Posted on 07/24/2010 4:20:59 PM PDT by Willie Green
Private investors to build large-scale for-profit toll
Faced with growing highway congestion and a lack of tax money for road projects, Texas is turning to a group of investors to build private toll roads as a way to ease the gridlock.
Construction is set to start soon on two such projects -- the North Tarrant Express along Loop 820 and Highways 183 and 121 in Tarrant County and the LBJ Express along Highway 635 in North Dallas.
Critics say the move amounts to a privatization of an essential government function -- building and maintaining highways -- and that drivers will end up paying far more in the long run.
Backers of the idea say the state has few other options in a time of whopping budget deficits.
"We provide the funding to actually build this project,” said Robert Hinkle, spokesman for NTE Mobility Partners, which represents a number of companies involved in the project. “We bring it to fruition in less than five years, we open the road, we manage it and operate it for the 52-year contract.”
The state does provide roughly a quarter of the upfront money, he said.
The investors, led by a Spanish company called Cintra, collect the tolls over those 52 years and keep the profits.
(Excerpt) Read more at nbcdfw.com ...
The Dallas-FW area has had toll roads for years, as has Houston. If you don’t want to pay, go the FREEway.
Willie’s just lettin’ off steam. He’s never seen private investment in infrastructure that he didn’t hate.
“Willie’s just lettin’ off steam. He’s never seen private investment in infrastructure that he didn’t hate.”
Well some of us have a BIG PROBLEM when a private company is given a MONOPOLY and protected by competition by the FORCE OF LAW. It’s no different than electric and phone utilities (until recently), except people back then had ENOUGH BRAINS to regulate what they charge.
As an aside TYPING IN CAPITAL LETTERS DOESN'T MAKE A POST SEEM ANY SMARTER.
Mr. Deport...
I haven’t seen a post from you since Goodhair backed down on the TTC, but I wasn’t looking real hard either...
Normally if DOT is doing its job correctly, mowing is suspended during the wildflower season until the plants have gone to seed; we have just entered into that part of the year and the mowers have been by our frontage along a state highway.
This is one of the reasons Texas is not broke. It should do your heart good to know that Cintra is still going to make a buck or two...
Naw Texas isn’t broke just some estimated $18 billion in the red for the upcoming budget session. It will be interesting to see what the good Gov. comes up with to make up the differences. Maybe Obama will give him some more stimulus money to balance the budget with like last time around. If not we will be in for some cut backs and raises in fees/services/taxes I’d guess.
Wildflowers, maybe, But the areas I’m most familiar with don’t have the bluebonnets, indian paintbrush, blackeyed susans and others they plant. What I’m seeing is weeds, etc.
With toll roads, you've got:
1. less congestion, for you've got to pay for the usage
2. no drain on the public coffers (ie: road maintenance is handled by the company running the road)
3. better road quality (less traffic coupled with the understanding that if it does get bad, then the company will lose out on customers who begin to avoid it)
4. more rapid expansion to meet increasing road usage (for this would be for profit... and what company, faced with an increasing demand would not try to ramp up supply to meet it?)
Heck, if more roads were privatized, we might actually see a reduction in the ever increasing amount of traffic congestion we are currently facing in America.
Heck, if more roads were privatized, we might actually see a reduction in the ever increasing amount of traffic congestion we are currently facing in America.
Where does that traffic congestion go? It doesn't magically disappear. The traffic moves to ancillary roads and through neighborhoods instead of remaining on the main thoroughfares. In the San Antonio Area, the plans were to turn major highways on the north, northeast, and northwest side into toll roads. These roads were built using taxpayer dollars. What it would amount to is the transfer of public infrastructure to a private company for profit.
The TTC debacle of a few years ago amounted to a land grab, where property was to be snatched from the owners for a pittance and sold to Cintra-Zachary (Cintra being a foreign owned company) for a pipe dream.
How is this a bad idea?
Toll roads are a great idea, IF they are operated by a government agency.
If the toll roads are operated by a government agency, you get not only all the benefits that you mention, but any extra toll revenue collected can help FILL the public coffers and help reduce other types of taxation.
It is privatization of toll roads that is bad because the extra toll revenues (essentially a monopoly tax on drivers who use the road) get sucked out of the state to be used in some foreign country.
Willie...take a look when you get a chance and you will notice there are things available called frontage roads that are FREE. Use them and save yourself from fretting about issues that are obviously too complex for you to understand about public and private sector improvements of infrastructure. Deport you need to take a look as well...oh I forgot...wouldn’t make any difference to you because you don’t like much of anything, anywhere, anytime!
Willie...take a look when you get a chance and you will notice there are things available called frontage roads that are FREE.
There is no such thing as a "free" road.
ALL roads must be paid for (both construction AND maintenance) through either tolls and/or taxes.
This should be a state/local government function, because all funds collected then remain within the state for local use.
Tolls and/or gas taxes should NOT be federalized or privatized because then the money disappears out of the local/state economy and gets funneled somewhere else.
Eliminate the federal gas tax.
Eliminate highway privatization.
Texas can collect its own tolls and build its own highways and railways without foreigners doing it for us.
LOL! Well-played.
Maybe Perry can induce Obama to give him a few more stimulus dollars to at least mow them once this year.
Or perhaps Gov Goodhair can trim his own state barber budget and use those funds to whack the weeds.
“The extent to which a toll road built and maintained without the exaction of taxes (and now privately operated) holds a “monopoly” over the general tax supported highway system is a testament to the advantage of private investment in infrastructure.”
Your post makes ZERO SENSE. And by the way, what the heck does EXACTION OF TAXES mean?
One of the reasons we chose our home was that it was on a paved FM road. There was a second house that we were eying, but the road settled the decision. (hubby had a harley back then)
A few months after we moved in road crews came in and tore the road out. We were fine with that. The original road had a lot of pot holes.
What did they replace it with?
GRAVEL.
The wear and tear on our vehicles is obvious. This has to have an effect on our property values.
Not impressed.
Replacing hard surfaces with gravel seems to be a process being adopted around the country. I read an article this procedure just recently. It may have been a thread on FR I just don’t remember. But the process sucks there’s no doubt about it for many reasons.
That ain’t right. In my understanding, a toll road doesn’t exist until a company bids for the right to build one.
Then they pony up the cash and build it, which then they get to recoup the costs and then turn a profit over a number of years.
Since the road in question didn’t exist previously, you’d see and increase in the amount of available roadspace, thus reducing congestion for everyone (as some would choose to pay the toll and drive on the new road).
Which would lead to less cars on the freeway... and less cars on the toll road in comparison to the freeway.
Read up on the history and shenanigans behind the "Trans-Texas Corridor". It amounted to a huge Texas-style land grab through emminent domain and a transfer of public infrastructure to a private for-profit company. These toll road schemes are nothing more than a down-sized version.
Two questions you may really want to ask before supporting one of these schemes is:
1. If we are required to pay tolls, which are essentially a usage tax, why should we pay a gas tax for roads?
2. If Texas is broke and cannot afford to build, repair, or replace it's current roads, why are 25% of Texas state fuel taxes diverted to education?
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