Posted on 01/23/2005 2:48:01 PM PST by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
Trans-Texas Corridor PING!
BobL: Bob Lanier? I worked for him once.
Other than that, all I can ask is: who reads the Houston Press?
The Press had a routine policy of knocking the snot out of city government.
Funny...
Super Conducting Super Colliding Freeway/Monkey Fist..
"And those traffic needs on I-35 could be relieved for at least 20 years by adding two additional lanes, he says."
Time required to add two lanes? Probably 25 years.
there's a lot more explaining that needs to be done.
for one thing, why is a foreign bidder necessary?
are we americans without venture capitalists? know-how to build freeways?
until i get further information--it appears to be an end run around the citizens who will pay for it.
I can't really call myself a "fan", but Bob did a much better job than Brown or White.
Czar Dr. Brown can take his "riderhood" and stick it where his son's City Hall carpets don't shine.
The Right Honorable Mayor White can take a tow truck to Moscow, IMHO.
That is one of the things that irks me about this project. They didn't pick an American bidder like Fluor Daniel.
I have no idea if BobL is this Bob Lanier you speak of.
Absolutely criminal.
Speaking strictly as an outside observor--the more that comes out about this project, the worse it smells. I'm all for innovation and private sector enterprise, but this reeks of corruption and I don't even know the players.
I bought it after marveling at Houston's freeway system as a visiting NY'er.
When I moved to New Braunfels in 1990, it was a 4 Lane divided Highway to and from San Antonio. In less than 15 years it is 8 Lane NEW Freeway with the remaining congestion in New Braunfels and San Marcos between San Antonio and Austin. This should be completed within 2 years. I35 is Great, here, for now. I've already paid for it and don't think I should pay again. Could I get on this Ping List Please?
Of course you can. You will be added momentarily. :-)
I-35 between Austin and Dallas is horrible. Absolutely horrible. No matter the time of day, or day of the week, it is filled with trucks and cars. I used to save time driving to Austin for business. Now, it's actually quicker to drive to Dallas and take Southwest down and drive in from the way-the-hell-out Bergstrom Airport.
I don't know whether this toll road is a good idea or not, but Slotboom's "oh, just raise the gas tax ten cents" is arrogance in the extreme.
Texas' gas tax is 20 cents per gallon and a fourth of it is dedicated to education and the rest is dedicated to roads. If you redirected the school portion to roads and raised the total tax 10 cents per gallon, you would get about twice as much money for roads from the gas tax, given the relative inelasticity of gasoline demand.
On the Trans-Texas Corridor, should it be built, if they really charge the outrageous toll of 20 cents/mile, you would have the equivalent gas tax of 4 dollars per gallon, assuming you get 20 mpg, while on the TTC. That's in addition to the current 20 cents per gallon of gas tax.
By that back-of-the-envelope analysis, you might be better off just raising the gas tax to 30 cents per gallon, redirecting it all to roads, and getting on with improving the current roads and building some "free" bypasses.
Just a thought.
Even if the TTC crowd saw reason and decided to, say, charge 5 cents a mile for 100 years, you would still be paying the equivalen of a dollar-per-gallon gasoline tax on the road. I'm assuming, of course, that the tolls I've mentioned go for regular passenger vehicles. They will probably be higher for trucks.
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