1nterceptor

https://transportation.nationaljourna...e-highways.php

Do We Need More Highways?

By Fawn Johnson

Correspondent, National Journal


The U.S. Conference of Mayors will unveil the results of a survey this week showing that the country's mayors are big fans of transit, and perhaps less so of new highways. The survey will show that most mayors want highway expansion to be a low priority when investing in infrastructure. A majority of mayors also oppose a gas tax increase--the preferred revenue-raising option of the transportation and business communities--unless the money from those taxes goes only to support maintenance of existing roads and bridges and expanded transit like rail, buses, and other public transit. They would oppose a gas tax increase if it were directed at highway expansion.

The gas-tax conversation is theoretical right now, with both President Obama and congressional Republicans on record opposing it. But the mayors' perspective speaks to a broader debate that will bubble up when policymakers start crafting a new surface-transportation bill--where should infrastructure investment go? New highway construction is lucrative and sexy, and thus easier to win political support for it. Road maintenance, by contrast, is boring. Public-transit investments can also cause difficulties because they set up disputes between urban and rural areas.

Are the mayors right that the United States doesn't need anymore new highways? If they are wrong, where should new highway construction take place? If they are right, how should infrastructure spending be allotted among public transit projects and road and bridge maintenance? Does it make sense to devote any gas tax funds to public transportation?

2wheelcommute

As an LA resident, where the mantra has been "more highways" for decades, as far as I can tell, new highways just get clogged with new cars as quickly as they're built. They encourage more sprawl and don't seem to do much of anything to relieve congestion or speed up peoples' commutes. I'm glad to see a consensus developing on this.

mikeybikes

I tried looking for the words bicycle, advocacy and safety, and cannot find any in the article. Care to enlighten me on how this pertains to bicycle advocacy and/or safety?

Doohickie

Funny, we had a new streetcar project all ready to go, and our mayor broke a tie in the city council, voting against it and canceling the whole thing. :-/

In other words, don't believe the polls; follow the money.

Doohickie

It discusses transit options.... close enough I say.

TheHen

Considering the amount of money that has gone into subsidizing infrastructure that is only used by cars and infrastructure that is designed to optimize car use at the expense of everyone else, I would say it makes a great deal of sense to spend some money, from whatever source, providing less-polluting options. A side benefit to the car addicts is that each trip someone makes on a public conveyance is one less car in their way.

The Human Car

I find it kind of funny that they are still trying to kick in the old argument "we need more highways for freight trucking" ... or better translated, trucking would be way more profitable if so many cars didn't get in the way. But what if we could get some of the cars out of the way by, I don't know, say raise the price of gas up to $4.

genec

Uh, maybe that IS the point.

mnemia

The thing is, in some big cities, they physically can't build enough highways to meet all the demand for cars that there is. There simply isn't enough space. And the more highways you build, the more demand for highways you create, because you make it more convenient to drive to places that are further away. So it doesn't really make sense to just keep building more of them in a place like LA: they're really running into diminishing returns there.

Instead, we should be investing more in the low-hanging fruit: neglected infrastructure spending, like bike and pedestrian improvements. Also, as the article points out, way too little money is being spent on ongoing maintenance. I don't know if this is a byproduct of the way that federal spending is allocated or what, but there always seems to be more money for new road projects than there is for maintaining existing roads.

I still think a much higher gas tax, gradually increased, is the way to go if we seriously want to wean Americans off of being so dependent on oil and so wasteful with it. Then the higher costs could be reinvested in our own country instead of just going overseas. But good luck with that in our political system, which views it as anathema. The politicians are unwilling to increase the gas tax, even just to match inflation, precisely BECAUSE it would be effective in forcing long term change in how this country does things.

crhilton

This may shock you, but bicycles use roads. Urban highways are roads, roads that often either outright ban bicycles or are simply a very unpleasant place to ride one.

mikeybikes

Forgive me if I just don't see much talk about bicycling advocacy here. I agree with lot of the points and all, I'm just missing the connection.

ItsJustMe

It'd be nice if they could keep existing roads and bridges in any kind of decent repair before they haul off spending tens of millions building even more.

mnemia

Especially when the most expensive roads are freeways that don't allow bikes, and the lions' share of the budget goes to them. I think it would make a lot more sense to spend money improving all our surface streets than to build more freeways between suburbs, etc. The freeways only encourage more long-distance commuting and generate more traffic, not to mention being an ugly blight on urban landscapes.

crhilton

A&S isn't about advocacy and safety. It's about how much we all hate each other .

Oh, and sometimes we agree, then we group jerk about it until someone points out that he hates us for agreeing. That used to be myrridin, but he seems to have disappeared. Then we all turn on that person and try to tear him down.

mikeybikes

Simple solution. For every mile of motorist freeway built or reconstructed, they need to build a mile of adjacent bicycle freeway. Would be a fraction of the cost of the whole freeway build.

I-Like-To-Bike

Yes that does sound simple. I have an even "simpler solution". "They" need to pass a law mandating that hills should be flattened and that the wind must always be at a cyclist's back.

bluefoxicy

I've seen you posting a lot lately.

Do you have any other function besides being the resident snide *******?

ItsJustMe

Use the search function, and you can answer that question yourself :-)

mikeybikes

I see no flaw in this plan.

I-Like-To-Bike

Being a lighthouse in the A&S darkness shining a beam of logic on the gullible and simple minded who believe riding a bike adds validity and/or credibility to wacky ideas, as well as on the self righteous, self appointed cycling safety experts who pontificate about the "science" of safely riding a bike.

bluefoxicy

A lot of the arguments made here are ludicrous, I agree. I mean it's a cycling forum; it's mainly going to attract enthusiasts with a somewhat warped, self-absorbed point of view... to varying degrees. The mean is going to be somewhere right of the general population mean; a standard deviation out is going to look somewhat imbalanced; and two out is going to be where the flaming nutjobs are.

However the collective flow of your responses only weakly indicates a potential logical structure; it more looks like flaming jackassery, self-absorbed narcissism, and general arrogance with a particular theme applied to it. You don't seem to have so much of a point as you do a pile of rickety plywood boxes stacked up so you can climb at the top and peer down at everyone else smugly.

It's amusing, to be sure; I guess I have to give points for being witty.

mymojo

Its the interwebz.

StanSeven

As a long time resident of NoVa (suburb of DC) I say we do. This area has grown rapidly and roads haven't kept up. The area is the 2nd or 3rd (depending upon which study) worse in the country. I often commute by bike but it's dangerous with no shoulders and traffic barely moving. Road rage is probably the worse in the country outside of Miami. Regardless of the reasons, more lanes and better roads need built if only to improve the well being of residenst. My 20 minute commute by car or bus when I moved here now is 90 minutes

rekmeyata

We don't need new highways, we can't even afford to keep up the ones we have! I don't understand why we didn't and don't build our highways the way Europe does which builds their road base 4 inches thicker then ours and they last longer. I aways thought that toll roads were suppose to be in pristine condition because that's what the toll money is being used to do, but the I80 up where I live looks like it's gone through a war, and then I heard tax payers money is still used to fix those roads...so whats the purpose of the tolls? Why do we blacktop roads only to have to fix them within two years and repave them about every 5 years? And lately in the past 10 years or so the road crews have been cutting 5 or 6 foot long squares out of a newly paved road on the slow lane for miles then refilling them only to have the road turn into a bumpy ride. I think they just want to find ways to employ people and to rip off taxpayers.

rydabent

New hiways keeps traffic moving. The car and road hating econazis forget one fact. A car sitting still in a traffic jam is getting ZERO miles per gallon!!!!!!