I have no problem with MTA razing the toll at the toll facilities in Maryland. My beef is when the State Legislature and Governor use those revenues to to pay for other things in the state budget like they are doing with funds collected for the transportation trust fund.

I would like to see the state constitution amended to prohibit the State Legislature and Governor from raiding the various dedicated accounts to pay for things that those accounts were not setup for.

Disclaimer: I use the William Preston Lane Memorial Bridge (Bay Bridge) daily.

by Sand Box John on May 13, 2011 9:12 am • link • report

I think that the MTA should either raise tolls or raze the toll facilities...
Tolls should be collected either electronically--reducing overhead--or should be so steep as to keep drivers off the roads (reducing repair costs of roads)

by David F-H on May 13, 2011 9:27 am • link • report

I might prefer DASH buses to be equipped with GPS, so I can know whether it would be faster to walk or to wait for one. But if there were bikeshare, I would always beat the bus, so no need for GPS.

by m on May 13, 2011 9:40 am • link • report

@Sand Box.
Agreed, but depends on what you define as other things. I am ok with 95 tolls for example being used to also help pay for the ICC or other MD roads. They should not be used for the general fund.

Raising tolls should not be done to keep cars off the road. People do have ligitimate reasons to drive.

by Matt R on May 13, 2011 9:48 am • link • report

@David F-H;

The food you eat passes through those toll facilities to get to your dinner table.

Are you willing to pay more for your food just to satisfy your desire to punish the users of those toll facilities?

FYI: 18 wheelers pay more then 3X the fare then do cash fares paid by driver of passenger cars and light trucks.

by Sand Box John on May 13, 2011 9:54 am • link • report

@SBJ: problem there is 18-wheelers do much more than 3x the damage to roads that the cars do.

Regarding bikeshare in Alexandria, the critic in question just doesn't see how bikeshare will financially work in the city. I should also mention that this person has been vocal about preferring buses over streetcars at the city's high capacity transit meetings.

by Froggie on May 13, 2011 10:03 am • link • report

@Matt R

That is what I meant, MTA revenue stays within the MTA. Tolls collected regardless of where they are collect would be used to retire the MTA debt regardless of where it was spent.

by Sand Box John on May 13, 2011 10:05 am • link • report

Re: Investigating gas prices:
I have to think the cost will be so small to be irrelevant. Also consider that if they find malfeasance, the companies can be fined and it will be a net benefit (though there is no guarantee that that money would go to transit).

@Sand Box John:
The tolls for an 18 wheeler have practically no effect on the price of food, even if it is three times what cars pay. Things like fuel and labor are much bigger components. And if it does have some market affect, won't it encourage alternative transport modes (like freight rail)?

by Steven Yates on May 13, 2011 10:09 am • link • report

18 wheelers pay more then 3X the fare then do cash fares paid by driver of passenger cars and light trucks.

They also have 4x the number of wheels, and weigh up to 20x as much.

The problem with raising tolls is that the costs will be borne by independent truckers.

by andrew on May 13, 2011 10:28 am • link • report

@ Andrew

Good point, but there is no reason why hikes could not be phased it. Go up for cars first perhaps. What about charging for more for peak fares? Perhaps to encourage people to take trips at different times.

by Matt R on May 13, 2011 10:41 am • link • report

@Froggie:

That 3X figure I quoted is on the conservative side of what the fare really is. Last time I passed through a cash lane at the Bay Bridge the fare for a 5 axle vehicle (18 wheelers) was $15.00, that is 6X what is paid by driver of passenger cars and light trucks.

18 wheelers do not inflict 6X the damage to roads compared to passenger cars and light trucks.

Based on my observation some of the damage to roads can be attributed to poor quality of maintenance, poor quality of material used and improper design for the environment and volume traffic carried on the road.

by Sand Box John on May 13, 2011 10:42 am • link • report

@ Sand Box John:

18 wheelers DO inflict much more than 6x the damage to roads compared to passenger cars and light trucks. The damage increases with the fourth power of the weight of the vehicle, according to estimates in this article in the Journal of Forest engineering: http://www.lib.unb.ca/Texts/JFE/bin/get6.cgi?directory=July99/&filename=martin.html.

This Texas state analysis reaches similar conclusions, and says that an 18-wheeler at the 80,000-pound weight limit inflicts as much damage on the road as 9,600 cars (or six trucks hauling 50,000 pounds each). http://www.window.state.tx.us/tpr/btm/btmtr/tr05.html

And then there are the higher costs of building roads and bridges to accommodate heavier trucks in the first place, and the disproportionate effect trucks have on congestion (they can massively magnify and perpetuate volume-based congestion, due to their slow acceleration).

by Jeff on May 13, 2011 11:48 am • link • report

@SBJ:

The statement that '18 wheelers do not inflict 6X the damage to roads compared to passenger cars...' is only correct in that a factor of 6 is a gross understatement.

Research conducted by AASHTO in the 1950s and 1960s established that damage to the road increases as the fourth power of axle weight. This means that if you double the weight, you get 16 times the damage; if you have 10 times the weight you get 10000 (ten thousand) times the damage. Now things get a little tricky with tandem axles and double tire axles, so a concept called ESAL=Equivalent Single Axle Load was developed. It is a (linear) measure of damage done to roads by different vehicles.

Your prototypical 18-wheeler, a five-axle tractor with a single trailer, has an ESAL of about 1.2. A car would have an ESAL of about 0.0004.

So the truck does about 3000 times more damage than the car. Should the toll be 3000 times as large as well?

by thm on May 13, 2011 12:16 pm • link • report

The damage cause by vehicle weight is only part of the issue. Weather also damages roads, which should be borne equally by all road uses.

by goldfish on May 13, 2011 2:02 pm • link • report

Re: Bike lanes
Using just a bit of paint, DDOT recently transformed 11th Street SE from Pennylvania Avenue to the 11th Street Bridge from a speedway with four lanes for cars to a neighborhood street with two bike lanes, two car lanes and a wide median. I love it -- despite the whiny letter the Committee of 100 sent to Mayor Gray last fall, the war on cars continues!! I guess the "real stakeholders" just don't have the influence they used to..........

by rg on May 13, 2011 2:10 pm • link • report

@rg:

Shhhh.

Are you *trying* to provoke a backlash!?!

by oboe on May 13, 2011 2:14 pm • link • report

@rg, oboe

I bike, run, and drive on 11th St SE. Vehicle speeds have not been affected at all. If anything, the fact that left-turning traffic now has its own lane has made traffic on that road flow more smoothly, even with the speed limit taken down from 35mph to 25.

It's also changed the street from a "no-go" area for cyclists to a primary backbone of my daily commuting route.

by andrew on May 13, 2011 4:21 pm • link • report

@Jeff/THM: that rule is why I always laugh whenever someone says that bicycles should pay registration fees, since they also inflict wear on roadways. Pay what? One penny every century?

by Payton on May 14, 2011 2:21 am • link • report

DC should fix the sidewalks first than deal with the bike lanes; the photo that is on the linked page provides a great reason why the sidewalks should be fixed

by kk on May 14, 2011 3:49 pm • link • report