crossings into the mix, it is probably well over a billion dollars a year being redistributed in the NY metro area. “
Yea, you don’t have to tell me. Delaware has a 9 mile stretch of Interstate 95, and they collect something like 45 cents per mile on it. If tolls were limited to the cost of highways they would be something like 5 cents per mile (with half of that paying for the tolling system - LOL), at most. Here in Houston, they’re simply open about the fact that Harris County tolls now are used for “high-priority” county projects (i.e., general fund). At 15 cents per mile, they collect WAY MORE money than they ever needed for the highway, even before they paid it off.
It’s just a crying shame that something like half of the FReepers are fine with toll roads, under then DELUSION that the money is used just for that road.
The next step will be mandatory transponders in cars with GPS tracking. I know that Governor Perry has looked into that (but thankfully hasn’t proposed it yet), and that the Libertarians think it’s the greatest thing since sliced bread. The idea that some central authority can locate your vehicle anywhere in the world, charge you mileage fees based on where you drive, what you drive, when you drive, and maybe what you make, just doesn’t seem to raise an eyebrow with them...just as the laws in the early 1930s most likely didn’t bother the Jews that much.