Cascadia Prospectus

In a significant return to a controversial topic - the positive mention of which once earned him a sharp public rebuke from President Barack Obama's press secretary - U.S. Transportation Sec. Ray LaHood today in Chicago reiterated the possibility of vehicle mileage fees to help pay for mounting U.S. surface transportation needs. His remarks indicate a softening of Obama's official position against the idea. Underscoring evolving bipartisan support, Republican U.S. Rep. John Mica, the ranking minority member of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, explains to a Florida paper today why the mileage tax makes sense, long-term. No such policy will be enacted anytime very soon, but could begin to move more seriously toward eventual mainstream adoption as part of a broader surface transportation bill reauthorization with which Congress will grapple after the 2010 mid-term elections. LaHood today also reiterated earlier conceptual support he expressed on the administration's behalf for several other next-generation funding tools, including expanded electronic, time-variable tolling and public-private partnerships, as Dow Jones Newswires was first to report.

The U.S. administration is still considering a higher gas tax or mileage fees to upgrade the road network, though there would be no move until the economy improves, transportation secretary Ray LaHood said Thursday.....LaHood, speaking at a transport conference in Chicago, said state and federal officials had to look at 'other creative ways' beyond the (troubled Highway Trust) fund to maintain and expand roads. President Barack Obama has ruled out any increase in the gas tax that funds the HTF until the economy improves, noted LaHood. Other possibilities include tolled 'HOT lanes' running alongside existing roads, as well as more public-private partnerships and even imposing tolls on existing roads. "That's going to be a wildly debated topic," LaHood said of any scheme to toll existing roads. He said it would be 'hard' to persuade taxpayers to pay again to use something funded from general taxation.

The trick there is to offer them a tangible improvement in the form of guaranteed faster travel times and ramped-up express bus service, in express toll lanes that whenever possible are carved out from the existing highway's footprint, with free passage for vehicles carrying three or more passengers, plus toll rates determined by real-time congestion levels, and parallel lanes free to all drivers. In any case, after Congress works through health care and climate change, and the transportation "revenue enhancement" window opens wide after the 2010 mid-terms, look for a rollicking debate on transportation. Funding tools, land use and greenhouse gas emissions, and systems-focused performance measures to guide spending decisions are all likely to be part of the commotion. Whatever's decided in D.C. will set the stage for heavy lifting by states and regions.

Among the pressing legislative priorities facing Congress this autumn -- besides the headline-grabbing health care and climate change bills -- is an extension of the federal surface transportation program. The program authority expires on September 30 and its renewal is essential to keep federal transportation money flowing. The House and Senate have been on divergent paths in their approach toward renewing the program. The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, under the leadership of Chairman James Oberstar (D-MN), has been intent on passing a six-year $500 billion surface transportation measure ($450 billion for highways and transit, $50 billion for high-speed rail) during this session of Congress. In late July, a bill to this effect was reported out by the House Highways and Transit subcommittee. Chairman Oberstar announced at the time that he would hold a full committee mark-up soon after the House returns from its summer recess.

The Senate, on the other hand, has been working toward an 18-month extension of the existing surface transportation program. Its rationale for doing so was succinctly stated by Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA), chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, and Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK), ranking minority member. There simply is no way, the two senate transportation leaders concluded, that Congress could pass a multi-year authorization of the surface transportation program before the program's expiration at the end of September. "There are just too many big questions left unanswered, not the least of which is a lack of a consensus on how to pay for it," Boxer and Inhofe stated. A better approach, they said, would be to pass an 18-month extension as recommended by the Obama Administration.

Left unsaid were probably two other motives for wanting to postpone enactment of a long-term legislation.

Blogging from Kabul, Seattle Times reporter Hal Bernton is struck by how the post-Taliban proliferation of private vehicles has boosted smog and air pollution, threatening public health. Now picture the possibilities in places such as China and India, where rapidly multiplying populations are enjoying new opportunities and car ownership is seen as an important step on the economic ladder. The small, affordable, fuel-sipping Tata Nano is a success story in India, yet The New Delhi-based Center for Science and the Environment recently warned of carbon emission risks posed by a growing percentage of bigger vehicles in the nation's fleet, combined with a failure to set fuel economy standards. (Open Microsoft Word doc. after clicking here). The Times of India confirms the sport utility vehicle market there is heating up. In addition to the tiny Nano, Tata Motors, India's largest auto manufacturer, makes many types of mid-sized and larger rides, including SUVs such as the Safari Dicor, the Sumo Victa, the Sumo Grande and the Xenon XT pick-up (pictured, right). Plus commercial trucks, now enjoying a sales boom in India. The "50 By 50 Global Fuel Economy Initiative" report highlights a projected tripling of the world's light vehicle fleet by 2050, with 80 percent of that growth occurring in rapidly developing countries.

The report concludes that improving the average fuel economy of the global car fleet 50 percent by that year will "mainly involve incremental change to conventional internal combustion engines and drive systems, along with weight reduction and better aerodynamics." Important aims to be sure, but "50 By 50" unfortunately consigns the eventual wide adoption of green vehicles such as plug-in hybrids and all-electrics to "icing on the cake" status, and largely sidesteps environmentally beneficial congestion reduction measures. In contrast, The Economist's approach to controlling greenhouse gas emissions from a growing global fleet of light vehicles starts with a strong call for a carbon tax calibrated to vehicle type, and includes other economic incentives and electrification.

"Getting people out of their cars?" Ain't really gonna happen here in the four counties of metro Puget Sound. Not to any appreciable degree. Consider the eye-opening figures released in late May for the Puget Sound Regional Council's "Transportation 2040" Draft Environmental Impact Statement. A five percent mode share for transit in 2040, versus more than 80 percent for the evil auto, even in the rosiest scenario modeled.

There has been little or no discussion of this data in the region's media or blogosphere, puzzling because our many Greens profess to care so deeply about increasing transit usage to fight greenhouse gas emissions in the transportation sector. What emerges instead from the data is that the policy response should lead with incentives for cleaner cars and road pricing, the two of which can be coupled. Let's drill down, starting with a summary of the key data.

Yesterday in Crosscut, the Northwest online daily journal of politics and public policy, I published a piece titled "Time to Go 'All In' On Tolls." It starts this way:

The four-lane Evergreen Point Floating Bridge across Lake Washington on State Route 520 is a relic of a bygone era, congested and disaster prone. How urgent is the need for a planned six-lane replacement? The Washington State Department of Transportation has gone so far as to graphically model on YouTube how the bridge might buckle under duress, threatening lives and paralyzing the region's highway network.

And is the region stepping up to the challenge? Less than half the funding is secured. The Seattle-side configuration is still being debated. More broadly, the project begs a more comprehensive regional tolling strategy because our bridges and highways are all connected. We can't keep doing transportation mega-projects on a disjointed, one-off basis.

A key to any solution is tolling, and soon. Here and nationwide, 40 years of sizzling growth in vehicle miles traveled has left too many sections of highways, arterial roads, and bridges overburdened, in disrepair, and obsolete in the face of seismic and other hazards. Those ballyhooed federal stimulus funds were a mere drop in the bucket, amounting to less than one-quarter of what a landmark Congressional commission report says is needed annually. The per-gallon gas tax is badly failing at the federal and state levels. The federal gas tax trust fund is bankrupt, and living on bailouts. Even tripling state gas tax contributions to pending mega-projects in Washington state would do little to close wide funding gaps, state data show. A big new federal transportation bill — which may well include the first hike in the U.S. gas tax since 1993 — will help some, but not that much.

Read the whole thing.

Corridor-length Approach Is Favored; I-405/SR 167 Seen As Model

Reporter Newspapers covers East and South King County, and has produced a lengthy special section - also available online - delving into the region's surface transportation challenges. In an in interview for "Navigate King County's Future," Washington Department of Transportation Secretary Paula Hammond talks about funding, with an emphasis on beginning to to add variable-rate express toll lanes for the full length of major highway corridors such as I-405/SR 167. She also alludes to the next-generation approach of charging vehicles for all miles driven, with on-board units.

In the future, you could be paying for your right to use roads the same way you pay your utilities — a bill based on exactly how much you use. According to Paula Hammond, secretary of transportation, and the state’s highest transportation official, the technology to do that isn’t that far down the road. “It’s 10 to 15 years out,” she said, noting that kind of direct-user fee could be part of the equation for future transportation funding. 

But in the meantime, there is a complex – not to mention expensive – series of transportation needs that the Puget Sound area has to resolve, or at least come to terms with. Traffic congestion; freight issues; super-efficient hybrid vehicles slowing the state’s gas tax to more of a trickle: all of these elements are adding up to a Gordian’s Knot of worries on which the state is working to get a handle.

...Hammond called attention to one of DOT’s latest projects: high-occupancy tolling lanes, or HOT Lanes. It’s a concept allowing non-carpooling drivers to use the HOV lanes, by charging them for the privilege. For more than a year DOT has been operating a test segment of State Route 167 in South King County.

And it’s working...Given the promise of HOT lanes have shown, DOT is working to expand HOT lanes on more of Puget Sound’s clogged roadways – starting with I-405, where road-expansion work is ongoing, and HOV lanes are already present....“But we’re looking at the entire (405) corridor. And as it comes through the 167 interchange and carries down there as well.”...The concept of paying as you go, to fund specific projects like the HOT lanes, is gaining serious momentum as a payment solution for transportation issues...Hammond said drivers investing directly in the roads they use is a critical part of the equation...

WashDOT Slideshow: "Moving Seattle Forward," (based on state plan, "Moving Washington Forward').

At a meeting in Seattle last week, lawmakers heard that the funding gap for replacing the storm- and seismically-vulnerable, crowded four-lane SR 520 bridge across Lake Washington can be shaved from $2.6 billion to $2.38 billion through a sales tax deferral of $220 million. They also had a look at the current menu of gap-closers. It includes more borrowing against electronic tolling revenues, plus higher toll rates on the 520 bridge, and especially, tolling of the parallel I-90 bridge. As ever, tolling's a flash point, but it needn't be ugly. It can equitable, and farsighted. Metro Puget Sound needs a comprehensive regional highway corridor electronic tolling plan, typically with express "HOT" lanes aside free lanes, and higher rates at peak hours.