Okay, read the back-and-forth between you two, and I have to commend you both -- disagreeing without being disagreeable. It's a skill that's rusted up pretty well for me, lol.
What I find to be a blemish on society is the automatic assumption that, if you have to part with your MONEY for something, you're automatically BUYING it, or that it BELONGS to you. Not just the roads, either -- over the past several winters, I've noticed fewer and fewer people shoveling snow off the sidewalks in front of their houses; some of it, I'm sure, has to do with 'renters', who feel little obligation (around here, anyway) to maintain anything -- some don't even mow the lawn! When I checked into the city code, it requires sidewalks to be cleared by 9AM after a snow. YEAH, RIGHT........ I've had 'dialogues' with people, and when they are told it's their responsibility to clear the sidewalk, their answer is invariably some version of, "That makes it MY sidewalk, then!"
OK, back OT......
Truthfully, regardless of the size of the fees, I have a hard time accepting that they pay a significant portion of road costs -- I base this on the staggering COSTS of road work that get quoted locally! I broke down the $$ on one a couple years ago, divided it by the population of the city, and it STILL came out to about 4 months' pay for EVERYONE! (Don't still have the numbers, sorry, can't supply 'em anymore) It DID actually help me deal with drivers who spout the "you don't pay for the road" line -- I just laugh loudly at them. Boy, do they hate THAT!