Posted on 07/11/2010 5:52:25 AM PDT by Willie Green
While transit advocates are discussing where to put rail and how soon, a broader debate continues about the wisdom of spending any tax money on any form of rail.
Critics say that if passenger rail were practical, private investors would happily build it and reap the profits.
They're half right. If profits were to be had, many people would be trying to capitalize. But that's no justification to refuse to subsidize better mobility on corridors where road expansion is impossible or would cost much more than a rail line.
The great expense of right of way, the slow return on investment and the complexity of operating across multiple jurisdictions are among many reasons investors won't risk money on passenger trains. But trains aren't the only thing taxpayers subsidize. Yacht owners didn't build the Intracoastal Waterway. Ship owners didn't build the Port of Tampa. Airlines and airplane owners didn't build Tampa International Airport.
Those who fret about rail subsidies should remember that from the early 1940s until the early 1960s, before rail service was nationalized, a federal tax on railroad tickets went into the general fund. Some of the revenue was used to build highways and airports.
The total collected, adjusted for inflation, would today be in the tens of billions of dollars, enough to build high-speed rail in selected corridors.
Despite what some politicians promise, it is unrealistic to expect civic improvement to continue no matter how little is invested in it.
The free market is focused on the next quarter and next year, and especially so in hard economic times. It's government's job to focus on the next decade and wisely invest in infrastructure that will be around to serve our grandchildren.
High speed rail and local commuter trains are the wet dream of Fascists and Euro-weenies! They dream of a world where the government controls your arrival and departure, your route and your destiny. These are the people who hate Big Oil but love Big Brother!The autobahn(which inspired American highways) was another of Hitlers pet projects.The Nazis loved to force folks onto trains too!
No it doesn’t. People don’t ride trains, people don’
t WANT to ride trains, funding trains is a stupid pathetic waste of money. Don’t waste money on transportation we know for a fact will not be used.
No it doesn’t. People don’t ride trains, people don’ t WANT to ride trains, funding trains is a stupid pathetic waste of money. Don’t waste money on transportation we know for a fact will not be used.I think the liberal idea is to make cars expensive enough that the great unwashed stop driving and leave respectable citizens on the highways.
Europe really is the model of the modern liberal.
So, how's that Urban Renewal/Model Cities/Slum Clearance fifty year loser program eating trillions going in Detroit, Gary,E. ST. Louis....( insert 200 Democrat cities names here...)
Fuel taxes are not the only taxes collected for roads. Every truck, trailer, tire is taxed. You might of noticed ‘tolls’ too, where trucks pay to use the road. Further the trucking industries is a industry that wouldn’t exist to be income taxed if the road didn’t exist.
So, in short a truck pays fuel, tire, truck and trailer excises tax, plus coporate income tax.
Frankly, I would like the Highway system sold to private investors, and let the market decide.
For most Americans the daily 10+ mile walk (each way) to the train station would be healthy.
This train stuff is just silly. Everyone (i.e., Willie Green) points to Europe as a model. But they all forget that Europe grew up around the train system. America grew up around the highway system. If train travel were viable in America there would be private companies building tracks everywhere.
Cite please.
I’m seriously interested in your numbers, because I was unaware that the fuel tax didn’t cover road maintenance.
It was my understanding government collected far more than it needed and used the fuel tax to subsidize other portions of government.
For most Americans the daily 10+ mile walk (each way) to the train station would be healthy.They're a bit more ambitious than that. If you read the liberal urban planning blogs they're intent on starving out the exurbs and remodeling the suburbs to get rid of cul-de-sacs(to force through traffic into neighborhoods). They want you to take the bus in town and if you need to go a long distance, the train. Anything but a car.This train stuff is just silly. Everyone (i.e., Willie Green) points to Europe as a model. But they all forget that Europe grew up around the train system. America grew up around the highway system. If train travel were viable in America there would be private companies building tracks everywhere.
question; WHY DOES IT COST MORE TO FLY VIA PHILADELPHIA THAN,SAY ALLENTOWN OR READING?
I’ll even give the answer!; the AIRLINES pay a user fee to the city of Phila. which is used to fund the airport.
Thanks.
Your position seems to be that public funding for transportation infrastructure is fine for certain forms of transportation but not for others. I see no logic in this.
From the US DOT bureau of Transportation Statistics. Note how roads actually GENERATE revenue for transportation? And how air and roads essentially receive ZERO per thousand passenger miles? And how transit and trains receive hundreds of dollars per thousand passenger miles?
How about rather than subsidizing rail, we charge rail riders a real price, one that covers the costs of operation (like we do for highways)? Make it pay for itself? How about that - that's fair, after all...
NO! It DOES NOT make sense! I don’t want to PAY FOR some damned railroad in Tampa when I live in South Carolina and would never use it! If the people in Tampa want their own “train set” to play with, then let THEIR taxes buy it. If they can’t afford it, tough ... ride a bike!
Bogus article, especially when the author states that “gas taxes are not user fees”. BS - total BS, and thus the conclusion of that “article” is completely wrong.
This silly argument deserves to be hammered again and again. Car/Truck travel pays for the roads through taxes and tolls. Most states, from time to time, have pulled money from these tax funds for other, non-road taxes.
Cars and trucks pay their own way, and then some.
If you look at this chart: http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/policy/ohim/hs03/htm/balchrt.htm
It shows outlays of 32 billion with income of 28 billion.
However, the highway trust fund still has a balance, as of 2003 of 12 billion dollars.
Just fuel taxes alone, in 2003, were 25 billion dollars. Evidently, though, the highway trust fund collects taxes from other sources, such as the sale of tires, lubricants, etc.
Anyway, looks like it could go either way. After all, we are dealing with government accounting.
Quite frankly, I’m surprised the number is only 32 billion in 2003. Seems a bit low.
As an aside, when I was a kid, a billion dollars was an almost magical, mythical number.
Now, a billion dollars doesn’t seem to be that big of a deal.
Sad.
That might be how they’re thinking, but once you get west of the Mississippi the place is just too wide open for it. They’ll need to make cars REALLY expensive, and then we’ll still probably drive them. Public transportation, for local or long distance, just can’t work out here, the population density is too low. They’ll never learn though.
Transportation infrastructure is actually in the Constitution (maintain postal roads) so it makes sense in the broad sense. In the specific sense we should only be funding transportation that actually gets used, the government is supposed to work for us after all. So spending a bunch of money on trains nobody will ride is dumb, while spending money on the highways that have replaced them makes sense.
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