BIKE: The "road lobby"

[Roger Baker]

On Mar 4, 2005, at 9:34 AM, Mike Dahmus wrote:

> Roger Baker wrote:
>
>> McCracken is the immediate hero here, but he likely wouldn't have 
>> done it without Sal Costello, SOSA, and all the independent 
>> grassroots organizing.
>>
>> On CAMPO, McCracken's resolution got defeated about 2 to 1, with 
>> Gerald Daugherty on the bad side, along with CAMPO Director Aulick. 
>> TxDOT's Bob Daigh deserves a special bad actor award for expressing 
>> his opinion just before the CAMPO vote, with no reasons given, that 
>> any independent study of the CAMPO plan would be likely to threaten 
>> TxDOT funding for our area. -- Roger
>
> Just like the transit people in Austin with Mike Krusee, you've been 
> completely snookered if you think these people are your friends.
> The goal of McCracken et al is NOT to stop building these roads; it is 
> to build these roads quickly as FREE HIGHWAYS.
> In other words, McCracken and Costello ___ARE___ THE ROAD LOBBY!
> Keep that in mind, folks. Slusher and Bill Bunch don't want the roads 
> at all, but pretty much everybody else who voted against the toll plan 
> wants to build them as free roads.
> And these highways built free is a far worse prospect for Austin and 
> especially central Austin than if they're built as toll roads, in 
> every possible respect.
> - MD

All that is easy for Mike to say but, as usual, lacks any factual basis 
or documentation. Furthermore, he does not appear to read what I have 
previously documented.

Mike doesn't seem to think we face an energy crisis, although that is 
probably the soundest reason to resist being pressured by TxDOT into a 
crash program of building new toll roads to serve future sprawl growth 
using borrowed money.

The truth is that even with nearly a $6 billion a year budget, TxDOT is 
short of money because the rising cost of maintenance is crowding out 
the budget for new state highways. Over 30 years it can cost as much to 
maintain a highway as to build a new one.

Yet the two main special interest groups, the road contractors and the 
sprawl interests primarily tied to real estate, want lots more highways 
built to serve land development in accord with past political 
tradition. In a state like Texas, you get what you pay for, which is 
why the road contractors have given Gov. Rick Perry more than a million 
dollars since he has been governor, as Time Magazine revealed back in 
Dec.

When TxDOT says that that "its either toll roads or no roads", they 
really mean that keeping up with congestion and sprawl patterns of 
development is rapidly outpacing their existing highway funding 
sources, but they refuse to give up these unsustainable patterns of 
growth, which are quite contrary to sound sustainable growth, and 
especially to the progressive development goals of Envision Central 
Texas. They want to toll existing roads precisely to generate the 
predictable revenue to build yet more toll roads with borrowed money, 
and that is what has triggered the political backlash.

What TxDOT is trying to do is to secure small reliable revenue streams 
based on fees, etc., like the Texas Mobility Fund, and to use that as 
leverage to borrow money from Wall Street to get a bunch of toll roads 
under contract as soon as possible. But why should we get such a huge 
number of toll roads to serve decades of future sprawl development 
under contract immediately? -- unless there were something very 
suspicious and political about the whole process? About 50% of Austin's 
highways would be toll roads according to CAMPO's planning.

Any sound independent appraisal of the CAMPO planning process is to be 
feared by TxDOT, much as the vampire fears the cross. That is why TxDOT 
and Mike Aulick voted against McCracken's call for an independent 
review of the toll road plan, despite the fact that federal law clearly 
gives the public the right to examine the planning process as much as 
they please during all stages of planning. To the credit of the Austin 
City Council they voted for just such an independent review yesterday. 
Why would anyone be against such a review unless they fear a second 
opinion, independent from TxDOT, on a plan that has now risen to a 
total cost of $22 billion? (up from $18 billion since just last summer 
when they put in the toll roads)

I'll conclude with Bill Bunch's letter to the Statesman today, which 
makes excellent points. -- Roger Baker, road scholar

                    **************************************

COMMENTS BY READERS
  Friday, March 04, 2005

  Poor plan for the future

  In questioning Austin City Council Member Brewster McCracken's 
proposal to study toll road alternatives, Austin's reigning toll road 
champion, state Rep. Mike Krusee of Williamson County, said, "We're not 
looking to the next city election. We're looking decades ahead to see 
how to solve our congestion problem." (March 2 article, "Austin might 
study toll road alternatives")

  Apparently, Krusee has not read the Capital Area Metropolitan Planning 
Organization's $22 billion, 25-year plan, which is toll road heavy. 
Page 53 states: "In 2000 10 percent of the road network was congested. 
While the improvements to the road network that are called for under 
this plan will manage some congestion, it is expected that 29 percent 
of the 2030 roadway network will be congested." 

  So, straight from the horse's mouth: $22 billion and congestion almost 
triples. Hello? Tolled, or untolled, the debt-financed highway 
construction binge now under way will make congestion much worse, 
bankrupt the region and ruin our air, water and scenic Hill Country.

BILL BUNCH

  Save Our Springs Alliance

  Austin














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