Posted on 07/13/2009 6:27:35 AM PDT by La Lydia
Virginia is trying to pull a fast one on motorists who live along the Interstate 95/395 corridor, and we all will be moving slower and paying more as a result...The latest plan effectively hands ownership of Interstate 95/395 to a foreign corporation for the next 80 years. Transurban Group, Melbourne, Australia, will lease the existing high-occupancy vehicle (HOV) lanes for the 64-mile stretch between Spotsylvania, Va., and the Pentagon. Transurban will be responsible for building new access ramps and performing maintenance for the lanes. Drivers interested in a congestion-free ride can pay an expected $1 - or more - per mile to use the HOT lanes while the regular lanes are gridlocked...
The devil is in the details...The Beltway gets new lane construction where it is needed most; 95/395 does not. Instead, between Garrisonville Road and the Pentagon, three lanes will be squeezed into the existing two-lane space...
The commuter who undertakes the 64-mile journey from Spotsylvania would pay a shocking $33,280 each year to use the toll lanes...common commutes from a town such as Dumfries would cost drivers $8,840 each year...adjusting upward for inflation...
...Only those who register for and install a special car-pool tracking device will be allowed into HOT lanes...Because it is in Transurban's interest to minimize the number of nonpaying customers, VDOT agreed to contract language that will actively discourage ride sharing on the Beltway....
...According to the Beltway contract, Virginia taxpayers are on the hook once again if, between now and 2087, improvements are made to free, non-tolled roads in the vicinity of the toll lanes. These agreements ensure that the toll-road company will enjoy a monopoly at taxpayer expense...free roads will be neglected and not expanded to create congestion that will force motorists into the tolled lanes...
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...
My suggestion is to ride I95 down to Ashland and see a part of Virginia you know nothing about.
That level of stupidity is still present among local Democrats in this area. I think they're mostly the dregs from New Jersey who couldn't steal enough to keep up with the neighbors.
I'm right here at the intersection of all these highways. Takes me under an hour to get to downtown Richmond though.
It would be cheaper than that to fly a private airplane on that route at 3 times the speed with no drunks, cell phone drivers, or speed traps.
“I think they’re mostly the dregs from New Jersey who couldn’t steal enough to keep up with the neighbors.”
Bingo! Look up Audrey Moore.
Ummm... you said... "Tales me about 35 minutes to do the Springfield to Ashland trip..."
Fast Eddie Rendell tried or is trying to do the same thing with the Pennsylvania turnpike. So far, state GOP lawmakers have stopped him cold.
You can have socialism or you can have good, free, roads, but you can’t have both.
But you’d get shot down over the Pentagon.
I make the trip 2 to 3 times a month and know you can't do it in under an hour unless it is 2 am and you are driving 90+ miles an hour.
Under an hour to get from what intersection of what highways?
What they need in Atlanta is a 6-lane I-75 bypass (3 north, 3 southbound) with NO exits within 30 miles of the city. A sizeable portion of Atlanta's traffic along I-75 is people travelling through the city, not local commuters.
Your education about Virginia is incomplete, and hardly qualifies you “native” status. Ashland, Virginia is some 15 miles north of Richmond on interstate 95. I arrived in Virginia in 1956 and have been in every county in the state. I have only been away for two years.
Ping to post #36!
>Boy, you guys in Virginia are in for a real treat...Yer gonna love this...<
Dallas and Houston heeded the demand of Big Brother to build HOV lanes.
Now, most daily commuters have to drive past mostly vacant HOV lanes at minimal stop and go speed, wasting more gas.
Why? the truth is that the HOV lanes really didn’t lure people into car-pooling. Maybe the area is so large that car-pooling simply isn’t an attractive option since employers are spread out.
Pick any other well-connected government contractor or "partner" and tell me how many times they have been successfully sued for some venture related to thst partnership or close contract relationship.
Legally, what you say may be perfectly correct. However it is also illegal to come into this country illegally and claim benefits intended for U.S. citizens. How well are those laws working out?
One of our crooked RAT commissioners (who has always had an easy re-election) has announced he is retiring this year. It is now common knowlege that he signed the county to a long-term lease for expensive and unnecessary government space from a company which he owns and even the 63%-36% edge in RAT registration in this county isn't enough to save his sorry hide.
One of the really disgusting elements of this is that the people of the state DID NOT approve this, nor did the General Assembly, which turned responsibility for this over to the state Department of Transportation (VDOT) (non-elected bureaucrats, non-accountable), the agency that signed on the dotted line. I don’t remember any candidate for state elected office running on a platform of turning our interstate over to a foreign entity. I can’t imagine what the bureaucrats were “thinking,” if you can call it that, because it will not relieve traffic, it will not be environmentally friendly and it will cost the taxpayers through the nose. So, who will benefit? The foreign company, and perhaps one or more people who plan to retire from VDOT and go to work for the corporation. I do not know that for a fact, but it is the most reasonable explanation I can come up with for what is happening. There has to be a skunk (or a herd of skunks) in the works somewhere, because otherwise it makes no sense.
how many bureacrats can we fire to make up the budget shortfall?
Turning over our infrastructer WITH OUR COMMUTER DATA AVAILABLE TO FOREIGN NATIONS is just a mistake.
Ecconomic espionage is just as important is military spying.
WHERE is the national security data about employees? if a hostile government wants to track government employee X, they now have the means to do so.
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