Posted on 06/14/2007 5:38:29 PM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
AUSTIN — Transportation officials on Thursday approved more than 80 toll road projects across the state, many of which probably would use some private financing.
State lawmakers recently passed a two-year moratorium on some private toll road contracts. The law still allows local and state planners to move on the new toll projects — with a price range of more than $50 billion — although the rules have changed.
Under these projects, local officials would get the first crack at development before the state steps in. And even if privately financed, the government would own and operate the roads and collect the tolls.
But with that comes the added risk to taxpayers that if the tolls don't produce the revenue they were expected, they get stuck with the loss.
"The message we got was toll roads are OK, but we don't want privately owned roads," said Ric Williamson, chairman of the Texas Transportation Commission, which approved the projects.
The projects touch most of the state's largest cities. Williamson said they need to be built as toll roads because traditional state funding won't cover the cost.
"They will be almost 100 percent private sector financing," Williamson predicted.
According to state officials, the agency's $16.6 billion budget the next two years is only a 2 percent increase that won't cover the double-digit inflation in recent years of road costs. Gas tax collections will not even cover road maintenance, let alone support building new roads.
"These are projects local officials have said are needed to reduce congestion but are waiting in line for funding," Williamson said.
Toll roads and the state's aggressive policies regarding the controversial Trans Texas Corridor were among the major issues of the recently completed legislative session.
Legislators from rural areas were concerned about private property rights. Those from urban districts complained of toll roads financed and owned by foreign companies.
"We were moving faster than most government agencies move and it spooked some people," Williamson said.
Lawmakers originally considered a two-year ban on private toll road contracts. Gov. Rick Perry said it would kill jobs, shut down road construction and prevent access to federal highway money.
The compromise bill signed into law by Perry last week freezes some of the kinds of private funding contracts the state had been using, but also carved out about a dozen exemptions for those projects that were far into the planning stages.
It also created new rules for projects like those approved Thursday, giving local governments more authority to build toll roads.
The compromise bill also imposes limits on comprehensive development agreements, used in contracts for private-public road building. It also set up a process to determine a road's market value.
Comprehensive development agreements, or CDAs, are a relatively new tool meant to let the Texas Department of Transportation complete road-building projects more quickly and cheaply by using a single contract for design and construction.
Those agreements have attracted the attention of multinational consortiums willing to pay large sums up front for the right to operate roads and pocket the tolls for decades to come.
That startled some residents and lawmakers who said drivers will become hostages to the private companies, forced to pay increasingly hefty tolls.
___
The transportation bill is SB792.
___
Texas Transportation Department: http://www.txdot.state.tx.us
Trans-Texas Corridor PING!
This is a scam and violates the Constitution.
This is a scam and violates the Constitution.
We have the best politicians money can buy;it ought at least be Americans owning them!
You posted that twice! You could have posted it twice again.
The government building roads is socialist. There’s no such thing as a “free lunch”. If a private corporation were to own roads on Manhattan, they can charge a congestion fee during the rush hour in order to decrease traffic. (Taxis and buses will be excluded)
Also, we can always double or triple the estimates of costs that the politicians come out with at first.
Post roads are Constitutional.
Kind of like the professional sports stadiums in Houston that the "tourists" are supposed to be paying for. Why is it that expenses are always under estimated and revenues are always over estimated?
for 4 years i’ve wondered:
why didn’t the dog bark? as in sherlock holmes.
why didn’t the democrats bark about the extra price of tolls owned by foreign companies?
Thanks for the ping!
80 toll roads?
These guys are insane.
BTTT
That is not true! —and free travel is encoded as a right in our Bill of Rights: “Congress shall make no law...or the right of the people peaceably to assemble,...â€. To assemble implicitly requires travel and the roads are the means of travel. Therefore pursuant to our right to peaceably assemble, the government is obligated to build roads that may be used for the people to assemble for whatever purpose they deem necessary. Furthermore our body of common laws was descended from England where they have had a right to travel over the land in common law for centuries. Clearly, private toll roads derived from the conversion of free public ways is clearly UNCONSTUTIONAL!
Get them suckers built now.
I thought we paid for road building and maintenance with gas taxes - the more one uses the roads, the more one pays.
So, if there is an accident on a private toll road causing congestion, will the taxpayer supported highway patrol manage the traffic flow and removal. or will private companies hire there own patrol? If the state provides the service, will private companies reimburse the state for the cost (certainly efficient management would impact profits)?
How would tolls be collected - electronically or by hand? Hand collection impedes the flow of traffic, electronic collection makes a record of your movements.
If collection is electronic, would each company bill separately?
“will the taxpayer supported highway patrol manage the traffic flow and removal. or will private companies hire there own patrol?”
Actually for the 183-A toll road, Ceder Park got 2 new officers exclusively to patrol the toll road. Not sure who’s paying their salaries.
6 new toll projects in the Austin area will basically cause anyone visiting the city, to pay a toll. Only exclusion......I35. Think it’s congested now?
FYI: Toll authority officials stated, traffic and revenue on the new 183-A toll road, is far less than previously expected. HAH!
bump!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.